The Blog

Playaway Bookpacks – Books and Technology Come Together

A great item for the younger set are Playaway Bookpacks, a perfect aid for students learning how to read. This new program pairs pre-loaded audio books with their print counter-parts, providing a read-along experience helping emerging readers build literacy skills. The educational benefits include increased reading comprehension, retention, vocabulary skills, phonemic awareness, fluency, and other reading capabilities. Best of all, these Bookpacks are free at many local libraries throughout the country and currently feature more than 200 titles for various ages and reading levels.

As a librarian and a mom that loves to read to my kids not many review items have got me quite as excited as Playaway Bookpacks. These bookpacks blend my love of books and my love of technology into the perfect reading tool for little learners. They use children’s books paired with easy to use audio conveniently placed together in packs for children to use.

If you have visited your local library you have probably seen these hanging on a rod in the children’s section. They are ready to grab and check out making it super simple.

The audio pack is placed inside the protective orange sleeve. With easy to follow instructions for use. Of course I had to explain how to use it to Big Sis as she is at the very early stages of reading.

Here is the back side of the audio pack. All you have to do is plug it into headphones, speakers or your car audio system to get started.

My daughter thought it was the coolest thing ever that she could listen to the book being read to her while she followed a long. The audio makes a small noise to let the reader know when to turn the page.

They offer such a great variety of Playaway Bookpacks including classics, best sellers, award-winning titles and common core state standard collections for all ages.

You can read more about the benefits of audio paired with print over on their website.

Using these is like having your very own story hour in your own home. These are great for all kids and can be used alongside homework, homeschooling or just plain old reading for fun. Using these can help children with reading, fluency and comprehension skills and they won’t even think of it as learning. For me there is nothing like getting into the pages of a really good book and I love sharing my love of literature with my children! I think these Playaway Bookpacks are a great way to help nurture that love of reading. Check out your local library or even your child’s school media center to see if they offer these and start checking them out and enjoying them today!

Connect:

You can connect with Playaway on Facebook and @FindawayWorld on twitter.

Buy It!

You can purchase the Clifford Playaway Bookpack for $74.99 and the Charlotte’s Web Playaway Bookpack for $64.99.

I received a sample product for this review. All opinions are my own and/or my family’s, take it or leave it. Click here to view my whole disclosure policy.

text-Ur Foam Activity (Review and Giveaway) Plus a Behavioral Chart Craft {CLOSED}

Blog· Crafts· Review

We have created a whole line of products that let you “FEEL” the fun! With tantalizing textures and 3D space-urs?, text-UR Foam brings craft foam to a whole new dimension!

Choose from 8 different Kits:

3D Masterpiece Kits
Activity Kits
Character Kits
Foam Sheet Value Pack
Frame Kits
Layered Stickers
Shape Stacks
Shape Stack-urs
Stand up Kits

So the picture you see above is what Creative Hands Crafts sent my family to try out! When I opened the package the first thing I thought was “how colorful and fun!”

My kids are 5 and 3, I thought they would need some sort of supervision for these activities…I was wrong! This craft is great…even for messy 3 year olds!

The great thing about these Kits are the fact there is not need for scissors, or glue….nice! The foam shapes simply pop out, then you peel, stick, and stack to make a fun object!

I have been wanting to make a behavioral chart for some time now. At my son’s school they have a color chart: Green=Great Day, Yellow=2 warnings, and Red=3 or more warnings. The nice thing they have incorporated this year is if they get in the Red they have the opportunity to turn around and get back in the Yellow for good behavior. They also have a treasure box for good behavior.

I saw this chart was positive reinforcement for my son at school, so I wanted to incorporate it into our home as well. Plus it gave us chance to make a cool craft! So I allowed the kids to each pick a bug out of the Bug Activity Kit.

My son picked the snail, well, it looks more like a whale, but it’s a snail. I told him he could use his imagination and place them how he liked or he could copy the picture. He copied the picture. Imagination this boy has!

My daughter picked the Lady Bug. She placed the dots wherever she wanted, the table, the chair, and finally the bug! The great thing is they came right off…easy clean up!

text-UR Foam offers a Foam Sheet Packs, so you can use these until your imagination explodes or brain! I popped some of the shapes out so I could stick them to the rim of the behavioral chart (see below.)

