Fear No Numbers by Jose Paul Moretto--Book Review

Fear No Numbers  (How to multiply or divide and always get it right)  by Jose Paul Moretto.


ISBN  978-1-4327-8724-0

Paperback--52 pages.  Also available in ebook format.

Published by Outskirts Press, Inc










When I seen this book in my email with an offer to do a review I wanted to jump on it.   Most of you know that we are a homeschool family.  I only have one daughter left at home and she does not like math at all.  It's what we are struggling with to get enough hours for high school credit.

I received the book in the summer with full intention of making her do math with this book over the summer.  As summer goes, that just didn't work out.
We did just recently finish going through the book.

At first Jasmine hated it just like she hates all math.  Before it was over though, she loved it and was even showing others how it works when they would come over!

In Fear No Numbers we are taught 2 concepts:  The Proof of Nine and the MaXima system.

I knew there were several secrets to the number 9 in math.  I had NO idea about these systems.  I had fun learning them as well.
I recommend this book whether you are a homeschool family or if your child is struggling in school as a supplement for home.

 

Fear No Numbers: How to Multiply or Divide & Always Get It Right

Interview with the author:
What is your book about?
It introduces proven and fun ways to check one's products and quotients, by using the Proof of 9 System and the Maxima System.

What made you decide to write this book?
In late 2010, the media reported that the status of America's young people had fallen to 25th in math and science, compared to other countries. I want young people to have a fun addendum to what they are currently learning.

How did you get your book published? I self-published through Outskirts Press.

Who would be interested in Fear No Numbers?
Pre-teens and up, who are looking for new ways to become enthusiastic about math.

What differentiates your book from others in the same category?
The book demonstrates simplification of numbers to "single whole numbers".

Do you plan on publishing more books?
For my next book, I want to address/recount my childhood experiences during and after World War II, while staying at successive orphanages in Southern France. Though conditions were harsh; meager food, little resources for shoes and clothing, and even abuse by some of those in charge, we children also experiences times of laughter, discovery, and vindication, especially right after D-Day.

Fear No Numbers: How to Multiply or Divide & Always Get It Right


Disclosure: I received Fear No Numbers from the author for the purpose of this review as well as additional information to share. I was not compensated in any other way and all opinions are my own.

Homeschool Journal---The End of the School Year is Closing In

I've not written a "journal" entry blog post for our homeschooling in some time now.
It seems that since Christmas we have had so few days that we actually got in a good amount of book work in a day.

It seems it's just so much unschooling now!  Let's see if I can give a lot of examples.

Jasmine has been doing a lot of exercises as well as learning about "super foods" and more.  This would be health/PE.
Exercising with the Slim in 6 dvd's that I purchased as well as still dancing with the Wii, but also with the Playstation game as well.  She's even tried some exercises that she's read in magazines.
The Slim in 6 dvd's came with a booklet all about exercise, eating and health---we've read it cover to cover twice.  We've tried different recipes etc.
On nice days she's been taking walks.  This last week she walked to the public library (just over a mile from our house)...read half a book while there (language arts) and then walked back home.

Jasmine has taken it upon herself to watch some of the science shows through netflix---such as the How It Works and How Stuff Works series.  She then tells us, and others what she learned from each show.

She is still attending Bible study each Tuesday and youth group each Wednesday.
Recently youth group attended the Winter Jam concert.  This prompted her for days to look up bands and lyrics, and do some sharing of both on facebook. (music)

I pulled out the Thresholds to Adult Living textbook and we've been reading it out loud with discussion.  I love those books!  I picked this one up as well as a few others at the public library book sale.  They are all from the 1960's but still very much (if not more) pertain to how a person should live today.  All of these texts cover every aspect of life from friends, dating, marriage, fitness, cooking, health, jobs, budgeting, decorating, and so much more. (I love the photos within the books)

Jasmine, on her own, had been making herself a budget/goal book.  She has made specific goals of things she is saving for and how much (what percentage of) she will save for each goal out of any money that she earns.  Other math would include grocery shopping with me.  We have been working also in an Everyday Math Survival Skills workbook.

Of course she is still drawing all of the time.  I am going to end this post today with a picture she has recently drawn.  I've also used this picture as the intro photo on one of my squidoo lenses.

