Dreambox Plays Well with Right Start
2 CommentsBy Lostcheerio on Thursday, March 05, 2009 at 7:51 AM.
If you're a fan of Right Start math, you may be interested in checking out this new online curriculum: Dreambox, for K-2 math. Sadie is working her way through Right Start's kindergarten curriculum, using lots of visuals -- tally sticks, an abacus, counters and manipulatives. When we started playing around with Dreambox, she found many of the exercises comfortably familiar, as Dreambox uses these same tools, but in the context of Flash animation and games. Dreambox encourages kids to visualize numbers and think in blocks of five and ten, just like Right Start, and we've just found that the two systems dovetail extremely well.
Dreambox's online math curriculum is very interesting, in that it progresses at a variable speed, based on your child's performance. If something seems easy for the child, the software skips him/her along to something more challenging. If something is too hard, the software pulls back to spend much more time on that skill. This quality means that it's *super* important for you as a parent not to help your child. The software is meant to be used by a child independently, because it customizes itself to the student's strengths and weaknesses. I did make the mistake of directing Sadie a bit too much at first, and that resulted in her being skipped ahead too much. Dreambox fixed it for me, though, and now we're back on track.
Here are a few screenshots of the software:
This shot shows the three sections of the Dreambox world -- the house, the adventure park (where most of the math games are played), and the carnival (where the less academic, more fun games are played). Kids earn tokens in the adventure park which they can "spend" at the carnival to play and unlock games. In other computer math systems I've experienced, there is more difference between the "work" games and the "reward" games, with the reward games being purely fun and the work games being more purely work. Dreambox mixes it up a little -- the work games are contextualized in narrative and have little cartoons and characters to play with, and the reward games are also teaching math concepts. Here's a shot of the carnival. Yes, Sadie's avatar has purple hair -- a harbinger of things to come, no doubt!
You can play for free for two weeks, and then it's around $10 a month, depending on how many months you buy at a time. If you have a strong internet connection and a K-2 child who likes computer games, Dreambox is a great way to teach without worksheets, without pencils, without lectures. The learning is intuitive, the rewards are integrated, and the software is fun!
Dreambox's online math curriculum is very interesting, in that it progresses at a variable speed, based on your child's performance. If something seems easy for the child, the software skips him/her along to something more challenging. If something is too hard, the software pulls back to spend much more time on that skill. This quality means that it's *super* important for you as a parent not to help your child. The software is meant to be used by a child independently, because it customizes itself to the student's strengths and weaknesses. I did make the mistake of directing Sadie a bit too much at first, and that resulted in her being skipped ahead too much. Dreambox fixed it for me, though, and now we're back on track.
Here are a few screenshots of the software:
This shot shows the three sections of the Dreambox world -- the house, the adventure park (where most of the math games are played), and the carnival (where the less academic, more fun games are played). Kids earn tokens in the adventure park which they can "spend" at the carnival to play and unlock games. In other computer math systems I've experienced, there is more difference between the "work" games and the "reward" games, with the reward games being purely fun and the work games being more purely work. Dreambox mixes it up a little -- the work games are contextualized in narrative and have little cartoons and characters to play with, and the reward games are also teaching math concepts. Here's a shot of the carnival. Yes, Sadie's avatar has purple hair -- a harbinger of things to come, no doubt!
You can play for free for two weeks, and then it's around $10 a month, depending on how many months you buy at a time. If you have a strong internet connection and a K-2 child who likes computer games, Dreambox is a great way to teach without worksheets, without pencils, without lectures. The learning is intuitive, the rewards are integrated, and the software is fun!
Labels: curriculum, curriculum reviews, dreambox, homeschool curriculum, math, online learning
Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding: A Science Curriculum for K-2 by Dr. Bernard Nebel
1 CommentsBy Lostcheerio on Saturday, April 26, 2008 at 5:45 PM.
Learning science in kindergarten is a privilege that most public school students do not enjoy. Teachers have enough to do teaching them to read and do math and stand in line and answer to bells and wait their turn to speak and print their names properly and wait for paste and line up their crayons in a row. Ironically, the kids probably get more science education in preschool when they do themed unit weeks like weather week or ocean week than they do in the early elementary grades.
That's the kind of science little kids get, when they do get it: topical stuff. Let's learn about fish. Let's learn about plants. We'll learn about fish this week and plants next week, but we're not going to learn about what connects fish to plants or how the sun is connected to both fish and plants, because little kids don't typically get trusted with that kind of information. They aren't asked to see the big picture, draw lines between their thematic units, understand science as a whole, as a system of interconnected disciplines. A privileged first-grader who's getting a bigger-than-average helping of science is going to know the names of the planets and how bees make honey and that their eyes allow them to see, but that's where it stops. I can't honestly say that I've ever seen a whole-world approach to teaching science to young children until I saw Dr. Nebel's books.
