I am going to turn away from the serious subject matter and review a couple of books that I have been using for history & science. Please keep in mind this is my first attempt at reviewing ever and that I am also learning to type on a tablet. Mistakes will be made and probably not noticed by me until later. I am definitely ordering a keyboard, so be patient.
The first book we enjoyed is The Kid's Book of Clouds and Sky by Frank Staub. This is our first experience with this author but he has also written many other educational books on a variety of science and social topics.
The targeted grade level for this book is 5-7, and indeed, some of the words are on the difficult side and it can get lengthy for my guys, who are in 1st and 3rd. The book is written as a series of questions, which is nice for easing the length. I was able to read a question or two, or a page or two, each day and we weren't feeling overwhelmed.
With every question topic, there is a group of small photos with captions that reinforce the topic discussed. This is not normally a format I get behind, because I have a pretty short attention span and a lot of clutter on a page overwhelms me quickly and tends to confuse the boys. In this case, though, it is done simply and with purpose and for the most part the photos and captions really do reinforce the topics instead of confusing them.
I chose this book primarily to help teach cloud formations, but we really got a mini-course in weather forcasting. It was fun. The book includes several mini-experiements such as making rainbows with water and prisms and making clouds in a jar. I think most of the experiments are too simple for the average 5-7 grader, but my boys loved them. They begged to do more experiments and then to do them again, which is really music to a mother's ears.
While we learned a great deal about our atmosphere and weather patterns and a lot of the material was on or around our level, the book does go into great detail on cloud types and is a bit more than I was originally looking for. I thought it was important that the boys know the basic cirrus, cumulus, stratus and cumulonimbus and thought they would be confused by terms like altostratus and cirrocumulus.
That is, until we went outside. We spent a lot of time looking at the sky with and since this book and we noticed nearly all of the cloud types identified in the book in our own backyard view of the sky. The boys did ask for an explanation of a cirrocumulus sky and they seemed to enjoy terms like 'mackerel sky'. I think a lot of sky time is a must to learn all of the terms and topics covered.
Almost as a bonus, the book also covers the night sky, auroras, constellations and moon phases. It provided a good introduction to our next topic, which will be the moon, the stars and the planets.
While my third grader probably got more out of this than the first grader, I think we all now have a greater understanding of our sky. This is worth a check out at the library, at least.
Stay tuned for my review of
The American Story: 100 True Tales from American History
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