Review In A Nutshell: Titles: Math Wizardry for Kids and Science Wizardry for Kids
Author: Margaret Kenda & Phyllis S. Williams
Price: $15.95 US each
Overall Rating (1-10): 9
Value (1-10): 9
Flexibility (1-10): 10
Ages/Grades: Ages 9-12
Review:
I stumbled upon this Wizardry for Kids series of books put out by Barron’s and just had to check them out. I started with the math and science versions since so many kids seem to particularly need some wizardry when it comes to math and science! I am always looking for new ways to make math fun and I am, personally, science-challenged so I was eager to check out the science book.
The first thing I noticed about this series is it comes spiral-bound. I *love* that.
The books are all written *for* children. They are not adult teaching manuals. They could be read directly by a child or read by a parent to a child. Overall, these books are really great! They are reasonably priced for a huge number of problems, activities and experiments. There is a section in each book that is for parents with helpful hints and ideas for making science and math fun and enjoyable (really!). There is also a glossary of terms (very helpful for the new scientist or budding mathematician) and index in both books. I really love the flexibility of being able to jump around in both books without feeling like we must go “in order”.
Individually, the books are very different, of course. The science book is filled with hands-on experiments that cover many areas of scientific study. In each area of study, there are several experiments and activities outlined with full directions and kid-sized explanations that live out different theories and help kids arrive at their own scientific conclusions. As someone who enjoys a good hands-on experiment but is extremely lacking in the idea department, this book will be my new science bible! I absolutely adore the ideas and feel they very thoroughly cover most areas of science for the ages they are aimed at. Likewise, all of my younger kids learned so much from the experiments and could fully participate and appreciate, despite its aim at older kids. I really appreciated this because, up until this point, all the other hands-on science books seemed geared at younger children. I enjoyed (and it’s safe to say my kids did, too) the advanced theories and experiments. They weren’t too difficult or overwhelming but they did the job.
The math book is laid out similarly to the science book. I loved that the math projects and activities were sometimes outdoors. There seemed to be a wide variety of methods for exploring math which would appeal to a variety of different learning types. There is some hands-on and building activities, some writing or drawing activities. There are lots of math games to play in new ways. There are illusions and patterns to recreate. It is just a really neat book of ways to experience math at around a 4th or 5th grade level in a very hands-on and real-life way. Younger children probably won’t appreciate this book as much as the science book but there is no shortage of opportunities for learning at a lower level, as well.
Bottom Line: These books are such a fun resource for any math and science curriculum. They could probably be used as curriculum, alone, very successfully. But they definitely will liven up any rote or book work and bring your studies to life and put them into action. I absolutely loved these books as resources that not only I can turn to but that I can hand to my kids to use on their own. These are keepers!