We have settled into the fact that our family definitely has a literature-based learning style. We love to read read read! History is one of the areas where literature based products are the most useful to get away from boring textbooks.
YWAM Publishing has a GREAT line of historical biographies on men and women throughout history who have contributed to the Christian cause or were key parts of world history in general. We previously have worked through Davy Crockett, Daniel Boone, Laura Ingalls Wilder, and Orville Wright (
you can read the previous reviews of YWAM Publishing on my blog). I was surprised when my boys decided to have us review
Heroes of History- Ronald Reagan from the
Heroes of History series this time. Join me as I share our unit study of the 40th President of the USA!
About YWAM Publishing
YWAM Publishing is a company determined to produce quality biographies and unit studies on men and women who are considered heroes—either to the Christian Faith or to history itself. With that in mind, they have created two series, Christian Heroes: Then and Now and Heroes of History, offering an extensive collection of biographies of men and women throughout the ages, who need to be recognized for their accomplishments.
Here is a sampling of the titles included in each series:
Christian Heroes: Then and Now
Betty Green, C.S. Lewis, David Livingstone, Gladys Aylward, Jacob DeShazer, Corrie ten Boom, and more!
Heroes of History
Christopher Columbus, William Bradford, Captain John Smith, William Penn, Benjamin Franklin, George Washington, John Adams, Meriwether Lewis, Milton Hershey, George Washington Carver, Laura Ingalls Wilder, Harriet Tubman, Clara Barton, Douglas MacArthur, Ronald Reagan, and more!
These books are available in print, digital, and audiobook form.
Most of the books also have a coordinating downloadable unit study curriculum guide, which includes reading comprehension questions, as well as extensive ideas for turning the books into full unit studies. There are maps, research topics, timeline, hands-on projects, and more included in these study guides. These allow you to take your book into other subjects like geography, history, cultural studies, science, and more!
How Did We Use This Product?
Let me start by saying, I knew what I was getting into with this product since this is the fifth time we have been blessed with a biography set from YWAM Publishing to review. So I already had a game plan! Once I received the zip file with the unit study, I downloaded it, opened it, and clicked "start". Everything is clearly labeled on the menu--I clicked Curriculum Unit Study and it took me to the place where I can print off what I need. The curriculum guide is labeled in two parts: Unit Study part 1 and Part 2. Part 1 has all the teacher manual portion. Part 2 has the reproducibles.
I wanted to have the reading comprehension questions ready to go for each chapter, as well as have all the additional extended learning activities available for me to reference. I printed off most of the teacher manual portion for my use and the reproducibles for the activities I thought we would use. Once printed, I went through the curriculum guide's extended learning activities and highlighted ones that I was interested in doing for this unit. There are so many different options that it was easy to find the ones which would probably work well for our family.
I put this unit study printout in a folder with tabs for holding pages so that I could keep it handy. In the past, we have used a composition notebook to record our answers, but I just added blank notebook pages to the folder for his answers. I made two folders--one for each boy with notebook paper and the reproducible printouts I planned on using. Like the biography page for my sons to fill out as we went. It lets them note the birth/death dates, the full names, the family members, profession, etc. This is very handy as we can fill it in while we are reading.
We went two different speeds for this review: read aloud and independent. My oldest son is completely independent on it, so he knocked out each chapter on his own. Once he was done reading the chapter, he went straight to the comprehension questions for the chapter. While I believe my youngest son COULD read the book on his own, it's much too meaty for me to just hand it over. I prefer to read the chapter to him. This means we went at a MUCH slower pace than my oldest son. I also adjusted what questions we did. I required my oldest son to do all 6 questions, but my youngest son only did the questions that related strictly to the reading itself.
One thing we like about the study guide is that the routine is always the same in regards to the six comprehension questions:
1. Vocabulary word from text (page number noted)—to be defined and used in a sentence
2. Questions 2-4 came straight from the reading
3. Questions 5-6 mentioned events or people from the reading and then had critical thinking questions to take the student beyond the reading and apply their own thoughts.
