Signs of Summer

Posted on July 31, 2017 by Barb

Yum…nothing says summer like green beans fresh from the garden:

Another sign of summer: tomorrow is August 1, and for many of you, that means getting ready for another year of homeschooling. It’s been six years since I finished homeschooling my youngest, but I still get that desire to buy more curriculum every August. Old habits die hard, I guess!

Back when I had the newsletter, I wrote and published a series called “The ABC’s of Homeschooling.” I think I’ll run it again, starting tomorrow, for those of you who would like a little encouragement as you start another (or maybe your first?) year of homeschooling.

When a Review is not a Review

Posted on July 3, 2017 by Barb

Whenever I’m going to buy something, I like to look at the reviews of the product online first to see what people are saying about it. In general, I think word of mouth is pretty valuable because it’s usually someone’s actual opinion based on their experience, as opposed to hype or advertising from the company that made the item.

Traditionally, a product review is something the product’s creator never pays for (other than the cost of the review copy and shipping); in addition, it’s bad form to ask for a good review. The whole point is for the reviewer to give an unbiased opinion. Obviously, if the review copy were to arrive with a check payable to the reviewer, the review would be biased.

We started Cardamom Publishers, our homeschool publishing business, in 2003, and we’ve never paid for a review or asked for a good review. We just send out review copies and wait. We’ve been gratified to receive good reviews, and we want homeschooling parents to know that those reviews are unbiased.

There are many good homeschool websites and magazines that offer unbiased reviews. But apparently there are others who require creators to pay for something they call a product review, but which is actually an advertisement. I recently received an email from one such site, howtohomeschool.net. They’ve offered to review our products. Here are the details:

Removed at the request of the writer 7/11/17

There’s nothing wrong with advertising, but to claim that a paid ad is a product review is dishonest. Homeschooling parents love hearing the opinions of other parents about homeschool products; I valued that input when I homeschooled my four kids. But there’s a huge difference between an unbiased opinion and a paid ad, and I don’t think it’s fair to imply that there isn’t one, especially when your intended audience is made up of very busy homeschooling parents who have enough to do without trying to figure out when they’re being misled.

Today: Life Prep, Third Edition Now Available

Posted on June 1, 2017 by Barb

Today is the official publication date of the third edition of Life Prep for Homeschooled Teenagers!

I originally wrote this curriculum for my eldest daughter and used it for her and her brother when they were doing homeschool high school. It was first published in 2003. We added to it and used that second edition (2006) for our youngest daughter when she was a homeschooled teen.

Homeschooling parents continued to buy the curriculum all these years, but over time I started thinking about how it needed to be updated. Two years ago, I began that work, but a serious illness with hospitalization interrupted my efforts. Just about the time I began regaining my strength, my husband was hospitalized with the same illness. So we had some hurdles, but thank God we’re doing better and we were able to finish the third edition of Life Prep just in time for the June 1 publication date.

It’s a lot bigger now! There are six new projects:

Debt Penalty Project
Debt Calculator Project
Student Loan Project
Checking Account Project
Debit Card Project
Bank Safety Project

Other features of this updated and expanded edition include:

The new “Work or College?” section helps you determine if your teenager is “college material.” Given the tremendous increase in college costs over the past 14 years, you can’t afford to miss that section. Another new feature of that section shows you and your teen how to research potential careers to determine which ones are financially viable.
I’ve added two terrific books to the Reading List: The Treasure Principle and George Muller: Man of Faith and Miracles.
The Financial Freedom project has been updated to reflect current prices, and the Health Insurance Project has been updated with regards to the Affordable Care Act.
The curriculum gained 34 pages and now has color illustrations.

You can buy Life Prep for Homeschooled Teenagers, Third Edition direct from Cardamom Publishers; it’s also available at Rainbow Resource Center, Christian Book Distributors, Amazon, Barnes & Noble…anywhere books are sold!

More Jobs Not Requiring College

Posted on April 8, 2017 by Barb

My kids are grown and my grandkids are little, so college isn’t really an issue in our family right now. But for homeschoolers, it looms large, so I like to share news of what’s going on in terms of whether or not teens can or should go to college.

Lately I’m seeing more articles about companies no longer requiring new hires to have a college diploma, like this one and this one.

I see this as a good sign. I have nothing against going to college; in fact, my college experience was a great one. But I think that requiring every potential employee to have spent (probably borrowed) six figures to get that diploma is ridiculous, and I’m glad to see the landscape slowly changing.