As a math teacher, he saw how much his students enjoyed his lessons and so he decided to record those and put them online for students around the globe to access. He decided to homeschool and knew that he couldn’t do both CTC math and teaching. So he decided to quit teaching and become a full time homeschool dad and owner of CTC Math! I sat down with his chief operations manager Nadim who was a student of Pat’s and has been with the company for seven years! 

Learn the behind the scenes store of this amazing math curriculum and how you can change the way you teach your children math! Plus, you’ll get a look inside the online program and how it also can be used to create your own worksheets so your children are practicing what math skills they need and not what they don’t.

Watch the video for the full interview or check out the transcript below!

It’s Janine Latulippe and we’re here with Nadim from CTC math! We’re talking all about the amazing features and how it could change your homeschool!

Janine: Nadim, please give us a little back story on how you got involved with CTC math and also to talk a little bit about Pat the creator of CTC.

Math Curriculum Was Created By Homeschool Dad of 10

Thank you for having me! I actually new Pat because he was my teacher. I had him in highschool. And in the early stages of CTC Math in Australia, it was mostly through tutoring centers and CDs. I have a passion for math, and went to school for it so when I went to college I stayed in touch with Pat and I was helping him part time with content creation. An opportunity came up and it worked out and I’ve been with CTC for 7 years.

Janine: That’s amazing! He was your teacher and you liked his teaching so you knew that you wanted to be apart of it. Tell us a little about his teaching and how he went about starting CTC math.

Made by Australia’s Best Math Teacher!

Pat is the best math teacher I have ever had. He has this ability to explain the concepts in a very clear and concise manner. It’s amazing. It will take him a few minutes only! It’s like lightbulb moments!

That’s amazing! That’s how I like to learn math too. Lol So did Pat make CTC before he was a homeschooler? 

He was working on CTC the whole time while he was teaching and homeschooling. He started getting really busy with the kids and CTC and so he transitioned from teaching to doing CTC full time.

In Austraila, we had a big deal with McDonalds, Mackers. They approached us in Australia only, and said that they see a lot of our employments failing our numeracy tests and we would like to use your program to help them. They purchased the program for all their staff and saw amazing results so they asked what they would have to do to make it available for all students in Australia. They struck up a deal with Pat to provide it to students for 3 years for free and CTC math exploded! 

What Sets CTC Math Curriculum Apart?

So we know that it is proven and that people love it. So tell us what sets it apart from other programs out there.

There are a few main things, but I think the main one is his video tutorials. The way he teaches is incomparable. The next, is that he understands homeschoolers, what they need, and there are a lot of things that are built into our program that are there to serve homeschoolers. He had them in mind when he built the program. 

So tell us about another main feature that you really think stands out and people like to use.

One of the BEST Features of the Program

Access to all grade levels, so you can use all of it from grade K-12; addition to calculus. It really is learn at your own pace. Pat understands that and so he understands that most kids need more to either review or to get ahead.

We do the same thing so I totally understand that. We don’t know what grades the kids are in! LOL so that really helps. One feature that I saw that I wanted to ask about is the pen and paper tool.

Maybe I can show you a little later on what they look like, you can actually make your own worksheets. It is really important to do pen and paper style math. So you can print off the worksheet and have it there during the video lesson or you can print it off and do it later.

I love that because I think it is so important to do the equations in different ways. Is there anything else you wanted to cover before we jump in and show people inside the program.

I wanted to mention that Pat does have 10 children! 5 girls and 5 boys so he understands homeschooling families and knows what they are going through.

Let’s talk about how parents can try the program. If you click in the top right corner, you can sign up for the free version which gives you access too samples in all of the grades. So just go to CTCMath.com and click free trial at the top.

The post Homeschool Math Curriculum from Father of 10 – CTC Math first appeared on True Aim.

This post is sponsored by World News Group. All opinions are my own.

We already have a curriculum for science and geography, but like to supplement with different materials to add interest and make the topics relevant to our children’s lives and the world around them. It is difficult to find science materials that have a biblical world view. That’s why I’m so excited to have found God’s Big World magazine.

God’s Big World Magazine

Each month kids get a taste of different experiences from around the world. Each magazine is broken down into bitesize 8 lessons that are the perfect length for preschool and early elementary students.

The text is easy to read for beginning readers and includes more information for parents to help expound the subjects for their students. Plus, there’s scripture that relates to what you’re reading on every page.

There’s also puzzles and activities included in every lesson. My daughter really liked the big map that came with our copy, so we played a little game. We searched the magazine for states and countries and marked them on the map to see how many different places were mentioned.

You can also go online with your subscription and get more information for each lesson with simple videos. Download extra activity pages for multiple students from the site too!

This is the perfect solution to adding supplemental material to your homeschool science or geography curriculum, or turn it into your weekly lesson for preschool and kindergarten!

I can’t wait to see what is in next month’s magazine, and my kids are already begging to see more of the videos online.

Click here to save 15% on a yearly subscription!

World News Group Magazine Freebie and Giveaway!