His first book was a how-to manual addressing all aspects of elementary education, not just science. As an elementary level homeschool curriculum, it doesn't provide a box of workbooks, but teaches a philosophy of teaching and learning. It's called "Nebel's Elementary Education." Here's a summary, from the web site:
This single book (8 1/2 x 11, 450 pages) contains approaches and actual subject matter for delivering the entirety of a superior K-5 education. It describes not only WHAT to teach, but also HOW to teach it using hundreds of hands-on activities, and much more.
Most distinctive is the organization. Typical elementary curricula consist of an array of stand-alone units, which kids readily forget, confuse, and from which they never gain a full picture. In sharp contrast, Nebel lays out each subject (K-5) as a seamless continuum of lessons integrating different subjects along the way. Simultaneously, Nebel shows you how to guide your children along this pathway in a way that builds logically and systematically toward a broad, comprehensive, holistic understanding. The result is achievement of knowledge, skills, understanding, and problem-solving ability that will provide a solid foundation for all further learning.
The book is in total harmony with modern research concerning the most effective and efficient teaching techniques that bring children to become joyful, self-motivated learners. In short, this book may be considered a breakthrough in translating theory-what leads to the most effective and efficient learning-into a practical curriculum addressing all subjects.
His new book focuses just on science, and is called Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding: A Science Curriculum for K-2. I can't think of a reason why five-year-olds cannot begin to learn and understand science in context, just like they can start learning history at this age, not that they get that in public school either. Dr. Nebel has sponsored the G.U.E.S.S. Science Fair and we're proud to have him on board. We get to give away four copies of his books as prizes at the fair. If you appreciate Dr. Nebel's contribution and want to help spread the love, feel free to snag these images, link to his site, at http://www.pressforlearning.com, or drop him an email to say thanks. Homeschoolers have a special opportunity to start their children on the right path in science education, and Dr. Nebel can help.
That's the kind of science little kids get, when they do get it: topical stuff. Let's learn about fish. Let's learn about plants. We'll learn about fish this week and plants next week, but we're not going to learn about what connects fish to plants or how the sun is connected to both fish and plants, because little kids don't typically get trusted with that kind of information. They aren't asked to see the big picture, draw lines between their thematic units, understand science as a whole, as a system of interconnected disciplines. A privileged first-grader who's getting a bigger-than-average helping of science is going to know the names of the planets and how bees make honey and that their eyes allow them to see, but that's where it stops. I can't honestly say that I've ever seen a whole-world approach to teaching science to young children until I saw Dr. Nebel's books.
His first book was a how-to manual addressing all aspects of elementary education, not just science. As an elementary level homeschool curriculum, it doesn't provide a box of workbooks, but teaches a philosophy of teaching and learning. It's called "Nebel's Elementary Education." Here's a summary, from the web site:
This single book (8 1/2 x 11, 450 pages) contains approaches and actual subject matter for delivering the entirety of a superior K-5 education. It describes not only WHAT to teach, but also HOW to teach it using hundreds of hands-on activities, and much more.
Most distinctive is the organization. Typical elementary curricula consist of an array of stand-alone units, which kids readily forget, confuse, and from which they never gain a full picture. In sharp contrast, Nebel lays out each subject (K-5) as a seamless continuum of lessons integrating different subjects along the way. Simultaneously, Nebel shows you how to guide your children along this pathway in a way that builds logically and systematically toward a broad, comprehensive, holistic understanding. The result is achievement of knowledge, skills, understanding, and problem-solving ability that will provide a solid foundation for all further learning.
The book is in total harmony with modern research concerning the most effective and efficient teaching techniques that bring children to become joyful, self-motivated learners. In short, this book may be considered a breakthrough in translating theory-what leads to the most effective and efficient learning-into a practical curriculum addressing all subjects.
His new book focuses just on science, and is called Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding: A Science Curriculum for K-2. I can't think of a reason why five-year-olds cannot begin to learn and understand science in context, just like they can start learning history at this age, not that they get that in public school either. Dr. Nebel has sponsored the G.U.E.S.S. Science Fair and we're proud to have him on board. We get to give away four copies of his books as prizes at the fair. If you appreciate Dr. Nebel's contribution and want to help spread the love, feel free to snag these images, link to his site, at http://www.pressforlearning.com, or drop him an email to say thanks. Homeschoolers have a special opportunity to start their children on the right path in science education, and Dr. Nebel can help.
Labels: guess sponsors, homeschool curriculum, homeschool science, science education
