• Aug. 20, 2008
TOS has out done themselves again!
I am sure that many of you have already either purchased The Schoolhouse Planner from TOS and/or a Digital subscription to TOS Magazine or you have at least seen reviews of one or both products. Well, here is another one. I hope that you find it useful and informative.
DIGITAL TOS MAGAZINE -- CONVENIENCE OR CATASTROPHE
First I ought to tell you, I do have a subscription to the print magazine and I really enjoy it. I really do not like reading articles of much length on the computer. When I come across something of length that I want to read, I print it out. Yes, I wind up with a lot of paper that winds up little more than scratch paper. Expensive habit that I really am trying to break. (Trying to save those trees.) So, going into this, I knew I would not like reading the magazine in digital format. Sure I can print it out and read it like that, but as I said, I am really trying to break myself of that habit. I really could not imagine printing out an entire magazine to read, either. I print out enough for teaching my children. So, with predisposed negativity, I set about "trying" to read the digital version of TOS magazine issue. Boy, was I in for a shock! I am constantly amazed at how God shows us the error of our ways/thinking. I was already being judgmental and I was SO wrong!
FIrst, as I said I enjoy the print version of TOS. I only got the current issue a couple of weeks ago and already it is well worn. I found so many websites that I wanted to look at and rather than write them down, I just flip back through the magazine to find them. I do it this was so that I can find new and interesting tidbits that I missed before. When I went to the digital version, I found that it was SO fantastic that I can click any link and it will open in a new page. Links opening in a new page is FANTASTIC! That way I can continue reading the magazine and when I am done, I have the links that I wanted to look at already opened and waiting for me. I get to further investigate the links I wanted to in a much easier manner. Another plus, the venders have clickable links as well. So, if I would like to research any of the vendors to see if they may be a fit for our family, those pages are waiting for me as well. I really like that I don't have to stop reading to click the link. That is a HUGE benefit to me.
I don't think I will switch from my print subscription to the digitial version. However, I still have time to decide that. When my year subscription is up, I may very well be a convert. The digital version of TOS Magazine is really just that great. By the way, the articles are not overly long so reading them online is not a problem. What I was sure would be a mediocre experience at best turned out to be really wonderful.
THE SCHOOLHOUSE PLANNER -- JUST HOW GOOD IS IT?
I am going to start off by answering my own question first and then explain why. HOW GOOD IS IT? It is absolutely FANTASTIC! I have been through dozens of different planners and found most of them severly lacking. The SchoolHouse Planner comes the closest to being "IT" as I have ever come across. Honestly, this thing is GREAT!
Within the planner, there are calendars in multiple formats (year at a glance, 2-page monthly spread, and weekly planning pages). For every month there are so many great learning/teaching ideas that are clickable. Granted, those ideas are from TOS and the links lead you to certain products for sale at TOS, but they are great for ideas whether you choose to purchase the linked items or not. The way some of them are grouped by theme and or holiday will make unit planning easier. Again, you do not have to purchase anything, just the link titles are good to use for further searchings elswhere on the internet or the library. I noticed several topics that I would not have grouped with other items within the group, but they really make sense together and they all lead into the others.
Another fantastic part of the planner is the inclusion of several historical documents of our great country (Constitution, Emancipation Proclamation as well as others). These are in easily printed format in their entirety wich makes it easy to laminate them for future reference or memorization of say....The Preamble. There are many other reference charts as well that are very informative and will be useful throughout several years. I know that my personal laminator will be getting a work out.
Not only are there several "educational" information charts, there is also a kitchen measurement conversionl chart that we normally would not view as educational, but it really is. To go along with the kitchen chart, there are many wonderful sounding recipes. I cannot wait to try several of them. I have even rearranged my weekly menu to include one right away.
Now, let's get to the "school" part of this planner. WOW! All the aforementioned items are indeed school related, but then we have the planning forms. However you like to plan out your year, it is covered here. There are also forms for recording curriculum used, websites, books, videos, etc. Really there are so many different forms to cover so many aspects of homeschooling. Co-op, support group, field trips, outside classes (like 4-H projects, Scouts, Brownies, etc.), unit studies, all covered. And so much more. Whatever your style, this planner will work for you.
I am sure that I am not alone in this. I try so hard to get at least the first six-weeks of school planned out before school starts for us. It never fails that something will happen and I wind up off schedule in one or more areas. Then, I have a dilemma. Do I re-copy everything and update my planner or do I flip back and forth in the planner until we get caught up (supposing that we do get caught up)? I do not have to deal with that anymore. No more writer's cramp. All the forms can be typed on and saved. If you have a program like Nova PDF Lite (you can get a free version here), you can click the print button, change the printer to the Nova selection, click print and it will create a page in a new file that you can save. That way, if you need to update, you can simply copy and paste (copy from the Nova file and paste to the new Schoolhouse Planner page) what you need to and only make changes to what needs to be updated. THAT is really AWESOME to me. Now, my planner won't be a constant reminder that we are not "on schedule."
There are also more household forms. There are forms for the baby-sitter, medical info, menu planning, grocery shopping, budgeting, address book pages, "To Do" lists, etc. There is even a garden planner! I am really excited about that one! Again, there are many more forms for the household, including CHORE CHARTS!
If there were anything I could change about this, I would add a "Day-at-a-Glance" page. As a WAHM, with a business that requires several appointments, that would be a BIG BONUS for me. I would also like a "Daily Schedule" page. My children, or at least my 10 year old son, needs to be reminded that we do have a schedule that needs to be at least generally followed. Sure, it gets overlooked sometimes as well, but if it were a part of this planner, it would be easy to update, tweak, and adjust as we needed to.
I really think that I will include this in the notebook I have which includes all our homeschool and household info/forms/schedules. Actually, this will replace the majority of what is in my notebook already. Here, I thought I put together a pretty good notebook. TOS has certainly filled in the gaps that I didn't even know that I had.
So, in closing, I must say that I was on the fence about buying The Schoolhouse Planner. I mean $39 for a school planner! I just really couldn't see it. I am SO THRILLED that I was asked to review it. It is not simply a school planner. It is a school and a house planner. It is a life planner that happens to include school and household planning as well. It is TRULY worth every penny. In using this planner for barely a week, I must say that I am really impressed with how much more organized I feel and how much more I am able to get accomplished in the day. And I don't feel harried or rushed. Good-bye guilt and hello organization. Thanks to TOS, I NOW have the perfect notebook!
