Amy's Wandering

I am an html dunce. I can kind of follow basic tutorials to create buttons and gizmos for my blog, but I never really understood what I was doing or why it worked.

Enter Web Design for Kids (and Curious Grown-Ups!). It is a DVD that teaches html basics. It was a perfect fit for some like me! Brian Richardson assumes that the viewer knows nothing and even includes a lesson on File & Folder Management. Here a few of the subjects covered:

• The 10 Basic Lines of Code
• Coloring the Background and Letters
• Making Letters Move Across the Screen
• Designer Backgrounds
• Changing Fonts
• Adding Pictures

Funny Girl(12) and I watched the DVD while following along on the computer. In no time at all she had created a web page with a background, pictures, and scrolling text. I was thrilled to learn what some of the different abbreviations meant and how to change an existing code.

The Nitty Gritty:

There is a Summer Special price of $19.99 + $3.99 s&h for a limited time only.

Things I Like:

• the ability to pause the DVD while we work on each step
• detailed, but simple, instructions
• lots of explanation – Brian would tell us to do something and just as I wondering why it was done that way, he would pop in and answer that very question
• Click Drag Solutions supports several charities through the sale of this DVD

Value: I would definitely pay $19.99 for this product (not so sure about full price though). I have read pages of free tutorials on the web, but none of them presented html in a way that I could follow like this program does. (Ok, all you computer whizzes can quit snickering now 🙂

See what my TOS Crew Mates have to say about Web Design for Kids!

It is the rare child who doesn’t like cars or horses, so combine them with a fun skill review game and we have a winner in The Quarter Mile Math!

We received the Deluxe version to test and it has been so much fun! Each person chooses a dragster to race or a horse to run through a meadow.  After choosing a topic, you try to correctly answer problems as fast as you can. Your five fastest horses or cars are always competing against each other, so the object is to top your previous best time. My 4 year old can even play along with the keyboard letter and number recognition categories.

I think this is so much more effective than flash cards. My kids are motivated to keep practicing the same multiplication problems in order to to beat their fastest time. I really appreciate how Barnum Software has made this cost effective for the majority of homeschoolers at $2.95 per month for the entire family!!

The Nitty Gritty:

The Quarter Mile Math comes in two different affordable versions. You can compare them on this chart.

Things I like:

• fun for all ages, from preschoolers to adult
• skills are very specific, not just a bunch of random problems
• kids are motivated to improve on their best time
• used by Sylvan Learning Centers
  
• very affordable

Value: Dirt cheap is how I would price this one!  LOL  I know that this is not true for all, but most families will not miss $2.95 a month. You can also purchase a one or two year subscription, or the standard cd version.

Barnum Software is offering my readers $5 off of the Standard or Deluxe version if ordered by September 30th using this code: 7R7K7

See what my TOS Crew Mates had to say about The Quarter Mile Math.