Here’s the kids with their fun finished products!

Here’s is the finished behavioral chart, super simple…just a little imagination!

Instructions:

Have the kids make their character of choice.
Glue their character onto a clothes pin. Let dry.
Grab two large foam pieces(I already had these in my foam stash) I choose Black and White.
Cut one foam piece slightly smaller than the other and stick together.
Cut three circles(red,yellow and green) the same size. I used texture pieces from the kit I received. Stick them on as pictured above.
Decorate the rim with the push out shapes.
Then clip your child’s character on each side of the chart.

Yellow is the place to start, then through out the day according to their behavior it either moves up or down. Examples: If your child willingly helps out with something, like cleaning up or helping with the dishes, then the clip gets moved to Green. Or say they hit or is picking on their sibling after a warning then it gets moved to Red. They do have the opportunity to move back to Green.

The excitement from you when they do something mentionable is a reward in it’s self….BUT if you want to make a little treasure box with stickers, balls, bugs, those types of things…that’s fun too! You decide when they get to pick…possibly every evening or once a week…that’s up to you!

So if you’re looking for crafts to keep your kids busy for hours, and spark their imagination, please look into buying text-UR Foam! Plus you will be able to create this awesome behavioral chart, and keep peace around the house!

Would you make something like this? What is your take on this behavioral method? I’d love to here your thoughts!

Connect:

You can connect with Creative Hands Crafts on Facebook, and/or @CreativeHands1 on Twitter!

Buy It!

You can buy the text-UR Foam Activity Kits at these retailers near you. Priced from $2.99 to $8.99.

The Giveaway: How would you like to win your own Crafty Package or Standard Package? I have one to give away to one lucky contestant!

To enter the giveaway please follow all of the directions below! If you don’t follow the rules, you can’t win!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

I received a sample product for this review. All opinions are my own and/or my family’s, take it or leave it. Click here to view my whole disclosure policy.

Baby & Toddler Feeding Stories #hfbrightside

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Disclosure: I participated in this post on behalf of Burst Media. I was compensated for my time and commitment, but all opinions are my own.

I’m sure we’ve all experienced feeding issues with our little ones. From food fights to throw up, there are surely lots of stories to be told to your child’s future spouse – and then later in life to your grand kids! We all love a bit of humor and Happy Family gets that. Trust me, you’re not alone in your feeding woes!

I’ve got my own stories and most of them involve some throw up. You see, poor Big Bro had a bit of an issue keeping things down when he was a baby. He couldn’t handle regular formula, so the Dr’s switched him to a soy based formula before he even left the hospital. Sadly, he still had issues and often threw up much of his formula- sometimes in pure Exorcist style! I swear, I went through at least 3 shirts a day as did my husband. However, our shirts weren’t always the only thing hat got hit and I ended up with it on my body and even my face from time to time.

Aside from that story, I do have some funny ones too. Lil Man was a big player with his food. We’d stick him in his high chair and put the food right on the tray because any plate or bowl would only get thrown. He’d sit there and smash it all in his hands, throw it on the floor and even spread some across his chest. Bath time was always a must after feeding him!

Start creating your own funny stories with Happy Family and get a $1 off coupon!

What are some funny stories hat you can share while feeding your little ones?

Win $10,000 for Your Child’s School through the “Help Your School Excel with Excedrin” Sweepstakes!

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Disclosure: This post is part of a sponsored campaign with Excedrin? and MomSelect. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

I’m sure that just like me, many of you anxiously awaited your children going back to school. While it’s great having them home for the summer, 3 whole months sure is a long time and the kids start running ragged after awhile. If you work at home like I do, the constant “I’m bored” statements might have gotten pretty old before August even hit.

Because we can never be totally happy and satisfied, the start of a new school season brought on other stresses – ones that can lead to a huge headache some days. My kids were not easy to wake up for that first week and Lil Man complained everyday, saying that he’s smart enough and doesn’t need school. He’ll get a job in construction where he doesn’t need to use his brain. Yes, that actually came out of his mouth – though I straightened him right up and told him no way! I mean c’mon, the kid is just 11!

