Thursday, January 20, 2011

Review: Passport To The World

Title: Passport To The World: Your A to Z Guided Language Tour
Author: Craig Froman

Do you have a passport?  I have an old one, though it's not up to date.  It's fun to flip through the passport and look at the stamps placed there at different times as my family moved from duty station to duty station.

My children don't have passports yet.  They aren't traveling from country to country as I was able to do as a child.  Their world is limited to the American Midwest.  We travel to different parts of the country, but the culture doesn't really change, and neither does the language.

Passport To The World takes children on a journey through 26 different languages and the countries they're associated with. The book even has its own passport inside the front cover so you can add a passport stamp as you study each language.  (Stickers provided at the back of the book.)  The passport has a proverb from each language group so you know right where to place the sticker, and learn another tidbit about that culture.  There are additional boxes in the back of the passport, which can hold future stamps as your family studies additional countries not covered in this book.

Each letter of the alphabet covers a different language, the country it belongs to, the fast facts about that country, 4 key words in that language, photos of the country and its culture, and several trivia facts about the country or language.   The fast facts about each country include its population, size, literacy rate, monetary unit, life expectancy rate, and a map of its location.   With that information and the cultural photos included with each country, the children can travel the world in their imagination.

Passport To The World begins with an explanation of how to use the passport and the book.   Next, the book includes a map of the journey you will take through the different language groups:  A - Z.   There is also a Biblical explanation of how the different languages developed from the Tower of Babel and their migration around the world.

The back of the book includes a chart with facts about each country covered in the book and how they rank compared to each other.   "Name that Flag" and "Name That Country" quizzes enable children to test their memory skills.  The book closes with a list of ten different charities that work to meet the needs of underprivileged or ill children around the world -- a resource for families inspired to donate to a charity.

Passport To The World is a colorful book with quality photographs and maps to help our  children learn about 26 different countries and languages. They may never actually travel to India and hear the Oriya language, but they can still learn about India and its culture.    Each country's traditional folk dress is pictured, along with a person wearing modern clothing, so children can understand that they won't see wooden shoes on the feet of every child in Amsterdam.

My children greatly enjoyed Passport To The World.  We left it laying on the coffee table, and I frequently found children flipping through its pages.  "Hey, did you know ...?" punctuated the family conversations as children shared facts that they had read.  Passport To The World lends itself well to a structured study, as well as a more casual learning experience.  Elementary students could use it to cover one country a week, supplementing it with books about the country, its culture, and its folk tales.

Passport To The World is a valuable resource for  Christian families and homeschools. Though it is written for children in the 9-12 age-group, all of my children enjoyed it.   My 15 year old read it, my 7 year old read portions of it, and my 4 year old flipped through the pages, asking questions as she went.   We give this book the ElCloud Seal of Approval!

You can view a trailer video about Passport To The World at Master Books' website, or you can take a look inside the book at Amazon.com.

Price:  $15.99
Publisher:  Master Books, New Leaf Publishing Group
Format:  Hardcover
Size:  10 inch x 10 inch
Pages:  64 pages
ISBN:  978-0-89051-595-2

This book was provided free for my review by Master Books publishing.  This is my honest opinion and no other compensation was received.




April E.