Mia London Game Review

 

Mia London and the Case of the 625 Scoundrels

Players: 2-4

Play Time: 10 min

Ages: 5+ 

Overview Video:

Review:

Mia London is a great, quick kids game. It's one of those that my teen and I don't mind playing with my son. I love that there are no pencils needed, everything is contained in the little detective notebooks, making the game super easy for kids to play. They also make resetting for the next game a breeze!

Like I said in the video, I started out saying what accessory card I was putting down each time, to make it easier to remember. Then you can graduate to just playing the cards, making the kids keep track totally on their own. The downside to this game, is that once kids master it, most games end in a tie. My son doesn't seem to mind that too much, and it would not necessarily be the case if kids were just playing with each other.

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Tot School: Apples

This fall is flying by! We recently wrapped up some apple themed activities for my daughter's tot school activities. Here's what we did!

Sight Word Apples

My First Orchard Game, big brother played too.

Apple maze from Busy Bee Kids Printables

Apple Tree Roll and Cover

Parts of an apple from 1+1+1=1

Magnetic apple maze

Apple play dough

Apple printing

Some Apple Themed Books. Ten Red Apples was the favorite, by far!

Not Theme Related:

Playing Patchwork Garden (no apples, but still harvesting)

Puzzles

 

Bringing History To Life When Home Schooling

 Homeschooling gives you a great opportunity to tailor your children's education to their interests and learning styles. However, some subjects can sometimes seem a little bit daunting. Take history, for example. However, history does not need to be boring, especially when you approach it right. You can make it exciting and engaging, and the children will love it. Include fun activities, creative learning methods and multimedia resources. You can turn history lessons into an adventure through time that your children want to do again and again.

Photo by Ksenia Chernaya: https://www.pexels.com/photo/children-in-costumes-standing-beside-a-castle-wall-painting-6800536/

Let's have a look at some of the tips that you need for making history fun when you are homeschooling: 

Turn It Into A Storytelling Experience 

When you really think about it, history is a collection of stories about real lives and real people. When you present history as loads of different stories rather than just a list of facts, it becomes much more interesting for children. Try to focus on human aspects, such as what people were feeling like during historical moments, why they made certain decisions, and what challenges they faced. 

Include Hands-Learning Activities 

Hands on activities are brilliant ways to bring history to life. When children can build touch or create something related to a historical event, it helps them understand the lesson and makes it more memorable. For example, if you are talking about castles, you might want to think about building a castle out of paper mache. Or, if you are learning about ancient Civilizations, why not make a model of a pyramid or start drawing some of your cave paintings? When you give the children the opportunity to use their hands and be creative, they get involved in the subject and are made much more enjoyable and engaging. 

Use Documentaries And Movies 

Visual learning is extremely effective, especially when it comes to children and history. Watching documentaries in movies can help bring historical events to life, which makes them much more real and tangible for students, especially when they are young. Seriously, it is important to choose films that are accurate and appropriate for your children's age; however, there are many wonderful resources out there. For example, if you're teaching older children about World War 2, you could introduce them to the film Oppenheimer and watch Oppenheimer online and use it as part of your home school curriculum. 

Build A Historical Timeline

When you piece together, a visual timeline can help your child to understand historical events and how they fit together. Timelines are a great way to enable students to see how one event may have led to another and how different periods of history may overlap or influence each other. You can make this activity extremely fun by turning each time into an art project. Have your children use a variety of different materials to design a timeline on a large piece of paper or poster board and then stick it around your room. As you learn more history, you can add them to the timeline together and put it in the right order. This is an extremely hands-on activity that will help your child grasp the flow of history while allowing them to take ownership of their learning. Something that they can refer back to Time After Time as their history studies grow. 

Travel back In Time With Field Trips 

If you can, take a field trip to a historical site. This is one of the most engaging ways your children can learn about history. Whether it is a museum, historical landmark, castle, or battlefield, this gives your children the chance to make a connection with a part of the past. 

Even if you're not able to travel far, you may be surprised by how much there is history wise in your local area. Research your local area, and if you go on holiday, research those destinations too. You can then include visits to historical sites in your homeschooling and give your children an unforgettable learning experience. 

Conclusion 

When you use some of the tips above, you can make history fun for homeschooling. It’s all about ebbing creative and adding variety. Using storytelling, hands-on projects, watching documentaries and movies, a heading to historical sites, you can turn history into an enjoyable subject and possible their favorite subject. You will find that including these methods in your homeschooling will help your children retain their facts and develop a love for history. Do you know any other techniques that would be good to share? Let us know in the comments below. 

