Looking Back at the 2014 Schoolhouse Review Crew Year!

Yesterday I posted and linked up my final review for the 2014 Crew Year. How awesome that we got to end the year with a game! So, today I’m looking back over the year and remembering what amazing products my family got to use.

Schoolhouse Review Crew has a Blue Ribbon Awards tradition where the crew gets to vote for their favorite products. The girls and I powwowed and came up our favorites and submitted our votes.  (The Official Winners will be announced on the Schoolhouse Review Blog on Monday!)

So here’s a few of our favorites from 2014:

Favorite Literature Program:  Oh my this was so hard to choose just one to vote for the official Blue Ribbon Awards but since this is just a list of my family favorites and it’s my blog, I’m going to go ahead have two favorites!

It’s Shakespeare and it’s Lightning Literature so of course we loved it! Boobear is a much bigger fan of Shakespeare than either Turtlegirl or Tailorbear but I was surprised by how much they enjoyed using and reviewing Lightning Literature Shakespeare Comedies & Sonnets.

 

 

 

I love love love love Progeny Press study guides. We have reviewed them multiple times over the several years I have been on the crew. It should not be a surprise that we could not decide between two wonderful and very different literature curricula. This was the first time that Supergirl used a Progeny Press guide and she loved meeting with mom to have mom read the book, The Courage of Sarah Noble, aloud. I think she loved the extra mommy daughter time and I know she loved building a log cabin out of pretzels and frosting! I loved that my high schoolers could use the Hunger Games Study Guide.

Favorite Math and Language Arts Supplements: This actually covers 4 or 5 of the official categories but I’m combining them because my two favorite products can both be used as Math and LA supplements!

In 2014 I got to review IXL for the third time! This year they have a new math app for grades k-6 that works for the newer Kindle Fires. You’ll have to read the review to see all the other neat stuff but Supergirl adores being able to practice math on Mama’s Kindle. The LA portion of the website can be used on the Kindle using the browser!

 

 

 

The Learning Palette makes my list of favorites! I love the wrap-ups but I adore and Supergirl loves and adores the Learning Palette. It is fun. It can be done independently and it covers so many topics in both Math and Language Arts. When she has finally mastered all of the first grade material, I am going to have search for sales on the second grade packages!

 

 

 

A Few More Favorites: Rather than try to group them by category I just present a few more of our favorite review crew products from 2014!

I love Math-U-See so I was sure I would love Spelling You See. I was not wrong. I was afraid that it would be too much for Supergirl. We’ve had to take many long breaks from using it but she’s making far more progress than I thought she could and that means this has to be one of my favorite crew products for 2014!

 

 

 

I will confess that I was not interested in Roman Roads or the Old Western Culture program they offer when I saw it on the upcoming vendor list. I really didn’t not want to have to write a review. I showed the website to Turtlegirl and let her check out the sample lessons and she begged for it. What could I say? This was her favorite crew product. And you know what? It ranks up there as one of my favorites too and I am so grateful that we had the opportunity to review it!

 

The Last favorite that I share today is the My Student Logbook. In my review I stated that I would be voting for it as The Product I Didn’t Know I Needed. This simply tool has helped us so much. She keeps track of chores and school and little things like “put on glasses” since she often forgets to wear her glasses which seems to contribute to her headaches. I will have to purchase one of these for her next year!

 

 

So that’s it for now! I reviewed so many wonderful and amazing products but these stand out as some of our favorites. Next week I’ll share about the official winners!