hidden treasure curriculum

[helena]

Are you using something great in your classroom, that no one else seems to have heard of? Or amazing books that you never see on reading lists? This fall we started a lot of new stuff, and I've found some gems. They are: The Bat Poet (book), The Private Eye (science using jewelers loupes), and making felt pictures using a Waldorf how to book and supplies. I would love to know about what has been a surprise hit at your house.

[Lisa in the UP of MI]

This is not exactly a curriculum but we love Montessori Read and Write for pre-reading skills. Our favorite activity from the book is the sound game, which teaches how to segment words into their separate sounds. It has lots of other fun activities and games to do for pre-reading and pre-writing (and up through reading and writing, but we aren't using the methods in the book for this).

[Amber in AUS]

Enid Blyton books, specifically The Enchanted Wood and The Magic Faraway Tree. I never see these on reading lists and my kids just LOVE them!

[sagira]

Not mentioned much, but I really like Peak with Books (http://www.amazon.com/Peak-Books-Childhood-Resource-Balanced/dp/0766859487). It's a literature inquiry curriculum for young children. Great program to start on our journey. Has taught me a lot.

[djkapp]

Several years ago at a book fair, my husband stumbled across Challenge Math by Edward Zaccorro. It is a great supplement book! Each topic contains a review of the essential information and three levels of word problems. By the time you get to the Einstein level, these are challenging!

I've used the book at different times with each of my five children--some of them have used it more than once, each time working on a different level of the problem sets. I highly recommend it!

Yvonne

[Alphabetika]

My dd loves the Complete-a-Sketch program from Insight Technical Education (available at Rainbow, Timberdoodle, too). It's excellent for kids who like precision, need help with fine-motor coordination, like a more technical art style, need a pre-drafting program, or all of the above. We love it, yet whenever I mention it, people either haven't heard of it or they've vaguely heard of it but have never considered it, etc. We highly recommend it!

[SnowWhite]

God Made Music. We love it! It's available from praisehymninc.com and it's about $60 per level, then only $7-8 when you re-use the same level for another child. One 30-min lesson per week, 30-34 weeks.

[whitestavern]

I used two off the wall curriculums to teach my kids to read. With DD, now 8, I used Simply Phonics. With DS, 6, I'm using Progressive Phonics. I haven't heard talk of either of these on the boards. I just purchased Word Attack spelling for my DS...I believe someone on the boards self published this. We are enjoy it so far and it's working well for my son.

[Aurelia]

We use ABeCeDarian reading which I don't hear mentioned much. It has been wonderful for us - we aren't bogged down working on the same letter sounds for pages and pages, has less writing than ETC, and it has been the only thing that actually taught Ariel how to segment.

[helena]

I'm trying to find the books by Enid Blyton, thanks Amber in Aus! They're going to make nice gifts.
Does anyone else have something yummy?

[Carol in Cal.]

Waldorf-y craft books for better crafts--especially the Gnome book.

and

My Book House -- OOP, but great especially for about 2nd through 6th grades. A series of old timey books, summaries of classic plays and literature, stories from the lives of composers and authors, a little poetry, just packed with material. Surprisingly international for its time.

For instance, it has a child's version of "Don Quixote," and one of Dante's "Inferno," and a long, excellent summary of "America, the Melting Pot"
that really made an impression on me when I was a kid. I find myself going back and back to this series--it has been a great resource.

A funny story--we got these books at a thrift store when I was a kid. My mom would not give them to me to use for my DD, and I knew that I could not afford to buy them at a rare book store--they are quite expensive now. But one day my DH was taking a truck load of wood from tearing apart an old deck to the dump, and he found this carton of discarded books there, and it was the whole series plus a book of Japanese poetry from a parallel series by the same publisher/editor! So we got them free!

[helena]

Carol in Cal. That's crazy!!! I just called my mom to see if she still has our old set, she has them at her school (she has a Montessori school), and that I can come get them!! She said none of the teacher even picked them up! Usually books have a short life at a school. What luck! I'm so glad that you found these books again, I remember the pictures mostly, and that one of the books had a story about a kingdom made of desserts. These are the books you remember, and want to make an impression on your kids.

[swellmomma]

My dd loves the Complete-a-Sketch program from Insight Technical Education (available at Rainbow, Timberdoodle, too). It's excellent for kids who like precision, need help with fine-motor coordination, like a more technical art style, need a pre-drafting program, or all of the above. We love it, yet whenever I mention it, people either haven't heard of it or they've vaguely heard of it but have never considered it, etc. We highly recommend it!

I am so glad to hear it is a gem because I ordered it last week from rainbow resource for part of ds's xmas gift

[Amber in AUS]

No problem helena. Check out the Book Depository in the UK they ship free and i am sure i have seen them or a compilation there.

[Nicole M]

Carol in Cal. That's crazy!!! I just called my mom to see if she still has our old set, she has them at her school (she has a Montessori school), and that I can come get them!! She said none of the teacher even picked them up! Usually books have a short life at a school. What luck! I'm so glad that you found these books again, I remember the pictures mostly, and that one of the books had a story about a kingdom made of desserts. These are the books you remember, and want to make an impression on your kids.

I have my dad's set, from the 1930's, when he was a boy. I loved A Midsummer Night's Dream, especially the illustrations. My dad read it to me again and again. Just thinking about it, I can hear the rumble of his voice, the way it sounded when my head was on his chest.

I haven't used them much, though. I'll have to get them out and have a peek.

[Carol in Cal.]

I have my dad's set, from the 1930's, when he was a boy. I loved A Midsummer Night's Dream, especially the illustrations. My dad read it to me again and again. Just thinking about it, I can hear the rumble of his voice, the way it sounded when my head was on his chest.

I haven't used them much, though. I'll have to get them out and have a peek.

You might be amazed, as I was, at how many classics are represented there. Greek, Roman, and Norse myths, Native American folktales, stories from literature and operas, lots of biographical stories--it's really quite a treasure trove. And it is very well indexed--IIRC there is one index by country, another just regarding topics, another that is quite general--so it's easy to glance at the last book and be directed to everything relevant in the whole series.

Enjoy!

[Zoraida]

For those of you who enjoy the Enid Blyton books - one of my favorite website is http://www.enidblytonsociety.co.uk/cave-of-books.php I especially enjoy visiting the Cave of Books section in the sidebar.

Blessings

Zoraida