As you can imagine, the headaches are almost constant around here – especially because I have six males to deal with. I swear, it’s all that testosterone! Between their schedules, the constant running around, homework and everything in between, I’m almost ready for next summer already!

If you’ve already got the back to school blues and headaches are a constant reminder of how busy our lives are, then you will definitely want to continue reading. When you purchase Excedrin for your headaches, you’re able to enter? for a chance to win $10,000 for your child’s school through the “Help Your School Excel with Excedrin” Sweepstakes!

Here are some fun facts from a survey that Excedrin just conducted:

69% of parents, who have at least one child in school this coming year, say they are excited for their child’s first day of school.
44% of parents also say they expect to get a headache during the back to school season.
more than one-third of parents* cite getting themselves (41%) and their children (43%) back on a schedule at the top of the list of things that might cause their headaches during the back to school season.
more than one-third (35%) of parents* say shopping for school supplies might give them a headache.
a large majority of parents (85%) think their schools are in need of new or upgraded supplies such as pencils and paper and computers or software and gym/sporting equipment. And that’s because with every purchase of Excedrin?, parents can enter for a chance to win $10,000 for their child’s school.

* Parents that can name at least one thing that might cause a headache during the back to school season

For those reasons and all of the others, you should be sure to include Excedrin on your back to school list this year!

Spelling Works-Help Students Master Spelling Rules

Blog· Review

After more than thirty years of teaching writing skills and developing his own unique mechanics exercises at a top New York school, Jim Halverson decided to share his successful methods with a wider audience. The result is Spelling Works, a book that makes the difficult task of English orthography both engaging and fun. As Halverson says, “Every teacher knows the inefficiency of teaching spelling by rote memorization. The kids study for the quizzes, do well on them, and then misspell many of the same words the next day in their own writing.” To involve students, he created exercises that are each part of an ongoing story, and at the end of each unit they review the new concept with games and a “spelling maze.” An added benefit of exercises that are stories is that the students also learn better proofreading skills as they scan sentences for misspellings.

These days we rely too much on technology to “auto-correct” and help out with our grammar and spelling errors. I know I do! If you think about it, auto-correct is great when you’re in a hurry. On the other hand it can truly be a crutch. Wouldn’t it be nice to rely on our brain skills rather than technology? I know when I spell a word and know how to spell it, I feel a bit of satisfaction!

If you feel anything like me and would like to improve your spelling skills, boy, do I have a fun book for you!

*Note: This book is not just for kids, I had a great experience with it myself and I’m 32. Just goes to show you can’t be too old to learn.

I have learned in a few short months how important it is to spell correctly due to my blog Bugs and Beans and writing reviews for Outnumbered 3-1. Professionalism is very important, and proper grammar is just as important.

Here’s what Spelling Works has to offer:

Dividing Words into Syllables
Halverson is the author of, Spelling Works, a handy book that takes the mystery out of the most difficult spelling rules in the English language and makes learning them easy, engaging and fun.

?Knowing how to spell is crucial in professional communications, he said. ?It can be very awkward when your smartphone corrects the simple things you are trying to say and turns them into something funny, lewd, or downright raunchy.

?People may accept a few improperly spelled words in email that carries the words ?Sent from my iPhone?, but if they catch errors repeatedly, it can have a serious effect on professional performance and may even be career threatening?.

Singular vs. Plural Possessives
Spelling Works is a simple-to-use book for learning spelling rules and how to spot your own errors. Halverson developed the techniques over decades of teaching students how to spell. He created a series of exercises that are each part of an ongoing story. The end of each story unit reviews the key concept with games and a ‘spelling maze.?

Without a doubt, this book has helped me spot my own errors and learn how to correct them! The mazes are super fun not only for children but also for adults! Spelling Works not only helped me learn simple concepts, but helped me remember them through their learning activities and mazes.

So if you have a child that needs help with spelling, or maybe you yourself need help, pick up this book! I promise, you won’t want to put it down!

Buy It!

You can buy the Spelling Works for $14.99.

I received a sample product for this review. All opinions are my own and/or my family’s, take it or leave it. Click here to view my whole disclosure policy.

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