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Customer Review

 
Jennifer M. from Toronto wrote the following on 11/01/2011:
First of all, the grade range listed for this book is inaccurate. I read it with my 6- and 4-year-olds and they enjoyed it very much. The older one got just about all the math there is to get out of it. It's recommended here for a Grade 3-6 range, but kids that age would be bored to tears with it. Anyway... on to the review! These books are the hottest topic of discussion on homeschool message boards! I like Life of Fred for high school, so when I found out there was an elementary version, I had to have it. I was expecting weirdness and a bizarre storyline; that's the hallmark of Life of Fred math. This book certainly delivers. In a few places, I wondered if it was too strange for such little kids, but they seemed to enjoy the silly jokes and the light tone of the book. As with the "bigger kid" books, there are short "Your turn to play" sections at the end of each chapter to review the math (and other) material covered. Because we generally read the book while snuggled up in bed, I used this as an opportunity to practice oral math skills with my 6-year-old daughter, except in a couple of cases where she neeed to draw a quick diagram. After I bought Apples, I was warned in an online forum that Book D, Dogs, contains references to euthanasia. While no dogs die in the book, it is seriously implied that quite a few are put to sleep at the very end. The author, Stanley Schmidt, insists that these references are no more distrubing than those found in Bambi and other classic literature. Still, it's a parent's decision, and some parents have been offended or upset. Different children may respond to this differently. Also, it's been pointed out that as the author is a religious Christian, there are occasional Biblical and moral references in the books. I'm okay with these, but parents should be aware of this, since it's a pretty rare thing in a math book. I bought this book as a supplement ONLY - it may indeed constitute a full curriculum, but I found that the material was scattered willy-nilly throughout the book. I wasn't sure why some things are repeated over and over and others are not. For instance, the book promises to teach "numbers that add to 7" - boy, does it EVER. You and your kids will either be giggling or groaning at all the 5's and 2's, or 6's and 1's, that he throws into the book. Other volumes in the series cover numbers other than 7. I'm not sure why he chose 7, but my daughter loved automatically knowing the answer by the end of the book (7!). Finally, Life of Fred: Dogs is fairly short - probably only a few weeks of regular reading, though I tried to spread it out quite a bit (interspersed with LONG Little House on the Prairie chapters!). Most parents probably want the bulk of their math studies to involve a more rigorous and systematic curriculum that will last a good chunk of the year. Because it's so short, I wouldn't say this book is a terrific value. At $16 for a few week's math reading, it's a pricey curriculum supplement. But for what it offers - a fun way to show kids that it's okay to play with math and not take the whole things so seriously - we will definitely be investing in the next book sometime soon.