TOS review: Positive Action for Christ

I'm always looking for good ways for my children to learn more of God's Word so I was so excited to be able to review the 5th grade curriculum from Positive Action: Possessing the Land.

Positive Action desires not to just teach kids what God's Word says, but to teach them how to apply His Word to their lives.  They want kids to think about the Bible and what the "stories" mean.  (I used parenthesis for stories because I do not think of the Bible as a book of stories.  The Bible is part of God's history and it is not a fiction book.)

Possessing the Land came with a teacher's manual and a consumable, colorful workbook for Precise Prince to use.  It is an overview of the Old Testament starting with Genesis. 

Here's a confession-I don't "do" teacher's manuals. My oldest is fifth grade this year and last year was the first time I purchased a teacher's manual to go with something--and that was only because it was part of an awesome package deal and was less expensive than buying only the pieces I wanted.  So when I saw the thick teacher's manual to go with the curriculum my eyes glazed over and I hyperventilated a bit.  But I managed to sit and read the intro and even look through it while Precise Prince and I reviewed his workbook.  I even have come to like the teacher's manual for Possessing the Land!

The Teacher's Manual is geared toward a school setting but is easily adaptable to the homeschooling family.  Each lesson has scripture to memorize, a hymn to go with the lesson, a teaching strategy section and often other activity ideas to further the study.  There is emphasis on learning the relationships of the people in the Bible ( for example, Sara was married to Abraham and Sara bore Isaac, Hagar was the maidservant and bore Ishmael).  Each lesson also has a quiz you can copy for your child (or you can give the quiz orally).  There are lots of good discussion ideas in each lesson as well. 

The workbook lessons start with vocabulary words pertinent to the lesson.  Then there are about 5 or 6 sections with Bible reading, questions and sometimes puzzles for the student to complete.  We took one lesson per week doing one or two sections per day.  The questions aren't quick and simple-many of them require thought so asking Precise Prince to do a whole lesson in one day would have been too much.  Many of the lessons end with a section called Conquering the Enemy.  This section is meant to help the student apply God's Word to their lives.  I really liked this section as it got Precise Prince to think about his own life.

You could use the workbook on it's own without the teacher's manual, but you really won't get as much out of it.  I recommend the teacher's manual (did I just write that? LOL).  If you have only the workbook, you will need to do the questions with your child to be sure they are reading the Bible passages correctly and understanding what they are reading and there will be more work for you.  In addition, the teacher's manual has many ideas to expand the curriculum to further help your student apply God's Word to their life.

I'm just going to say it-I love this curriculum! It is an in depth Bible study that does more than just try to have the kids memorize a bunch of Bible stories.  I love that the questions are geared toward the child learning to apply God's Word to their own lives.  I am planning on getting the 3rd grade curriculum for Creative Princess.

One word of caution I feel should be mentioned-do this study with your child.  Don't just give them the workbook and let it end there.  I have not found anything I have disagreed with in this curriculum but we should always be taking anything man-made and referring it back to God's Word-even Bible studies.  As I mentioned, I plan to purchase the 3rd grade curriculum for my 3rd grader and we will continue to use the 5th grade curriculum but I will be reviewing their work and working with them.
The Possessing the Land student workbook costs $12.95.  (There is a discount for large orders of the same book.) The Teacher's Manual in print form (it comes with a three ring binder) costs $33.95 and is only $19.95 if you order the CD-ROM version instead.  You can also purchase music to go with the curriculum as well.  Go here to order Possessing the Land. You can purchase curriculum for other grades as well-just click on the grade you want on the side bar. 

Go here to see what my fellow crewmates had to say about Positive Action for Christ.  You will find reviews on the different grade levels.

(I received a copy of the fifth grade curriculum, Possessing the Land from Positive Action in exchange for my honest review.  No other compensation was received.)