Our latest Crew Review item was threefold. We received a book on George Washington: True Patriot as well as a two part study guide. These are available from YWAM Publishing. They have a series called Heroes of History with several different figures they focus on. We received George Washington while others received Jim Elliot
The George Washington book is recommended for children ages 10 and up. We used it as a read aloud for all of our children but found that the study guide was a bit much for some of them. My 8 year old who is in 2nd grade did not have a problem completing the study guide but my 1st graders did. It's just a bit too much. They all had better luck answering the questions if I asked them out loud though.
Both the book and unit study are written by Janet and Geoff Benge. You may purchase the book in paperback, kindle, nook, or audiobook versions for $6.99. I think the audiobook versions would be wonderful for car rides though I have not listened to them so don't know how well the voices are done. The study guide can be purchased in paperback or pdf for $7.49.
We received pdf files of the unit study and a kindle edition of the book to review. I loved the voice that the book is written in. It is full of information but not dry or in a way that kids won't want to listen or be compelled to hear more. We are big readers in our family and I read a lot of books outloud to the kids so this was not a big deal to them, just another day in the Slocum house learning about history!
This study fit right in with what we're studying in school which was great! My kids already knew somethings and I would have to regularly stop reading to answer their questions or read around exclamations of names before I read them. It really was super fun and funny for me to hear them repeating things they'd learned and the excitement of them remembering things. For our Revolutionary war and Colonial history semester we've been watching a video series that my kids adore and it has included lots of information from this book that they loved being able to regurgitate to me and to daddy when he got home at the end of the day. I think they were surprised to discover that daddy already knew some of this stuff too! Their faces were priceless when he could tell them who the people they wanted to tell him about were.
At a length of 224 pages this is definitely not a fast reading book. You wouldn't want to read it fast either as you might miss important information. My kids were shocked to find out that George Washington was involved in more than just the war but went on to be President as well. They also were very outraged that he was in the British army at one point. It was definitely a good learning experience for them.
I have say if this book is any indication of what the rest of the Heroes of History series is like we will be wanting to use more of these in our history lessons. Not only do they cover history but also geography, government, and science. They are a joy to read and the study guide is thorough and well thought out.
Other Crew members reviewed a biography of Jim Elliot as well as some who reviewed Washington as we did. Please hop over to the Main Crew Blog Post and read their reviews to see what they thought of their books. I'm sure most enjoyed them as much as we did!
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