I am linking up with:
 

Homeschool Journal--How Do You Handle Days In a Row of Chaos??

This is a me ranting post......but how do you handle having days and days of total chaos??

Last week we only got in one good day of school work with texts and workbooks.    We ended up out and about and not getting to come home when expected day after day.  We didn't even have the usual workbooks in the van to work on.  I had brought them in the house to take the time to go over the work she had done in them.  We only have gotten over one of those workbooks, and yes, that was on our good day of schoolwork.

Let me give you examples of what I am talking about.  One day last week, we started out the day by taking my mom to pay some bills.  It was my oldest daughter's birthday.  After taking my mom around, we stopped back by our house to check the mail for my paycheck.  Got the check, went to the bank, then to the grocery store where we did some coupon shopping.  Driving out of the store's parking lot, my phone rings.  It's my oldest daughter asking if I can please pick her kids up from school (it was early release day) because she was in a car accident.  Pick the kids up, go to the scene of the accident, have to run to my mom's and get copies of the insurance.  We were then at the scene of the accident for over an hour.  But, we then had to sit at the DMV for well over an hour to get my daughter's license renewed.  Directly after that it was to take my daughter to the ER as her neck pain and dizziness had gotten worse.  Dropped her off at the ER, went to Walmart to do my merchandising job, then home to make my daughter a birthday cake.  The cake barely had time to cool to get to my mom's house for the birthday party.    I don't remember what we did the rest of the evening!

Yesterday the morning started out with me going to do my merchandising job.  I often take Jasmine along because we have things that we do with our smartphones to earn gift cards and money.  We scan things at the stores.  We did our scanning at Walmart and then on to Target to scan more items.  From there we headed to my friends house to sort and cut coupons.  Oh oh...forgot that my mom had a dr. appt.  Take mom to her dr. appt, then my daughter called.  She needed me again to pick her kids up from school, take her to get a pre-paid credit card, then to the car rental place.  Once home there was laundry and dishes to deal with before we could get supper.  A last minute text message from the youth group leader reminded the kids that they were doing a movie and pizza that night.

Yes, lots of real life lessons in these days----learning what happens at the scene of an accident (pictures, paperwork, watching ambulance workers, watching the tow truck work), finding out the hassle of the DMV, coupon shopping to save money, earning money from work....the list does keep going.

Lesson learned??  Pray for patience!    Also, keep those workbooks in the van no matter what.  When I am ready to go over them with her,  just bring one in the house at a time, just in case.

Thank you for reading my ranting  :)

I am linking up with:
 

 

Homeschool Journal--It Was Vacation Week

 Hubby had a week of his vacation last week, so school work wasn't a priority  :)   In fact, the only book work that she did was a page in her Vocabulary Enrichment workbook and the chapter test in her Earth Science textbook.
We also did attend Bible study at church.

We spent a few days out of town with my middle daughter and her family.  That was such a blessing to be able to make the trip and spend time with them.
We did go bowling while we were there---which yes, is written in our time log for PE.

Here is a couple of pictures of Jasmine bowling:

We've started this week out strong, getting in all of the subjects yesterday.  We are heading out the door now for weekly Bible study at church.


I am linking up with:
 

Homeschool Journal--Getting Back In The Swing of Things

We had a good day yesterday getting back in to the swing of schoolwork.  It was actually nice after taking over 2 weeks off.
We started the day with devotions from the Guideposts book.  We moved on to Kansas History reading trading cards of famous Kansans that I had picked up at the state fair this past year.  Then it was Earth Science from the text.  We will be finishing the text up, hopefully before the end of March.  From there we learned about and calculated simple interest in the Understanding Investment and the Stock Market workbook.  She did a workbook page in her Vocabulary Enhancement workbook, and we can't forget exercising with the Wii.

I am glad that we did invest the money in buying the Wii.  Jasmine is sticking with using it for exercise and enjoying it.  

I took a video this past Saturday evening when we had 4 grandchildren overnight.  They were having a blast!