Download a FREE copy of God’s Big World here! If you have older children, you might like WORLDkids or WORLDteen.

Enter to win these awesome prizes valued at over $100!

• One Year Membership to the WNG magazine of your choice ($35.88 value)
• Preschool Bible Study Book: Kevin Tries on the Spiritual Armor
• Elementary Word Study Book: Adventures in Etymology  
• Inspiration for Christian Teens: Start Here: Doing Hard Things Right Where You Are
• Three $20 Crossway Gift Cards

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The post What Can a Kids Magazine Subscription Do For Your Homeschool? first appeared on True Aim.

But what I learned in school wasn’t history at all. History is not a line of unconnected dates and locations; history is a powerful story of men and women who impacted the world for better or worse. Everyone loves a good story, and true history is the telling of the finest, most powerful stories mankind has recorded.

So when I agreed to review Masterbooks Christian History: Biographies of Faith, it was with great hesitation. Would it be a study of dates, or powerful stories? I wasn’t disappointed.

I received 5 biographies of great Christian men; Life of Washington, Life of John Newton,  Life of John Knox, Life of Luther, and Life of Andrew Jackson. I only meant to thumb through the books in order to form an opinion, but the Life of Washington hooked me, and I read about half the book in a single sitting.

His story was incredible. And while the books are intended for seventh through ninth graders, I would recommend them to adults and even younger children. I plan to finish them myself.

5 Things that make a Great History Curriculum

Masterbooks Christian History: Biographies of Faith is a great history curriculum because it has these 5 qualities.

1. Fantasy is fun; history if better. If a kid’s hero is a comic book character, that’s not good. Superheroes overcome life struggles with superpowers, but our children don’t have superpowers. Biographies of Faith offers examples to our children of real flesh-and-blood heroes; heroes without superpowers; heroes our children could aspire to be like.

2. Faith Is Not a Footnote. The way I learned history in school, Faith was a footnote. Our heroes may have had some religion, but it was inconsequential. Yet, a short reading of George Washington’s biography proves that he didn’t just have religion, he had a deep and driving Faith. In fact, his Faith was who he was, and it certainly directed his actions. Washington was not a great man, so much as he was a man of great faith.

Our schools and colleges are intentionally secularizing these Christian men. They want us to believe that Faith doesn’t matter. They want us to believe that great goodness can spring from Godlessness, but that isn’t the case. Christians will never retake America until we start putting faith back into our children’s history lessons.

3. Serious Reflection: When it comes to learning, I’m not a fan crafts and crossword puzzles, especially as kids get older. The questions in Christian History: Biographies of Faith foster serious reflection. I didn’t see any questions about dates, and few about places. Instead, most questions ask about pivotal moments and attitudes, drawing students’ attention to the character traits and wise decisions that distinguished these great men of history.

4. Only Essential: Did you know that George Washington had wooden teeth? That is about all I knew after studying Washington in school. The best part is, it is not exactly true.

For some reason, history textbooks in school give too many details, details that have nothing to do with history. Washington is not a remarkable historical figure because he had some false teeth. And the Pilgrims aren’t worthy of memory because they sailed on a ship called the Mayflower. Yet, I remember answering questions in school about those very things.

Luckily, Christian History: Biographies of Faith asks no such silly questions. The focus in on the essential facts and motives, the details that make these historical figures set apart from the other men of their time.

5. Vocabulary: Most of reading comprehension comes down to vocabulary. That is why I love that this curriculum starts off by having students define vocabulary words, in context, taken from their readings. Not only will this help them understand the material that they just read, but it will help them decode other, even more complicated, works in the future.

As someone who produces curriculum of my own, I am often very critical of other’s learning materials. However, I could not be more pleased with Christian History: Biographies of Faith. This is how kids should learn history!

Get 26% off ALL Masterbooks curriculum sets and FREE SHIPPING on any order over $75.  No Code Needed. Offer ends August 31st.

Masterbooks Gift Card Giveaway!

If you’d like to try out Masterbooks Homsechool Curriculum? They have a wide variety for children of all ages! Here is your chance to win 1 of 2 $75 gift cards to Masterbooks.com.

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  I was sponsored by Masterbooks to review their Christian History homeschool curriculum. All opinions are my own.

The post 5 Things That Make a Great History Curriculum first appeared on True Aim.

That’s why I’m so excited to tell you all about Homeschooling with Math-U-See in this sponsored review and giveaway post. All opinions are my own. For more information please read my full Disclosure.

What is Math-U-See

Our daily math lessons have become my daughters’ favorite part of their homeschooling day. With Math-U-See, learning new math concepts is easy because my children visualize the problems and concepts with manipulative blocks. The dvd lessons also provide teaching support and reinforce the concepts in each section of the workbook. This takes tons of pressure off of me to explain new material.

Each Math-U-See program has 2 sets; an instruction pack and student pack. The instruction pack comes with a teacher’s manual and instructional dvd. The student pack comes with a workbook and tests. The manipulative blocks are separate, but essential to the curriculum, and you only have to purchase those once.

