A Child's Story of America is a fourth grade history textbook from Christian Liberty Press. Students read about the history of America from Columbus to the 1980s, with plenty of attention paid to Christian figures and the current need for revival in the United States (at least, current in the '80s). While this isn't exclusively a text about Christians, there does seem to be an imbalance between coverage of historical events that are important in a Christian context and historical events that are important in general.
How Does This Work?
There are 29 chapters, all under ten pages long. Students read the text and answer a few review questions at the end of the chapter. There is a supplementary test packet as well as an answer key that includes answers to in-text exercises and test questions. The answer key is not a teacher's manual; if you want supplementary information you'll have to find it yourself.
Plenty of black and white illustrations lend some life to the pages. The text is readable and clear, but more textbooky than other CLP titles. Still, 4th graders should have no trouble getting through it, and since there are 29 chapters plus tests, this text is easily adaptible for use over a normal schoolyear.
OurHonest Opinion:
No one expects fourth graders to have a comprehensive knowledge of history, American or otherwise. This text won't give them one, but if you've used CLP history up to this point, it will fill in gaps in your child's knowledge. The "Providential history" approach is plainly evident here, and while there's nothing wrong with that per se, sometimes it leads to more historical interpretation than historical presentation. Having said that, kids will get a pretty good overview of the flow of U.S. history, and some interesting portraits of figures they aren't likely to hear much about in comparable texts.
Did you find this review helpful?