Today is my monthly sewing club at church.  After the usual Bible study upstairs at church, Jasmine will come down, have lunch and then get busy on the various workbooks that remain in the van.  They remain there since we do end up out and about a lot.  This way she can keep on working.  It works for us!   Do you do anything like this as well?

I am linking up with:
 

Homeschool Journal---December 2012 in Review

Happy New Year!

December didn't bring much schoolwork as far as textbooks and workbooks, but we stayed super busy with Christmas!

Here is our month in review in photos:

Jasmine is helping me put together Christmas sacks for the whole family.

The completed Christmas sacks are filled and ready to be handed out.

Our family Christmas gift this year, bought for ourselves is a wii.  Yes, bought mid December.  Here is Jasmine, and my grandson Allen dancing away.  She is trying to dance to at least 3 songs a day.

Jasmine portrayed Mary in the Christmas program at our church, December 16th.  Joseph was played by her boyfriend, William.
Both of them also were part of the bell choir at another church where they attend youth group.  That was lots of practice time both for our church program and for their bell songs.  Unfortunately I don't have pictures of the bell choir as they were in the choir loft and we couldn't see them.

Other highlights for the month that I don't have photos for include:

Dinner theater put on by their youth group.  Jasmine didn't choose to take part in the theater part as far as acting, but did help with the staging and props.   She also cooked and served the dinner.

They served a soup supper during the annual Luminary.

They are currently with their youth group right now.  They had a New Years lock in last night.

Here's to 2013 and a productive year all the way around!!

I am linking up with:




 

Homeschool Journal 11/27/12

Happy Tuesday!
I took last week off from blogging with the holiday.....and I needed a break.

I think I will post these journals every other week.

Thanksgiving week I did have sewing club at church, which means that Jasmine takes her laptop, or workbooks, and she does schoolwork while I sew.  I would really rather her sew for the day with us, but I just can't get her interested in sewing! (I did buy a book at the quilt shop titled Learn How to Quilt in 6 Easy Lessons.  She told me she would work in it with me.  So far we've not gotten past going over the supply list section.)
I did snap a picture of her while we were there.  She was working in some of the SW Advantage software.

So she did have a good day of schoolwork on Tuesday.  She still attends the Bible study upstairs in the morning.  Once it's over we all eat lunch, then she gets to work on whatever it is she's brought.
We also had a full school day on Monday.
Just like yesterday!  We had a full school day with Kansas History, Math, Reading, Vocabulary, Devotions, and Earth Science.  In fact, she did 3 types of math yesterday.  She still has trouble with her multiplication tables, so I pulled out the stack of flash cards.  She worked in the Everyday Math workbook, and we started a new workbook that is all about investing and the stock market.    If we could have days like this 5 days a week it would just be awesome!

Until next week, I am linking up with:

 

Homeschool Journal--US Government

Again we have been lacking in getting schoolwork done.....or at least what I think we should be getting done.

With the elections last week we spent a LOT of hours with US Government.
We bought a workbook called Elections, Elections, Elections and worked through it a bit.  Jasmine did a lot of studying on her own about the candidates and government in general.
On election day we had the tv on to CSPAN for hours.  She learned about the electoral college among other things.
Of course the entire evening and on until about midnight we watched the election results.

She even did US Government through the SW Advantage software.

She is asking me if she can call it good for US Government.   I would say pretty much so.

Otherwise this last week we did a lot of math.   I know she did some other things--US History, Grammar, Vocabulary, Home Ec,  and the usual Bible study and such that is every week.

This week so far we are right on track....ok, so we've only had Monday.  We ripped through all of the subjects yesterday and I am crossing my fingers that we can stay on track.  We are out all day today, but she will take her laptop with us and work in the SW Advantage software on various subjects.

I still need to finish adding up hours and see just where she is on high school credits.

I know this is pretty boring without photos so I will try to work on that for future weeks.

I am linking up with:
 

Homeschool Journal 10/30/12

We are getting back into the swing of schoolwork. We had a great week last week.

We finished the book we were using for math review on the board. We are now using the board for yet another math review book. Math review is good for Jasmine!

I'm still working on writing down time for each subject, so I've not added any of that up yet to see just how many credits she does have for each subject. I really must get that done so that I know which ones we need to highly concentrate on.