If your child is in preschool, you will want to start with the very first level called Primer. This will introduce your child to basics of mathematics including counting, number recognition, place value, and basic addition and subtraction.

If you are unsure about what level your child is at there is a simple online assessment. My youngest daughter is 5 and assessed at the Beta level. My eldest daughter is 7 and assessed at the Gamma level. I choose the Beta level to review because both my daughters could use it. My youngest would be learning new concepts and my eldest would be strengthening her skills. However, I plan to get Gamma for my eldest daughter next year!

The BEST Thing about Math-U-See

The first thing we do with every math lesson is to get out our blocks and review the previous lesson. ALL my kids LOVE the blocks. Just playing with them teaches basic skills like patterning, sequencing, and value recognition. The combination of the instructional dvd and blocks really make this curriculum different from all the rest.

Homeschool dad and teacher, Steve Demme, does an amazing job connecting all of the concepts in this program to real life while using the blocks so children can actually SEE the problem being solved. You can view samples of his instruction on the Math-U-See website. 

In the first lesson, my children learned about place value. Mr. Demme explained it by drawing a road he calls decimal street. What a great idea! Each house has a different family (units, tens, hundreds, ect.) and the houses are only so big, so if a house gets too many units in it, someone has to move over to the next house. Check out the explanation for yourself below!

That is just one example, but Mr. Demme has lots of other great methods to explain confusing concepts to young children.

Another great new feature, is the Math-U-See Manipulatives App.  It is a virtual version of the physical manipulatives so children can practice what they’ve learned while on the go.

There are so many great benefits to the program, but my favorite part is seeing the smiles on my daughter’s faces when they solve a problem correctly. My eldest quickly solved a triple digit addition equation mentally after practicing with her blocks. My jaw dropped, I was just so surprised! Math brings joy to my children which means they are learning to love learning; a priceless gift!

Math-U-See Giveaway!

One lucky True Aim reading will win a Math-U-See curriculum of their choice!

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The post Giveaway! Hands-on Math Curriculum with Math-U-See! first appeared on True Aim.

That’s why I was really excited to try this new Christian Homeschool Science Curriculum.

As part of a sponsored post from Kendall Hunt Publishing I received a Free copy of ByDesign. All opinions are honest and I was not required to give a positive review.

ByDesign Christian Science Homeschool Curriculum

When my ByDesign Science set came in the mail I flipped through all of the materials; Student Edition, Science Journals, and Teacher Edition. The first thing that really stood out was the beautiful images. There were no cartoons and very few drawings. Everything was pictures of real animals, plants and examples of scientific principals.

When using the curriculum, I included all of my children in the lessons. Although I received 1st grade, my kindergartner was captivated by the images in the book and was happy to sit and listen as we took turns reading.

The teachers guide is very complete and offers lesson plans to schedule your learning. We like to take an interest-driven approach so I just read a couple pages and then asked my children if they’d like to hear more. We continued reading a whole section. My 1st-grader, Audrey, continued to flip through the book looking at the pictures and asking questions. That’s what science is all about, right?

Curriculum Features

Right off the bat, the book attributes God as the maker of all living things. Throughout the book there are scripture references for Bible study and questions that help children connect the Bible to science. We LOVED it!

The book is well organized so you can easily find extension activities, scripture verses, and questions to ask your children.

For each main section there are science journals to help children go through the scientific process for the concepts they are learning in the text.

Science Activities

The first section of the student edition is about living things. We read the section about plants and decided to go one of their ‘Explore-a-lab’ activities.

We enjoyed a nature walk collecting leaves and other plant material to take back home and sort.

This activity was the kind that you can break up and make it last the whole week. That way you can keep up with all your other lessons, or you can combine this science curriculum into your writing, reading, and math lessons. There are ideas for all of that in the teachers manual!

Next we sorted all the things we collected and talked about the different things we found. I asked my children if they knew some of the plant names of the things that we found. They knew a few, but had no clue what some of them were.

As we made prints of the leaves, I continued to remind my children what we read in the ByDesign book about plants, the different parts, what they need to live, and what day of creation God made them.

We labeled our prints so we could remember what kind of trees they were from and it was great time! I can’t wait to explore the rest of the book with my children and learn more about God’s beautiful creation! Why not join us and purchase a copy today!

Christian Homeschool Curriculum from Kendall Hunt

Although this is a publication of the Seventh-Day Adventist church, I found that all of the Biblical Principals in this science curriculum were in-line with my non-denominational Christian Faith.

If you would like to learn more about this Christian Science Program for grades 1-8 as well as preview all the levels, go to the ByDesign website.

Kendall Hunt also provides faith-based programs in Reading Language Art called (Pathways) and a New Kindergarten program (Stepping Stones). In addition, Kendall Hunt offers Talented and Gifted programs in mathematics (M2 and M3) as well as products developed in collaboration with the CFGE (Center for Gifted Education) College of William and Mary in subject areas such as language arts, social studies, and science.

The post ByDesign Christian Homeschool Science Curriculum first appeared on True Aim.