We were recently asked by the Schoolhouse Review Crew to review the CHSH Download Club from CHSH-Teach.com. I found myself absolutely amazed at the plethora of resources available, and I think you will also be quite impressed!
About CHSH Download Club
First of all, to assuage your curiosity, I want to tell you the CHSH stands for Christian HomeSchool Hub. (It always drives me crazy when I can’t figure out what an acronym stands for!)
The CHSH Download Club is an electronic product, and we received an annual subscription for the purposes of this review. This site has many different resources for all ages. There are LOTS of different subject areas available, including Bible, Social Studies, Math, Languages, Science, Language Arts, and more besides.
I spent several hours one weekend just exploring the site, and I took a bunch of screenshots because it seemed like the best way to show you just how many resources this site includes. The site has a very simple set-up where you choose the subject you want and then it shows you all the resources in that subject area along with thumbnails of a few of the pages. When you click on a resource it takes you to its page where you can download it if you want it or bookmark it for later.
I feel like I’m always looking for handwriting practice sheets, and I especially liked this set that combines forming each letter with learning the American Sign Language for it. I do wish it was available for more than one letter style, including cursive, but it’s still a fabulous set!
I also thought this Zoopha set was really fun! Making each letter out of an animal is so cool, and I have several kids who would really enjoy coloring these. I think it would also make a fun extension activity to encourage them to see what other animals or other items they could draw into letter shapes.
All three of my girls love word searches, and CHSH has quite a few of them! We especially liked these two because of the horse shape of the first one and because our slight obsession with Hallmark’s Signed, Sealed, Delivered TV series has given my girls a fascination with all-things US Postal Service.
I really like the look of this coloring book. We usually do an extended unit on birds in 2nd or 3rd grade, so I’ll be tucking this one away until Littlenificent is ready for it!
CHSH has some great lapbooking units, and I love how attractively they are presented. That always makes a big difference in whether or not my kids want to do them, and I just know they will love these.
This lapbooking unit about owls will also be nice when Littlenificent does her bird study next year, but I suspect it might get used by Middlenificent even sooner than that. She is loving everything owls right now, thanks again to that TV series I mentioned above.
Another lapbooking unit that really impressed me is this one on the human body. Our study of that is coming up in just a few months, so this was a timely find!
Middlenificent and Littlenificent are wild for certificates right now. It is so meaningful to them whenever they are given one.
I love that CHSH has a large selection of certificates as that will save me the time I’ve been spending trying to create my own that don’t look the same each time!
CHSH also has a good-sized assortment of notebooking pages. We are loving notebooking more and more so I’ve bookmarked several sets, including these People of the Bible Notebooking Pages.
I also liked these music flashcards. These are useful for lots of different games, and it’s great to know I can print as many copies as I want to.
CHSH actually has an impressive number of resources for art and music. The crafts category is full of step-by-step instructionals as well as some out-of-print books that are really fun to page through!
I really like this collection of How to Draw books! My kids really enjoy these types of books, and I appreciated the variety CHSH includes with regards to topics as well as difficulty level.
Our Favorite Resource from CHSH Download Club
My hands-down favorite resource from CHSH Download Club is their 40 week curriculum, Learning about Character Traits.
This curriculum is so well organized! It is obvious that so much thought was put into making it work really effectively for a wide variety of ages. I used it with Littlenificent, who is 6 years old, and I even felt that I could use it for my own Bible study because you can go as deeply as you want! I also love that it’s in full-color with cute illustrations!
Each week, students learn about one character trait. On the first day, you go over the character trait and learn and discuss what it means. Then you choose a book with a character who demonstrates that character trait, either positively or negatively, to begin reading. This is the part that I consider particularly brilliant about this character curriculum. For young learners, this can be a simple picture book. For older learners, it can be a chapter book in which one of the characters displays the character trait. Bible stories can be used at any age. There are some book suggestions given if you find yourself particularly stuck, but I just love the possibilities given by allowing the teacher and especially the learners themselves to choose the book! What a great critical thinking component for older learners!
On the second day, students answer a couple of thought-provoking questions about the character trait regarding behaviors they would see in someone displaying it and how they themselves have displayed it. Another thing I really like about this program is that it includes both positive and negative traits, like grateful and greedy, so the kids are encouraged to evaluate each trait and self-evaluate both positively and negatively throughout the course. They are also instructed to either reread or continue reading their book.
On the third day, they answer more questions about the trait, again encouraging critical thinking and self-evaluation, and either reread or continue to read their book. Then on the fourth and fifth day, they reread the book or finish it and fill out a one-page character study on the character from their book who demonstrated the character trait of the week. They are asked to support their selection of this character by providing evidence from the reading using the character’s words, thoughts, feelings, and actions.
Concluding Thoughts about CHSH
CHSH Download Club is a great value – packed with resources that every homeschooling family can use. They do offer a number of their resources as freebies, so I encourage you to hop over there and look around and see if there is something that would make your homeschooling life a little easier!
Social Media Links
CHSH-Teach.com is very active on social media, so you can connect with them and find out more no matter which you prefer. Find them here:
Facebook Group | Facebook Page | Twitter | Pinterest
Google+ Group | Google Business Page | Linked-In | Tumblr
I, along with other members of the Schoolhouse Review Crew, received a free copy of this product in exchange for our honest reviews. You can see what my fellow Review Crew Members thought of it by checking out the Crew Blog Post for this product. I always love checking out everyone’s reviews as they always come up with creative ways I never would have thought of to use these things!
Can I just rewind and have my littles back again? This looks like a fun resource!
If I were homeschooling my little one which I had considered at one time. I would definitely look further into this. I have found a wonderful Montessori program through the school system which goes through 5th grade. I am so excited she will have the same teacher for 3 years. She has really excelled in this program. Good news, they are trying to get Montessori middle grade classes as well.
We looked for a good Montessori program when we were making our decision to homeschool but couldn’t find an affordable option. I’m so impressed with Montessori!