Saturday, December 17, 2011

TOS Review–Vintage Remedies for Kids

Speak Up Saturday

It’s Speak Up Saturday! Stay with me, I have a bunch of reviews to post today :) And remember, I have a giveaway for a Little Leaf Wet Bag that ends tomorrow!

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First up, Vintage Remedies for Kids. I received this book through The Old Schoolhouse Homeschool Crew, and we have enjoyed reading it together.

From the publisher:

This curriculum helps you teach little ones how to choose healthy foods, how to prepare some fun and delicious snacks, how to establish prevention based habits, and how they can participate in your family's natural lifestyle. The workbook is flexible and can be used for playgroups or as a fun family project. Children at this age learn best with active lessons, so this isn't a sit and read style picture book! It's a guide for parents that is packed with hands on activities that are perfect for little hands, but fun for all ages. Each of the 18 chapters includes a brief age appropriate lesson on the topic that parents can use to discuss with little ones while they are preparing for the projects, a featured project to teaches the lesson, additional instructions for parents to include these lessons in the family's lifestyle, and a selection of additional projects on the topic for additional fun. The book also contains sample schedules for preschoolers and convenient shopping lists for each project, complete with a resource guide and tips for parents and leaders.

When I received the package from Vintage Remedies, I was impressed with the detail and thought in just the packaging (wish I had remembered to take a picture!). It was “brown paper packaging tied up with string” (been watching too much Sound of Music). Inside was not only Vintage Remedies for Kids but they also threw in a bonus book for me called The Kitchen Herbal, which I look forward to reading after December craziness is done.

The book is broken up into 18 chapters. Each chapter includes a parent section and a kid section. After the kid section is several ideas about hands-on projects and recipes to really bring the lesson home.

The lessons are a bit lengthy for the younger ages, but Kahlen enjoyed them and sat still (enough) to listen to the kid sections. We were able to make two of the recipe suggestions, one from each of the first chapters. The first chapter introduces why we eat food with a discussion about it being fuel for our bodies and that it therefore matters what kind of fuel we give our bodies.

2011-12-03 Making Pizza (5)(making pizza)

The sections include:

  1. Food and Drink
  2. Health and Wellness
  3. Healthy Lifestyles

While I liked the overall content and I feel that there is definitely value in teaching these things to our children, it seemed much too formal to me. I feel like I will benefit more from reading the material myself and then presenting it in a more natural way. I think this would be an excellent resource for people who struggle with knowing nutritional information themselves and how to talk about it with their kids. For me, since I already include both kids in cooking, food choices, and discussions about different types of food, this book was less helpful to me.

I was also bothered by the use of “tummy” in place of stomach or intestines or whatever body part she was actually referring to. “Tummy” is where I am growing a baby, not where your food goes after you swallow it. If they’re old enough to understand nutrition, they’re old enough to know that there are different internal organs for each step of the process.

That being said, I still really enjoyed the parts of this book that we were able to do so far. I think for future lessons, I will read all the material first and prepare an activity from the suggestions. Then, while we’re doing the activity, I’ll discuss the information from the chapter.

Synopsis? Good resource, just not a good match for me the way it’s laid out. I will be incorporating the information into our lives (not necessarily school) without using as directed.

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Vintage Remedies for Kids retails for $25. You can see more of their products here and read more about the company here.

Photobucket See what the rest of the crew is saying here.

~S

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this product through The Old Schoolhouse Homeschool Crew in exchange for my honest opinion. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.

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