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We reviewed Little Folks' Letter Practice. We found this to be very simple. For our child this was too easy for K level. It is basically for the Pre-K level. It has pages that are of coloring book quality. We photo copied the pages to make them easier to write on with a pencil. The letters of the alphabet are one to a page with a trace and write page following each letter. The pictures with each letter try to complement our faith. The introduction offers creative advice for the use of the book. The last 5 pages of the book encourage the child to sound out words. There are four or five possible words in a column. A blank has been left in front of each word, such as 'an'. Pictures to the possible word are in the right hand column to assist the child in the discovery of the word. The child will need to sound out the word in the column look at the pictures such as 'man' and write the consonant. There are no difficult words to sound out. All words are only three letters such as 'man', 'cat', 'mop', etc. This is a nice book for becoming familiar with the alphabet.

I'm just thrilled with it the Little Saints program on my first overview. The subtitle of the book is "A Catholic Preschool Program with Classical Disciplines", and it is just what I wanted last year! I'm going to try it with my soon-to-be-3 year old and my Kindergartner this year.

Last year, I purchased one of the Five in a Row (FIAR) volumes, but FIAR just didn't mesh well with our gang. My 4 year old (who is the size of an 8 year old and looks like a meat packer, but is really an "artsy" teddy bear at present) was bored by re-reading the same book for a week, and he wasn't too thrilled with the question/answer/research type of work. He wanted to MAKE things and read MORE books...sounds like his mama!

The Little Saints program is *not* a phonics or math or "academic" preschool program, although phonics and handwriting and basic math information is included. It is heavily based in literature, religion, and the arts. I'm overwhelmed as it is *just* what I would have wanted to do had I the proper background....and a dozen years of free time.

The program is laid out by month, with "themes" for each week during the months of August through May. The 40 themes are those typical of preschool: seasons, family life, animals, senses, people around the world, and so on. Each theme is organized into a 3-day school week, with many ideas of activities for that day.

Every "day" has notes for the teacher as to the basic goal of the day, a short quote from the Bible (which I will be using for copywork for my Kindergartner), storytime, nursery rhymes, poetry, story-telling and finger plays (memory work), songs and circle games, at least one learning game, and an art project. The first pages of each week/theme clearly lays out for the busy parent: exactly what materials are needed for each game and each project, a listing of the skills being worked on that week, a listing of correlated classical music for music appreciation, and a long listing of picture books on the theme of the week. Most of the titles of the picture books are familiar to me, so they are either "classics" or easily found at the library.

The appendices include the text of the rhymes and finger plays and songs. The author notes that if you repeat the program for a second year that you will notice a considerable difference between a 3 year old child and a 4 year old child.

In short, I'm just thrilled with this program.

Our third child, now a deep voiced high schooler towering me by several inches, learned to read with me when he was five years old using these little folding readers. This new edition has a new cover and some additional materials, but the readers themselves are the very same I used ten years ago! He looked at these the other day and could remember many of the stories.

The bulk of this program consists of four levels of readers that we tear out and fold in four. I made color coded envelopes out of construction paper ten years ago, the same envelope I am using with our youngest this year. I tucked the envelopes in a pocket folder, and as we folded and read each little book, it was neatly stored.

The little books follow a simple sequence of phonetic sounds, beginning with the "short a" in the first title At Mass. What we like about these is the fact that we begin from day one reading a little story. None of my children enjoyed very much reading pages of words in other readers. These have a few new words displayed on the little book's cover, but each little book is one independent whole story. These mini-stories are delightfully Catholic, and succeed in being at the same time funny and suspenseful enough!

This latest edition has a nice new glossy cover and several cardstock pages with phonics strips and illustrated phonetic sound cards to cut. Silly Willy Sentences strip are also included, introducing basic syntax concepts. A separate Parent's guide booklet is included, with simple guidelines for teaching to read with this program, and booklet-by-booklet directions for introducing the new sounds and words.

This new book on the liturgical year was published last year by a recent homeschool graduate. The segment on Advent covers 34 pages (the pages are 8 1/2 x 11 inches with very dense text - so this is quite a bit of material). Miss McEneany, has provided a very thorough, updated resource for Advent traditions by bringing together detailed instructions, ideas and explanations from a wide variety of resources (including quotes from the Catechism of the Catholic Church and explanations about traditions from the Byzantine rite). This segment on Customs for Advent includes information about the Advent Wreath, (and the Byzantine Advent wreath), the Christ Candle, Jesse Tree Symbols and corresponding Old Testament readings, Advent Friends (sometimes called Kris Kringles), Gifts and Cribs for Jesus (to prepare with good deeds, prayers and sacrifices during Advent), ideas for daily spiritual devotions during Advent and quite a bit more. Each explained custom (where appropriate) also includes related prayers.

The second chapter provides detailed ideas for Home Education during Advent by means of a unit study on the time before Christ. This unit study ties together a certain amount of History, English/Vocabulary, Geography, Religion, Math, Literature, Health, Religion, Art, Science, Home Economics and Latin/Music in order to delve deeper into the meaning of Advent.

Chapter three covers Advent Recipes which differ from older books because of a more modern emphasis on natural foods. I would also have to explain that the recipes are not necessarily "traditional" Advent recipes, but rather natural food recipes that would be considered appropriate for Advent. This chapter includes an extensive segment on growing sprouts as well as recipes for dishes (along with explanations of why they are appropriate) such as: Avocado Potato Salad; Root, Sprout and Flower Noodle Salad; Carrot Salad Fish Loaf, Beet Soup, Avocado-Cauliflower Cream Soup, Carrot Cake and Sprouted Sunflower Burgers. All recipes in the book are meatless and in fact contain no animal products (making them cholesterol free). A four page section in the middle of the book provides glossy, full-color photos of the recipes, many of which incorporate festive decorations. The book also includes an extensive bibliography, a listing of sources for materials and foods mentioned in the book and an alphabetical index of recipes.