My children and I have been given the fun opportunity to review a study guide from Progeny Press, our first time ever! 🙂
Progeny Press gives us the chance to study works of literature from a Christian perspective, which I do appreciate. Their guides do use the NIV translation of the Bible, but in the “Note To Instructor” section of the Study Guide, it is clearly stated that the study can be used with any version of the Bible. My family prefers (and always uses) the King James Version.
Because we already owned the book and had been needing a push to get it read, I chose the Study Guide for “The Courage Of Sarah Noble“, which is currently available for the cost of $11.99. This is a downloadable product, so there are no shipping costs, plus, you have the advantage of using it for more than just one child if you like.
The Courage Of Sarah Noble, The E-Guide is suggested for lower elementary (grades K through 3), and my kids are older than that, but we quite enjoyed it anyway. My guys are special needs, two of them still struggle with reading, and the others with thinking skills, so it was a good fit. I would definitely put the reading level of the book at the upper level of the suggested range, but that could just be because “Mr. Loquacious” and “The Puzzler” still struggle somewhat when it comes to reading, and “Mr. Loquacious” dislikes reading altogether! We did think it was a pretty good book, which is based on a true story, something that all of my boys thought was really “cool, mom!”
The book “The Courage Of Sarah Noble” is about an eight year old girl in the year 1707, who goes to cook and clean for her father when he builds their family a home in the wilderness of Connecticut. During her time there, she learns the meaning of trust and friendship as she gets to know the Indians living nearby, and stays with them when her father goes back to get the rest of the family.
The pdf Study Guide is 39 pages long, and if you have reluctant children when it comes to handwriting (or are not proficient with it), the guide is set up so that they may type in the answers, and then print out the pages to keep in a notebook, portfolio, or any type of records you like to keep.
Within the study guide, there are “Before You Read” activities, such as defining a word, looking up a place on a map, or speculating on the “why” of something you will be reading about.
There are “As You Read”
Activities, such as making a list of how many times Sarah reminds herself to “keep up her courage”, and holds her red cloak. We are asked why she holds it, and what it reminds her of.
As we read the book, the study guide broke it up into two chapters per session, with pages for vocabulary, questions, and Bible passages having to do with something in those two chapters.
Question and answer portions we generally do orally, because we like to do unit studies together, and because it makes it easier for all to participate, no matter what their writing or thinking proficiency happens to be.
Finally, there are “Activities, Arts and Crafts” which relate to the book, and which your kids may find to be lots of fun. There is a crossword puzzle, a game that Sarah played with the Indian children, instructions for an art project to create a picture of Sarah and her father, a craft project in which the child can build a pretzel log cabin, and a recipe to make corn meal biscuits.
Finally, our study guide gave us a list of suggestions for further reading, plus an answer key for all of the questions in the study guide.
The Courage Of Sarah Noble, The E-Guide from Progeny Press is very thorough, and we really liked it. I particularly like that it is from a Christian perspective, and that we are not locked into a specific Bible version. It was definitely “tweak-able” for my special needs family, and also for my “King James Version only” family. I also appreciate that as far as I can see from looking at the various titles available, if you do not already own the book you are interested in studying, you will most likely find it at your local library, which definitely saves on the cost! 🙂
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100 Review Crew members reviewed a variety of Progeny Press Study Guides. To see what they and their children thought, please click the graphic below!
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