The Case of the Blue Diamond - A New TOS Revew!

Well, I don't know about you but I am not as enamored with diamonds as your every day girl.  Don't get me wrong, I like diamonds.  And I have one ... well, several, on my engagement and wedding rings.  However, I like gems better.  I like all their different colors and some just seem more rare and special then a diamond.

My girls, unlike me, are in love with wearing all types of jewelry and pretending to be princesses.  So when I had the opportunity to review a new study and read the title Blue Diamond, my curiosity was peeked.

The Product:
The study we chose was called Blue Diamond and is just one in the series called The Curiosity Files.  Heading your exploration into each study is Professor Anna Lyze.  These studies, created for 8-13 year olds, bring a new twist to your regular everyday science studies.  Each study or unit covers topics from science to math to a unique Bible study as well as crafts and projects to help the study come to life.

And they have a ton of other studies that might interest you including some titles I'm sure we'll be investing in like Red Tide, Blue-Footed Boobies, and Puffer Fish.  You can purchase all 9 of The Curiosity Files as an e-book bundle for $46.00 or on a CD for $49.00.  You can purchase each of the nine title separately, but please be sure to check The Schoolhouse Store website for pricing details.

Our Experience:

My girls were very excited to know that we'd be studying about diamonds.  The week before we started I went through the unit to see what items we might be able to use, since I have both a 5 year old and 7 year old.  I was hoping I'd be able to bring it down to Audrie's level without losing too much of the meat and not make it boring for Arianna.

We ended up doing that quite well.  Audrie was only involved for listening to the 'lessons', while I had Arianna doing some of the worksheets including multiple choice questions, matching, labeling, bar graphs, greater than/lesser than, weights, and many others.  She also enjoyed working on a word search and some copywork of pertinent Scripture.

As part of the lesson we learned about the rock cycle with a very fun experiment.  The experiment used very easily accessible household items and was quite interesting.  By the end of the experiment even Audrie was able to tell me the rock cycle.  Pretty good for a 5 year old.  I don't want to tell you all the details so here are some pictures taken during the process. 

My Thoughts:

I thought this was a very thorough and in-depth study.  I did think that the version of Scripture was a bit difficult to read for younger children.  I had to explain a bit more of the verbiage, but that is to be expected.  I thought the Biblical study enhanced the lesson tremendously.  The copywork was available for both printing and cursive handwriting which was great.

I found it hard to quickly pinpoint some of the activities that I could do with my group of youngsters.  Some of them were labeled with ages, I just wished all of them were.

And thankfully, at the end of the unit was an answer key to all the worksheets. Answer sheets are always time savers for me -- less thinking involved. :)

We really enjoyed our unit on the Blue Diamond and I hope to explore more with Professor Anna Lyze in the future.  I encourage you to stop by the Crew and see what my other Crewmates had to say about their studies of The Curiosity Files.

*** I am a member of The Old Schoolhouse 2010-2011 Crew and receive free products and services in exchange for a thorough and honest review. Though I am compensated with free products, I am not compensated in the form of money for any of my reviews. My reviews will always reflect my honest opinions, findings, beliefs and experiences with the products and services that I receive.***