Pearson Learning
800-992-0244
I love this company! This is the first catalog that I ever ready that made me believe that high school is MORE than do-able with my LD kids.
AGS Globe and Pearson publish textbooks written at Alternative and Foundational levels. Alternative texts are for students who need some extra support, but who are on-track for graduation. They are written for kids who attend general education classrooms, but who are reading 1 – 3 grades below level. Foundational texts are for studens who divide their time betweek regular classrooms and separate classrooms and who read 3 or more grades below level.
Why do you care what the public schools do, or what books they use? I cannot tell you how many times I have been asked this question: My child has been diagnosed with XYZ and I want to homeschool high school. How can I do those courses with him?
These types of modified texts might be the answer! They cover the content of state high schools, but at a level that is reachable by our students. Titles are available in all subject levels, giving you the knowledge that you CAN homeschool your special needs high schooler!
This catalog also has tons of other resources, like adapted classical literature, life skills instruction and more. When you call for the catalog, ask for the “Accessible resources for secondary students” catalog.
Remedia Publications
800-826-4740
There are so many fun and interesting things in this catalog! Like Catch Balls to practice math skills and Hot Dots (R) math flash cards. There are materials for high-interest readers, writing, math, science and test taking strategies. If you are looking for ideas to spice up any of these areas, you’ll find lots of them here. What I really appreciate about catalogs like this is that I can take the ideas and often make comparable materials for use with my kiddos. For example, there is a classroom time activity mat. The child lays on the mat and places their arms in the position of the hands on a clock, getting their whole body involved in learning to tell time. Great idea, right? In the summer, why couldn’t you draw a clock face in your driveway with sidewalk chalk and do the same activity for next to nothing? See what I mean!
EPS – School Specialty Intervention
800-225-5750
Have you heard of Explode the Code, or Wordly Wise? These great books come from this company and their School Specialty Intervention catalog is full of other great aids. You can fins a Gillingham manual here, as well as the Primary Phonics program and the Megawords program. This catalog is strongest in the language arts ares, including spelling, reading, writing, grammar, handwriting, and vocabulary. They also have some leveled and decodable readers. If you are at a loss for teaching in these areas, this catalog will give you plenty of ideas.
Sopris West
800-547-6747
Although prediminately “professional” resources, there are a few products in this catalog that I like. When my dd was in 4-5 grade, we used their REWARDS program for developing fluency in multi-syllabic reading. She learned prefixes, suffixes and root words, allowing her to ready many more words than she had before.
REWARDS programs are also available for social studies passages, science passages and writing – sentence refinement.
This is also the source for the Step Up to Writing program. Although it is pricy, this program teaches the 6+1 (c) writing trait method. If you aren’t already wedded to a program, like IEW (Institute for Excellence in Writing), this might be a good hands-on, incremental program to explore.
Perfection Learning
800-831-4190
Of the several vendors I’ll discuss, I am least familiar with this one, but their catalog is intriguing and is worth a look if you seek modified materials for your child. So many interesting books jump out, like parallel text Shakespeare Plays. The books have the original text on one page and a line-by-line modern translation on the facing page. Then, there are classic books in the Retold Program, which adapts cultural tales and classic literature. The literature section alone provides tons of ideas for fitting the work to the child, rather than the child to the work.
Another useful feature of this catalog is the booklists. You can cruise books for specific groups, such as reluctant young male adult readers, or ALA picks for middle school. For those of us who don’t always track with new writers and literature for students, these lists are a great take-along to the library.
Books are offered for other subjects as well, including science, grammar and more. Tale a look here to see if you can gather some ideas for your kids.
Academic Therapy Publications
800-422-7249
While Academic Therapy predominately publishes assessments and “professional” resources, this is the source for the High Noon series. These are so-called high interest/low level supplemental readers, with 1st, 2nd and 3rd grade readability. These are little chapter books that will make your struggling reader experience success in reading longer material. There are also a few mystery series, sports series, biographies, historical fiction, science-based fiction, and adventure series. I also really like the Cornerstone Classics series of classical literature adapted for our kids.
These are a little pricy. If you know a special ed teacher or receive services through a school, they will probably have these in their lending library.
Walch Education
Middle & High School, Adult/Alternative Education
800-341-6094
While this catalog has many products geared to public school systems, there are many resources that are appropriate and useable for our kids.
Have you seen the mini-sized books called “Daily Warm Ups”? These are available in a variety of subjects, like world cultures, law and world religions. What I have used them for is as mini-reviews for my kids.
There are topics that you want to stick that require several repetitions, like geography concepts, general math or daily editing exercises. I like these because they are bite-sized reviews that you can build into any study.
Another great product from Walch is their Daily Writing Fundamentals series. Available in four grade levels, each book has 32 weekly passages, with five-daily question and writing applications. Kids edit, dissect and learn from models of narrative, persuasive and expository writing, and daily work only takes 5 to 10 minutes. Again, a great way to work repetition of these concepts into your daily schedule.
The other products I have seen from here are two history volumes for grades 6-9: Short Lessons in World History and Short Lessons in US History. These are interesting, easy readings for our kids. Although they are advertised as a supplement to a core curriculum, you could use these as core texts, add some other non-fiction resources and literature, assign some writing activities and you would have a decent high school level course for our learners.
Walch also offers alternative texts for our kiddos in math, science and more. There are also several life skills books worth checking out to ensure that your child has these necessary skills.
