My family was given the chance to review the Book of Astronomy Set from Memoria Press recently. Considering where we live, this seems like a very good fit for a natural segue into science. I mean, 400 acres in the county with nary a city light in sight. It's the perfect classroom for astronomy.
In this set I received the student book and teacher's manual for this set. It's a nice deal for $31.90 since you get an entire year of science from it. In this book you learn about constellations, stars, zodiacs, and the solar system all tied together with Greek Myths. It is designed for third grade and up and I think that age level is appropriate for the information presented and in the classical manner in which it's given. It is divided into 4 sections and you end up covering all the zodiacs if you complete all sections.
You will be learning/teaching such things as the brightest stars in the night sky in order to locate constellations, magnitude of stars and their brightness which actually helps you move into those 15 brightest stars.
If you have more than one child that will be in this study, you will only need purchase extra student books. It is a study that will interest older kids as well. Younger children will appreciate it but I think the student book might be a bit difficult for them on their own, though working WITH an older sibling might be a nice way to handle that issue.
Now, I said this is all you need for a year of science. However, there is a suggested book for use if you want. It's especially helpful if your child has not studied any mythology or you are not very well versed in the stories themselves. This book is D'Aulaires Greek Myths. We didn't purchase it, but it's mentioned as an option if you want to dive deeper into the myths, the specific reasons behind the zodiac names chosen, etc.
Once you have started on the book and had gotten to know some of the information, you can then take that knowledge right out your back door and put it to immediate use finding constellations in the night sky. Be warned, kids have an automatic in to stay up late. "But Mom, it's SCHOOL WORK". How do you deny that one? Ha ha.
Our Thoughts:
My kids love studying the stars. Ever since we moved out here they have been fascinated with constellations, stars, their names, and locations. They pick it up so naturally so this type of study was excellent for that natural curiosity.
However, I was not a big fan of how much it was tied to Greek Mythology. While I understood and know where the names come from, the stories themselves, and why those types of names were given, we personally were not excited about the depth of mythology knowledge given at such a young age. We prefer to keep that for later in their educational careers, so we won't continue this study beyond the review phase. However, if you like or want to introduce your kids to the Greek stories, this would be an excellent way to do that.
There was quite a bit of writing with this study. Honestly, it might be nice to make this a handwriting portion of your day, especially if your kids aren't really into writing a lot. Or, you could do it orally. We are homeschoolers, there are always ways around those types of issues.
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