*This is a contributed Post

Homeschool History: Stone Age Unit

This year for history, we're just doing a bunch of units of early history. We recently wrapped up a couple of weeks on the stone age (mostly because I found a couple of books I knew my kiddo would like). Here's what we did.

Books and Worksheets:

He read these books about the stone age and then we worked on the graphic organizers. Since he is only 6, I did the writing for him.

Dinosaur Lady: The Daring Discoveries of Mary Anning, the First Paleontologist

Stone Age Boy

24 Hours in the Stone Age (he LOVES this series)

Look Inside the Stone Age (another series he loves)

Life in the Stone age

Stone Age Graphic Oragnizers

Videos:

Jewel Box Board Game Review

 

Jewel Box

Players: 2-4

Play Time: 15-20 min

Ages: 8+  (could probably go a little younger.

Overview:

 In Jewel Box, you roll a die to select different types/colors of beetles for your collection from a central log. The beetles are placed in a 4x4 grid, with each colored type scoring in a different way.

Review:

The components of this game are wonderful! The first time I played, we spent a long time oo-ing and ah-ing over the cool looking beetles (a sentence I never thought I would write). The tiles are thick and sturdy, as is the central playing board. I also think it is my favorite die of any of my games. The only thing missing was a player sheet. The game isn’t overly complicated, but a score sheet that breaks the score down by color would have been helpful. We just did it ourselves on paper.

Gameplay is simple and can be explained in just a few minutes. The game itself moves quickly, as well, making it easy to play multiple games in a row or include it with others on game night. Nothing about the mechanics is groundbreaking, but I feel like it is a well designed, enjoyable game that I could play with a wide variety of people. The whole thing is beautifully made and its simplicity will allow it to be played easily and often. It's a nice one to have in the collection.

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Mountain Goats Game Review

Mountain Goats

Players: 2-4

Play Time: 15-20 min

Ages: 7+ 

Overview:

Mountain Goats is a dice rolling race to the top of the mountain, however, be prepared to get kicked off by your opponents. The mountain consists of various peaks of different heights numbered 5-10. On your turn, you roll 4 dice that you can use in any combination to have your goats climb up the mountain. Each number you roll/create lets a goat go one space up that numbered mountain, gaining a point token at the top. If you're already at the top, you can keep gaining additional point tokens for each subsequent roll of that number. However, if someone else gets to the top, your goat is knocked all the way back to the beginning. You can also score bonus points for getting a goat to the top of each mountain.

Review:

This game is simple to teach and get to the table quickly. It also plays pretty quickly. I LOVE the small box and the little goat meeples are wonderful. The card based board did make me wish I had a game mat, though, especially when setting up on a relatively small table with a 6 year old. They look bright and colorful on the table, though.

Mountain Goats is light enough, I don't think this is a game I would ever chose to play with just my husband (we would pick something a little bit thinkier). However, this is a great family game or to play with non-gamers. I could see us getting it out with my in-laws or if cousins come over. However, I actually purchased it with playing with my 6 year old in mind.

After testing out Mountain Goats on Board Game Arena a few times, I decided I needed it for my son. I LOVE how much math it requires him to do without feeling like a "math" game. He has to compare his dice, figure out which numbers he can make with his dice, either individually or by combining different numbers of them, and then which moves will be most advantageous. That's a lot of computation per turn! However, it is just such an integral part of the game, he doesn't realize he's having to do it, he's just having fun playing. That means, I will never turn him down for a game!

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Jump 5 Math Game Review

 

Jump 5 (& Jump 3) 

Players: 2-3

Play Time: 20 min

Ages: 5+

Video Overview:

Review:

I will start off by saying these are definitely "gameschool" games rather than regular card games. They feel math-y and would not be played for a regular family game night. That being said, if my son gets to pick a math game, he will almost always pick one of these.

The gameplay is super simple, letting kids focus on the numbers. I think they're great for kiddos practicing multiple and in the pre-multiplication stage. My son is only in 2nd grade math and we haven't even thought about multiplication yet, so I think these will be good for the next couple of years of homeschool.

Because of where he is in ability, we decided to skip Jump 1 and Jump 2. I purchased Jump 3, which I feel was a great place for him to start. We won Jump 5 in a giveaway, which was great. However, since multiples of 5 are so easy, we probably would have preferred Jump 4 or Jump 6, which are both on our wishlist (and hopefully 7, 8 and 9 as those become available).

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