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I need a fun, open and go elementary geography


MeaganS
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Dd8 used Evan Moor Beginning Geography and enjoyed it a lot. I have her in another Geography workbook now, and she liked it to begin with, but now she's struggling. It has a lot of work on every page and she just gets bored with it by the end of the page. Even crossing out extra questions doesn't help that much. Every day she says, "Geography used to be fun but now it isn't any more!" So I'm hoping to find a new decent enough geography program. It needs to be open and go, preferable worksheets or workbooks. If it has read alouds as an important part, it won't happen. Geography only gets done here because it can be independent.

 

Are the rest of the Evan Moor Geography books comparable to Beginning Geography? I might just do that if that is the case.

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My dd8 loves Memoria Press's 50 States set.  It is workbook based, along with geography flash cards to help memorize the states and capitals.  Each time you do geography, the child reads a page from "Don't Know Much About the 50 States", then fills in the workbook.  We use the cards together during Morning Time and every few lessons she does a GeoPuzzle of North America.  It's going great and except for the cards, it's totally independent. :)

Edited by beka87
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Daily Geography (by Evan Moor), is very similar to Beginning Geography. Same idea, but broken down to days and weeks-a different map/concept each week, then 5 days of questions to go with that map. there's also a Challenge question at the bottom-not really challenge in my opinion, but more of just an extra thing to do.

 

Since your DD is 8, I would suggest the 3rd or 4th grade level. (My boys have always been a year ahead but we started Beginning Geography as a Kindergarten book). Having been through grades 1-5 now, each grade covers basically the same thing with the older levels adding a few more things. For instance, Level 1 may spend 2 weeks on directions (N,S,E, W) whereas level 5 will have it included in, so really spending only a day or so on it and then add some higher concept like different types of maps-Mercator Projection Maps. I guess what I'm basically saying, is that you would have no problem jumping into a higher grade-the concepts don't build on each other between grades.

 

I would also mention, that we do Daily Geography once a week, (we do other geography on the other days), and both my boys usually do 2-3 weeks on that one day. 

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Not going to keep you busy for an entire school year (or even close), but my youngest did Scholastic Success with Maps Grade 1 last year and liked it. I think only the Grade 2 one has a preview.

 

https://shop.scholastic.com/shop/en/tso/product/Scholastic-Success-With-Maps-Workbook-Grade-2

 

Btw, I forgot to mention that these seem rather easy for the grade they're intended for - I'd go up one grade level or so.

 

That said, I printed 8 pages from the grade 4 book for my 4th grader because they covered kinds of maps not covered in the grade 5 book, or something along those lines - I printed it in the spring, and only started it today.

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I agree with the moms above.

I have used Evan More and I really like it. This year, I used the scholastic for my 5th grader for the first 15 weeks or so of school. Now we are using Memoria's Europe, Middle East, and North Africa. I also recommend using Memoria's 7 continent series. I have this one too (for Europe) , but chose to do the Memoria first due to the fact it better meshes with our current history content. We also use the MapTrek book of historical maps from Knowledge Quest.

 

The Daily Geography Review series from EM is also one of our favorites:

 

http://www.evan-moor.com/c/193/social-studies?specs=1509

 

https://www.memoriapress.com/curriculum/american-and-modern-studies/geography-i/

 

 

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  • 8 months later...

I realize this is an old post, but do you feel that you need the teacher's edition to go with the books or are they quite self-explanatory and easy to correct? Thanks!

Are you referring to Evan Moor? They are an open and go workbook with no teacher manual. So easy to use and pretty fun.

 

I also like VP League and Legends.

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Thank you. I'm looking at the daily geography books and they do have a teacher's edition. So I'm confused as I've never used them before. Maybe there's more than one kind? I'm looking at 4th and 6th grades..

Interesting! I only have the earlier grades and they are made reproducible. I need to go off and investigate now :)

 

ETA: are you looking at the one that says Evan Moor Daily Geography Practice Grade 6? That would be the one I was referring to. I guess I didn't realize they had a teacher's edition. Hopefully someone who has used this grade can jump in.

Edited by nixpix5
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Thank you.  I'm looking at the daily geography books and they do have a teacher's edition.  So I'm confused as I've never used them before.  Maybe there's more than one kind?  I'm looking at 4th and 6th grades..

Evan Moor's Daily Practice books (science, geography, math, etc.) have several editions - a teacher's edition print, teacher's edition e-book, and a student edition. The student edition has only workbook pages. The teacher's edition (both print and e-book) has explanations, new vocabulary and the student's workbook. I buy only the teacher's edition.

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Thank you so much!  And is it true that they are about a grade level behind?  I.e. My third grader should do the 4th grade book this year?

 

I think that's completely subjective and you'd have to go on what each child already knows compared to what is taught in each book.

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Thank you so much!  And is it true that they are about a grade level behind?  I.e. My third grader should do the 4th grade book this year?

 

 

If you're referring to my comment, that one was about Scholastic Success With Maps. I haven't used EM. 

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I run DD a year ahead in Evan Moor, and it is still fairly easy. She is a year ahead in most subjects though. I think the books are probably fairly close to what is being done in public schools at each grade level. 

 

I always buy the teacher's editions of EM workbooks, just for the odd question where I want to see what answer *they* wanted, and because there's a scripted bit to go over with the kid at the beginning of each week. You do not *need* that edition, really.

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I love the inexpensive books called Maps, Charts and Graphs.  Each lesson is two easy pages.  It teaches map skills and other things alongside geography.  The early books are less world maps, and more map skills.  My kids have never complained about them at all and enjoy them.  However, if you are looking for something like world cultures and countries, it's not as heavy on that.  The higher levels get into more actual maps vs. fictional map skills.

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