Have you ever wanted to teach a subject but felt like you couldn’t just grasp how to fit in everything you wanted to do? That is exactly how I have felt about teaching US geography to my younger set of children. I had this grand plan last year, but well, things just kind of fell by the wayside and we didn’t learn as much as I had wanted too. I was so excited when I was offered the opportunity to review State History from a Christian Perspective and the My State History Funbook for our current state of residence, Virginia.

State History from a Christian Perspective and the My State History Funbook are paperback books that provide everything you need to study your selected state in 30 lessons or approximately six weeks or longer.  The Master Lesson Plan Book ties both of these books together seamlessly so that you can study state history with your whole family, from preschoolers through high school.

To get started, first you need to choose your grade level to teach and then gather your books. If you have a younger set of children, each student will need one copy of the My State History Funbook and one copy of the Activity Pages that are state specific. Both of these are offered on the company website for purchase. If you have older children in grades 3rd through 12th you have two options for completing the program. You can either use the My State Notebook by A Beka Book along with the state specific student book. The student book provides all the required text, tests, and quizzes for the course. The teacher will need the Master Lesson Plan Book. There is also an option to forgo using the My State Notebook and to just make a notebook using a 3-ring binder. The student would still need the state specific student book and the teacher would need the plan book. All of which are available on the website for purchase. 

Lessons are designed to take between 30 and 40 minutes for each lesson. If you need more time or want to go into more depth, expansion suggestions are provided at the end of each lesson. The length of time it takes to complete the course is variable. The Master Plan Book gives you options to take as little as 6 weeks to as long as a yearlong course, you decide!

Using this course with my younger 4 children in 8th, 4th, 1st, and preschool was a breeze! Not only have we covered everything there is to know about our state but it was fun too because of the extension activities offered for each lesson. Seriously, Joy Dean has thought of everything when writing this program! The attention to detail made it so that this was an open and go program for me without much prep time on my end. As a busy mom of many I really appreciate this aspect of the curriculum. My 1st grader enjoyed the coloring and cutting and pasting while my preschooler especially loved having his own book to work in. Having him feel a part of the group and learning made teaching easier most days too. I would definitely recommend the My State History Funbook if you have a preschooler in the house.

I love how the Master Lesson Plan Book is laid out so that everything you need to teach the lessons is right in front of you on one page. No need to try and pull lessons together from different spots for different levels of teaching. My 4th and 8th graders enjoyed being a tourist in our own state and finding out so much new information that we never knew. Now that we are just about finished learning all there is to know about this great Commonwealth of Virginia, my children and I look forward to diving into learning about the other 49 states using products from A Helping Hand.

—Product review by Jacquelin Caffey, The Old Schoolhouse® Magazine, LLC, September, 2016