CarrieF Posted March 12, 2013 Share Posted March 12, 2013 What does the hive recommend for encyclopedias?! I am not sure if we should subscribe online?! Buy a CD-ROM?! And then the question is WHICH encyclopedia will be best: Britannica?! World Book?! Something else I've never heard of/considered?! My two oldest are 11 and 9 so I want something that is academic, but not completely over their heads. Having said that, with my 11 yo going into middle school, I want it to be meaty. :glare: Please give me your opinions and experiences - please! Thank you in advance! :thumbup: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arcadia Posted March 12, 2013 Share Posted March 12, 2013 We use the free online version of Encyclopaedia Britannica (www.eb.com) for school work. For hardcover encyclopedias, we use the library's copy of World Book and Kingfisher. The library has the 2013 World Book set. I didn't notice any copies of Encyclopedia Britannica at my local libraries. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
threedogfarm Posted March 15, 2013 Share Posted March 15, 2013 We bought the World Book Encyclopedia set (2011) this year. We are using it A LOT, for both school and other random questions. I wish I had bought them last year when we first started homeschooling. Whenever someone has a question that I don't have an answer for off the top of my head (and know that I am absolutely right) we go look it up. Sometimes I look it up, sometimes I have my child do it (I could tell that if I always had them do it they might stop asking questions!). We use the encyclopedia for both spontaneous questions and for school questions. One example from yesterday was: Why is Hamilton on the ten dollar bill if he wasn't a president? I think the printed version would be more useful than the online version. I know that I could have answered this answer via wikipedia or online but I really like the idea of getting out a book to look up the information. We then learned about Alice Hamilton (pioneer of industrial medicine and the first female faculty member of Harvard--who knew???) because happened to be the next entry. My son, who is 9 will take a volume up to his room and read it on his own. I would definitely recommend World Book. Look on Ebay for recent sets. I bought mine for a great price and will continue to update with the year books from World Book. Also, check your library to see if they are updating their set. One more thing--I noticed in your signature that you have younger children. Look for Childcraft Encyclopedias as well--an older set is fine. You can find these inexpensively on Ebay. Get one with additional "add on" books. My daughter loves those and they are now my go-to when I need to occupy one child while I work with another. I LOVE the one on Holidays and Birthdays. I alternate who is responsible for keeping up with the holidays of the week. Who would have thought that a $30 investment would be great resource for quick lessons that require no prep? My son likes reading the Childcraft books but he will very quickly outgrown them. But for you. . .you will get many years out of these books. They are organized by topics, not alphabetically like a regular encyclopedia but they are very engaging for the younger set. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RootAnn Posted March 15, 2013 Share Posted March 15, 2013 We have my family's old (before I was born) World Book set. It gets used a LOT. But, we are also the type of family that doesn't have the kids using the internet to search for things. (We are somewhat neo-Luddittes, so they don't have their own iDevices, either.) World Book (the real books) do the job for us. Sometimes you can find an entire set at used book stores, Salvation Army (thrift) stores, etc. for CHEAP if you don't mind them being 5+ years old. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heathermomster Posted March 15, 2013 Share Posted March 15, 2013 You can get used World Book sets for free. My library just gave their set away. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heathermomster Posted March 15, 2013 Share Posted March 15, 2013 Nm Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mona Posted March 15, 2013 Share Posted March 15, 2013 I have the CD, but we hardly ever use it. Last year, I bought the World Book Encyclopedias for Christmas during the black friday sale and the science set for a fraction of the cost. DD likes to pick them up and read wherever she opens. If you subscribe to the emails, they will update you about the sales. The science/inventions set was over $200, but I got them new for $20! You can't beat that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KellyMama Posted March 15, 2013 Share Posted March 15, 2013 We won a year subscription to Brittanica online. I love it!!!!! I love being able to have the kids do their own online research. We use library books for pretty much all research papers etc but having a safe site for them to peruse according to interest is wonderful. We just don't have space for a multi-volume set of books or I would buy World Book (we had that as kids). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CarrieF Posted March 24, 2013 Author Share Posted March 24, 2013 Thanks for all the great feedback - very helpful! :hurray: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MeganW Posted March 27, 2013 Share Posted March 27, 2013 We bought 2007 World Books off ebay for about $150. My kids LOOOOOVE them!! They aren't allowed to take more than 1 book from the set at a time. Each takes one to their room at quiet time each day to look for something they are interested in. Most of the time, they don't ever get to what they were looking for originally, b/c they stop to look at 400 other things! Dh was initially very skeptical - he thought they needed to google. He has changed his mind! I knew they were the right choice, but I had no idea they would be this loved! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
journey00 Posted March 27, 2013 Share Posted March 27, 2013 Hmmm.....I better check out Ebay and re-think encyclopedias. My kids ask questions and I say google it but I do it with them since I'm not sure where they may accidentally end up, kwim? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
journey00 Posted March 27, 2013 Share Posted March 27, 2013 We bought 2007 World Books off ebay for about $150. My kids LOOOOOVE them!! They aren't allowed to take more than 1 book from the set at a time. Each takes one to their room at quiet time each day to look for something they are interested in. Most of the time, they don't ever get to what they were looking for originally, b/c they stop to look at 400 other things! Dh was initially very skeptical - he thought they needed to google. He has changed his mind! I knew they were the right choice, but I had no idea they would be this loved! That's awesome! Would a 2007 set be worth buying since it is 6 years old? I want to make sure I buy the right set. Thanks! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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