maps

Memoria Press has been creating Classical Christian Educational materials for Western Civilization since 1994.  Their products focus upon simplicity, affordability and quality and are designed with flexibility in mind for homeschooling families who know little about the subjects they are learning about.  Memoria Press products provide high academic standards for learning.

For this review, The Old Schoolhouse Review Crew was offered a choice between Memoria Press’ Prima Latina and Geography I.  I chose Geography I for us because it was more fitting to the ages of my children.  It is also a current interest in our home education.

Geography I arrived boxed nicely together in a few weeks.  Our box contained a teacher’s guide, student text and student workbook for Geography I and a Teacher’s Key and Student Workbook for the United States.  The set is soft-covered with crisp white pages inside.  Most of the print is black line master.

Geography I’s teacher guide contains the answers to all of the questions through the Geography I Student Workbook.  In the back of this book are quiz and tests for review of the lessons learned.  There is no other lesson information in this guide aside from the answers to the questions and the quiz and tests provided in the back.  

Geography I’s student text covers The Middle East, North Africa and Europe.  The student text breaks each of these continents down into countries.  As you work through the text, the student learns a little about each continent.  They learn first the Story of the Land which tells the history of the land.  Then they learn the Land of the Story which tells specifically about the land itself.  Each section also includes Fast Facts to tell you quick facts about the area.

Each of the continents is broken into countries.  Each countries page tells the student about the history of that country and then tells what the country is like today.  There are also Fast Facts included for each of these countries, as well as a picture of the area, a flag to color in and a map on the opposite page showing the country and area covered.  This repeats for every country and continent shared in this text.  

At the end of the Student Text is a colorized section of country flags for review and also to help the student know what color to color the flag for the country they are currently learning about.  Lessons are approximately two pages long, though they are thorough on information provided about each continent and country.  

The Student Workbook is where the work is at.  In the workbook, students must identify and label the countries on the continent maps.  They must break each country down, sharing capitals and facts.  This is repeated for each continent and country covered through Geography I.

The United States set is a review for students learning in Geography I.  Just like the Geography I teacher’s guide, the United States teacher’s guide provides the answers to the student workbook and also quiz and tests through the back of the book.  There is no lesson guide provided in either of these teacher guides.  Lessons are provided through the accompanying workbooks and student texts.

The United States Student Workbook is a States and Capitals Review text.  In this workbook, students will review the states and capitals of all of the United States.  These are broken down into regions to make the review easier for the student.  There is a United States map as a whole included in the front of the workbook.

These books work together to provide a full curriculum for Geography I.  Depending upon the teacher and student, this curriculum could be covered in a matter of weeks to a year.  The lessons are not long and can be completed quickly and easily.  Review expectations were for us to use this curriculum 3-4 times a week through the review, which allowed us to cover much of the curriculum before the review period ended.

Geography I is for students in grades 4-8.  My students that used this curriculum were ages 10 and 12.  I also did work with my 5 year old, allowing her to listen while we read through the country and continent information and providing her maps to color as we learned about each country.

We enjoyed using Memoria Press’ Geography I in our lessons because the lessons themselves were not long and the information we learned was just the right amount as to not be overwhelming each day we worked on them.  Our lesson week began with discussion of the continent and completing the workbook pages to go with it.  Then we worked through countries, taking our time to learn more by looking them up online and checking the news to see if they were mentioned recently.  After doing this research, the kids were left to complete their worksheets for lesson.  I placed the worksheet into dry erase covers so they could both complete the necessary worksheets for this curriculum.

Memoria Press offers Geography I as a part of their 4th Grade Curriculum.  It can be purchased as the 4th Grade Geography set for $48.00 plus shipping.  This set includes the Geography I teachers guide, student text, and student workbook, along with the United States States and Capitals Review teacher’s guide and student workbook.  Geography I covers The Middle East, North Africa and Europe in the text.  To view more curriculum from Memoria Press, please visit their website!