Exploring Creation with Zoology 2

jeannie Fulbright has another great book in her Young Explorer Series. The title, Swimming Creatures of the Fifth Day, clues you in that this is from a Christian creationist view. The book is divided into thirteen chapters covering whales, aquatic herps, primeval reptiles, shark and rays, mollusks and everything else living in the ocean. You can easily cover the sections in a class period. The book is full of quality color photos and also a link to a web address with more photos and video footage making it a great visual experience. There are some easy and effective experiments, notebook activities, and questions to make sure the student retains the information. It's a quality book at a great price.

Swimming Creatures brought to life a part of the world that awe inspiring. Students are taught how to correctly identify and classify creatures. Just the other day my 9yo was discussing sharks with my 6yo and explaining why sharks are always swimming.

This book was just wonderful. I had kids who were begging for this to be taught and were excited the whole time. They could not wait to produce papers for presentations on their favorite sea creature. They would come to class ready to participate and would want to know more. I was again very impressed with the authors way of showing God's creation in our world. The idea of trying to explain that we are complex creatures created by God's design and not something that evolved by accident could be seen using this curriculum and not some biased evolutionary text book.

This book, along with the other Exploring Creation books by Fulbright, is amazing! Our fourth grader has learned so much and is anxious to learn more since he has used this book. We did most of the labs and activities suggested, which really helped make the lessons more memorable. Our seventh grader wishes that she could have done this book. In fact, she wants to do it just for fun this summer! We also did a lapbook from KnowledgeBox which corresponds to this book. I would recommend this series to any elementary homeschool family.

Using this book to teach science has brought joy to our home school. When I wake up on the mornings that we have Science class I am so excited. I can hardly wait to get the school day started so we can learn more about the world God created. My degree is in Communication and I teach Literature to High School students. My weakness is Science. Never before have I learned so much about the field. I am no longer intimidated by Science. This book is well written. It is organized in such a way that it flows as you read it. The conversational style lends it self easily to discussions with the children. When we leave a chapter we have real understanding of the subject covered, not just more knowledge. This I think is a mark of a good author and a book that leads a student to a well-educated mind. The illustrations are beautiful and serve as excellent markers for the children as we go back to previous chapters reviewing the information to increase long term comprehension. They also hold the attention of younger students while you read and discuss more complicated ideas with the older students. In my opinion this book could be successfully used to teach a kindergarten student as well as a 7th or 8th grader, requiring less and more homework from the respective students. If I did not home school my children I would still want it in my library. Not only has it taught my children, it teaches me. The CD of notebook pages is an excellent resource. After the student has read and understood the concepts taught he can use the notebook pages to express his comprehension. These pages serve at least two purposes. He writes what he has learned which serves as an anchor in his memory and they become a personal science book for his records, an accomplishment he can be proud of in the future as he looks back on his elementary years. I am not easily enamored with curriculum. If you want your child to really understand our world regarding the oceans, seas, and rivers and all that live in them this is the book for you. I give this one a 5 star rating.