Review of Home School in the Woods HISTORY Through the Ages Hands-on History Lap-Pak: U.S. Elections

Our family recently to the chance to use and review HISTORY Through the Ages Hands-on History Lap-Pak: U.S. Elections from Home School in the Woods. We've been homeschooling for a really long time and Home School in the Woods has been around for much longer than we've been choosing curriculum. They are a trusted source for high quality curriculum. It was so cool to get a chance to give feedback on one of their products.

It’s our first time trying a lapbook product. I was a little unsure when I first looked at the product because it honestly at first glance looks like a lot of cut and paste. But because it’s an election year and I really want my kids to get an idea of what’s involved in the election, I gave it a go.

Here’s a little information on the product. It’s broken down into 21 sections/projects. 

1. Definition of Election
2. Different forms of Government
3. The American Experiment
4. The Three Branches of Government
5. Suffrage
6. Who Do We Vote For?
7. Terms of Office
8. A "Handful" of Political Parties
9. Caucuses and Primaries
10. National Conventions
11. The Presidential Campaign: Platform
12. The Presidential Campaign: Stump Speaking
13. The Presidential Campaign: Media — News Source
14. The Presidential Campaign: Campaign Advertising — Spreading the Word!
15. Raising Money
16. Statistics
17. Election Day
18. The Electoral College
19. Inauguration Day
20. The Electoral Race!
21. The "Vocabinet"

Each section has an audio portion that give you the information that’s also presented in the booklet that you print out and assemble. You can use the booklet and audio as a read-along for emergent readers. My daughter preferred me to read the sections to her as we worked on the different parts of the lapbook.

You can see she really loves the coloring part. The audio portions range from 1-7-ish minutes which is very easy to fit into any school day. I printed out portions as we got to them but you could print it all out at once. I found it easier for me to cut sections out and she would do the coloring and adding the pieces to the lapbook. My advice is: Get good glue. You want the pieces to stick and stay. My daughter has had a little more experience with the Home School in the Woods as she was in a homeschool co-op class that used the Time Travelers curriculum. She really loves all things crafty.

Here’s some product shots to show the finished product.

The little one on the right actually moves with a brass fastener! So cool!

The doors really open!

I really appreciate all the interactivity that results from the projects. It makes for a fun piece they can hold onto and show off. This was such a fun project. I’m not sure we are lapbooking converts but in the very least we had fun with this particular lapbook.

As a supplement to the lapbook, we also got some books from the library. Here's a couple of the ones we found. Monster Needs Your Vote by Paul Czajak and Vote from Eyewitness Books. 

Click here to see what other Schoolhouse Review Crew members had to say about HISTORY Through the Ages Hands-on History Lap-Pak: U.S. Elections from Home School in the Woods!