I'm sorry I don't have any pictures to share this week. I'm going to have to get better at that!

Is everyone ready for Halloween? I've already taken the grandkids (and Jasmine) to 3 trunk or treats. We will have trunk or treat at our church tomorrow evening. We are in Kansas, and they say that the tropical storm will cause us to have higher temps right now. I feel and pray for those families in the path of the storms.
I am making up bags to hand out that include samples of the Boogie Wipes, coupons, a coloring page, 2 crayons and a Dum Dum pop. Hubby has his own bags of candy to hand out. Hopefully that green box shows up on my front porch today so that I can make up more bags.

Well, here's hoping for a more exciting report next week-----I am linking up with:

Homeschool Journal--We've been on Hiatus!

We've been on hiatus from many things!  It looks like I've not even written a blog post since October 5th.  Wow!

Life has been just crazy.  First Jasmine was working at the state fair, then my oldest daughter followed the state fair to Oklahoma so we had her 5 children for 2 weeks.  That would have been awesome if I was also homeschooling them, but alas, the father of the 3 oldest says no.

Last week was Jasmine's 16th birthday.  You know 16th's are special so we did a lot of planning and preparing for her party, including driving out of town to pick up my middle daughter and granddaughter so they could be here for her day.

It was rather funny.  One of the things that Jasmine spent some of her birthday money on was a word search book.  At a lull between decorating for the party and such she sat down and started working the word searches.  Her boyfriend called me over to point out that she was learning doing the puzzles.  Each one had a theme such as horses, authors, etc.  I thought it was rather neat that he is seeing the learning outside the classroom and textbooks.  Yes, he goes to public high school.

They are also learning music in youth group.  Jasmine is learning to play the bells for a program they are doing.

I will end today sharing some photos from her birthday party.

I am linking up with:

Homeschool Journal--Hermit Crabs!

Yes, Jasmine spent some of her money earned at the state fair to buy Hermit Crabs.  She's been wanting them for years.

She is all about learning everything about them.  She is diligently taking care of them.

My question is this---one credit of her high school learning is to be laboratory studies in science.   Will learning about and taking care of her hermit crabs count as part of lab science since it's hands on learning?   We do have a microscope kit with book, but it won't come close to the 120 hours minimum needed to count for a credit.

I'm leaving you with some photos of her and her hermit crabs, as well as a video that I took.  All of these will be added to our squidoo lens as well.

 


I am also linking up with:

Homeschool Journal--Work Experience!

Jasmine has had nothing but work experience from September 7-16.  She clocked 104 hours of work at the Kansas State Fair.  She was in a booth selling showerheads.

I have spent this morning looking up high school graduation requirements.  I thought I knew them.  Now I find myself confused.  For Kansas it lists units.  It doesn't say anywhere just what a unit is.  I've done many searches and the best I can find is stating that a high school credit is 120-180 hours based on what the study is.  No help.

At one time I had a chart for graduation and it stated exactly on academic hours and it stated that an academic hour was 50 minutes.  If anyone has any help for me, please let me know!

I was going to give 2 credits of work experience but now it looks like one credit, and it will go under the elective units.

Here is a photo I took of her while she worked one day.  She happened to have just restocked the table and was tearing down the box. 

Looks like I have my work cut out for me calculating hours.

I picked up a whole set of famous Kansans trading cards as well as a book to go with them free at the state fair.  This will be more than enough for the requirement for Kansas history.  Not to mention that we recently took the vacation trip and visited museums too!

I'm also reading that one of the science requirements is a lab course.  We recently bought a microscope so looks like I need to find material to study using it.

I'm linking up with:
 

Homeschool Journal--September 4, 2012

I am finally getting back to posting these weekly.
Generally we start school each year on August 1st since that is the first day of the fiscal school year.  We start slow, introducing a different subject each day, the doing just 2 or 3 until the first day of the public school.
I guess we sort of did that this year too.  Jasmine and I went through her work books and the software.  I explained to her what my expectations are for the year.  We didn't, however, do any "real" schoolwork until the first day of public high school, which was August 16.

I have built a new squidoo lens that will highlight our schooling throughout the year.  It's already pretty full, but will continue to grow.  I do hope you will click over and check it out.  It will open in a new window.