The answers for questions 1-4 are provided are included in the teacher manual. Questions 5 and 6 are more open-ended critical thinking questions so the answers will vary.
I required my oldest son to answer everything in complete sentences. We decided that this time, we would trade off in how we answered the questions. We did a rotation of written response and oral response. This routine worked great. I was impressed that most of the vocabulary words he was able to define without even using the dictionary. I believe this is due to our strong focus on vocabulary studies this year and his increased reading level. He's coming in contact with a lot more advanced words and is able to use context to determine what they might mean.
Here is a sampling of what a set of questions looks like:
My oldest worked through the book reading 3-4 chapters per week, but due to the length of the chapters and the fact that there were more chapters in this book than previous times, he only JUST finished the book this week. In addition to the questions for each chapter, he also completed the biography page for Ronald Reagan, and two of the maps. The maps gave him a nice visual of where Ronald Reagan moved to throughout his life. We used my big state atlas to complete the map work, plotting the list of cities included in the curriculum guide.
While I didn't have him to the timeline with this book, we discussed the events of Ronald Reagan's life and where they would fall on the timeline. We also discussed how I was alive during the presidency of Mr. Ronald Reagan, even though I do not remember anything about it. He also spoke his grandparents about what they remembered about President Reagan and discovered all four have very positive memories of his presidency AND remembered the day of the assassination attempt. My oldest was enthralled with this!
His most favorite thing that we did this unit study, however, was to watch two of Ronald Reagan's old movies: Bedtime for Bonzo and This is the Army. I was able to find both of them on Amazon and we watched them through Prime Video. My son was amazed that the phrase his daddy has ALWAYS used for him "Bedtime for Bonzo!" comes from a Ronald Reagan movie! His dad laughed and said that it was HIS Nan's most favorite movie to watch by Ronald Reagan. It was great to have real-life connections to make. The boys LOVED the movies--, especially the Bonzo one.
My oldest son also discovered to his surprise (not mine! LOL) that the quote he has been working on memorizing for his regular history course is a quote by Ronald Reagan. He is even more thrilled to have initially picked it to learn--long before he ever did this unit study.
Out of all the YWAM Publishing reviews we have done (this is our 5th), I can safely say that this biography has been his absolute favorite. He just really connected with the story of President Reagan's life and we have had many great talks stemming from the curriculum study guide critical thinking questions--especially about the economy.
My youngest son is enjoying the story of President Reagan's life. He is a little below the age that the curriculum guide is geared to, but he is filling out the biography page and one of the maps with my help. And of course, he loved the movies!
As with the other YWAM Publishing unit studies, this one is excellent. I found it to be well researched and to really showcase how decisions made when Mr. Reagan was younger, led to him being the President he turned out to be. While not overtly a Christian unit study (his faith in God is mentioned, but not the primary focus), I like how the focus is really on the Christian character of the person (and yes, even some challenges they faced from unwise decisions). I am glad that we have this additional unit study in our collection--and with the addition of this book, we ALMOST have 200 years of US history covered in our biographies! What a great resource! (YWAM Publishing even shows you HOW you can use their unit studies for a full history curriculum on the curriculum guide!)
As always with Unit Studies, this curriculum is for the parent who doesn't mind grabbing this or that and doing some leg work to make everything happen. The "text" is definitely the book itself, but the additional information and suggestions for taking the study further are what REALLY make it an excellent unit study. It is not open-and-go unless you strictly are using the book and chapter questions only. You also have to sort of make up your own lesson plan. I don't mind doing this, which is why unit studies work well in our family!
Want to Know More?
For the last several weeks, we have been reviewing the
Heroes of History- Ronald Reagan Unit Study from the Heroes of History series by YWAM Publishing. You have seen how we used the curriculum, but there were a bunch more reviewed by our team--make sure you go and check them out!
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