My daughter recently asked for some Science workbooks so I contacted Schofield & Sims and asked if they would be interested in us reviewing their Understanding Science series (the series had been recommended to us by another Home Educating family). They kindly sent us all 6 workbooks in the series – Our Bodies, Animals & Plants, Using Materials, Changing Materials, Forces & Electricity and Light, Sound & Space.
As both my kids have a natural interest in learning about animals and plants we have already covered quite a bit in the workbook in our less formal learning manner (reading lots of books, youtube clips, growing our own plants, nature walks and chats while we out exploring) so I thought it would be a good workbook to start with as it would ease us into the series.
The workbook is 43 pages long and does includes answers for all the questions at the end of the workbook as well as a glossary of terms used. Following the typical Schofield & Sims workbook format they cover one idea over a double page, they stick to just black and green text which means the pages are not visually cluttered or overwhelming (this is one of the reasons why we use the Schofield & Sims workbooks so much as we have found other workbooks cram too much in on a page and go overboard with bright colours which does not suit us).
The workbook covers
- Plant parts
- plant life cycle
- investigating growing
- flowers and fertilisation
- seed dispersal
- germination
- asexual reproduction
- water transport
- more on growing
- grouping living things
- groups and keys
- animal life cycles
- more on groups
- habitats
- investigating habitats
- changing habitats
- food chains
- adaptations
- fossils
- fossils and changes
- evolution and inheritance
The pages do have a combination of explanations and then questions for the kids to answers. But we found the writing required was not excessive. My youngest loves learning about animals so he actually asked to do some of the pages with me and we did them as a verbal discussion – we read the explanation together and then we discussed the answers.
We really liked the workbook. I think it is well set-out. I think if animals and plants are not a topic which you have naturally covered it is a very useful resource. And I also think even if you have covered animals and plants in detail like we have it can be a great confidence boost for the kids. My daughter loved the fact that she could answer all the questions without having any doubts about her answers. She was beaming from ear to ear so it definitely gave her a massive confidence boost realizing she could do the workbook by herself and she is already talking about the other workbooks in the series.
If you are based in the UK you can buy these workbooks from local bookstores (price £4.95) or you can also get them from Amazon – Understanding Science: Animals & Plants
ofamily learning together 
Love this series of books…..and they cover so much valuable information that you can use in every day life.
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