Homeschooling 2012/2013 

I'm going to close this week including the photos of the main things we are using in our schooling this year.  These photos are also included in the lens:

I am happy to once again be linking up with:

 

Squidoo Hopping--This Week's Theme is School

Yesterday was the first day of public school here in our city.  Today is the first day for high school.  Usually we start slow into our schoolwork on August 1, since that is the first day of the fiscal school year.  This year is different only because my daughter now has a boyfriend and today is his first day.  Therefore it's also our first day and time to get serious!

This is why I choose school to be this week's theme.  Please share a lens or two below in the linky that have anything to do with school. (I will be building a new lens later today to get us started for this school year.)
Don't worry...if you don't build lenses related to school, feel free to share 1 or 2 of your other lenses.

Also, share any blog posts you have done that have anything to do with squidoo!

 

Homeschool Journal--About Time I Checked In

I'm not sure I've posted here on my blog about our homeschool since shortly after Jasmine got home from England.

Things have been crazy schedule wise.  We tried really hard to get back in to the swing of a full school day.  It somehow never happened.  Sure, we did have a few good full schoolwork days here and there but not many.

Now here it is summer break time.  I had intended to just do a few of the things until we were done with those books.  That's also not working out so well.  It's hard when her friends are out of school and wanting to hang out.  I just can't tell her "sorry, we need to do math, science, etc etc before you can go".  Her social life is important to her, and to me too.

We have been reading books about Japan.  That was one thing I wanted to finish up throughout the summer.  Well.....the books are due back to the library today and we have already kept them an additional 3 weeks.   I've written down the titles of the books we didn't get to.  I also wrote down the books we started reading and what page we are on.  I will still try to check say 1 out at a time and read when we can.  You know, I am reading these out loud to her so that I am also learning.   You can see the books we are done with on our Learning About Japan lens that we are building as we finish each book.

I wanted to finish up the math book we are using for review on the dry erase board.  We may still get to that as there are 20 lessons left.  We will see.    We are still reading out of the devotions books, of course.   We need to finish the questions at the end of the chapter we are on in the Introduction to Business text.   We are also going to keep working out of the Everyday Fit book.

Church, Bible study, and youth group and all activities involved in those still goes on.  And, we all know that schooling never really ends anyway, especially when you are homeschooling  :)

 

Homeschool Journal--Getting Back in to the Swing of Things....

......or at least I hope we are! We've had a rough year (2012) with so many different things going on (a wedding, funerals, etc) that we've not gotten in many days that I call full school days. A full school day to me consists of getting out all of the books for all of the subjects and working in each one.

We have yet to have a full day of schoolwork since her return from England, but at least we can say we've touched every subject at least twice per week. It's towards the end of the school year and we do have some books we want to finish. Math and devotions are the only 2 things we have done daily.

Hubby and I ordered her a bunch of workbooks for next year. I have loved Hayes Publishing since I learned about them years ago from another homeschool mom. The workbooks are small but you do have to do some research to find the answers. Each workbook does come with answer pages and a little more info. We bought her a new laptop so she will have access to internet to help her find answers.

One thing with me is that there are just too many times when I am busy. I need to be sewing for my craft business....I'm off doing things for my mom....there are church activities....and I've even taken a little part time job twice a week. With the workbooks she will be able to do a lot of work on her own. Of course I still will be working with her a lot. I would miss it if I didn't!

Below is a photo of the workbooks we chose between the 3 of us. You can see there is a wide variety of learning. We spent $94 with shipping.

Homeschool Journal--More Pictures from England!

It still feels like a whirlwind since picking Jasmine up at the airport last Wednesday evening.  The public school here was still on spring break.  We didn't have any intention of getting back to book work anyway.  She was full of stories to tell us of her adventures and things she learned.  She still thinks of something each day  :)

I need to do some figuring in her time book.  How many hours per day of history do I want to count?  She tells me lots because they were go go go go from the time they got up in the morning until they went to bed at night.   I'm thinking 7 hours per day will be good.  I will also be adding PE time to the books for all the walking that they did.

Today I am sharing a few of the 139 photos she took with my camera while away.  I hope you enjoy them.