As a Christian homeschooling parent, I find my beliefs are at odds with many resources in the various fields of science available to teach my daughter, but World of Science is exactly how I think science should be represented. This book is not apologetics; it does not try to prove God existence through scientific means. Instead, it states God created everything straightforwardly and then details our limited understanding of the wonders of His creation, which is what science really should be. For example, under the subtitle "Converting energy," it reads: "Energy cannot be made or destroyed except by God. It can only be converted...." Still, God is not really mentioned much throughout the book. This text focuses on the science, not the religion. It is more about what it does not include, than what it does that matters the most to me. There is no mention of "millions of years" or evolution theory often presented as fact in comparable books. When covering the five kingdoms of living things, it does not suggest anything about their development over time. Perhaps, the first paragraph in the introduction explains it well enough: "'In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.' From its very creation, the Earth was formed with guidelines established by our Maker."
The book has seven sections: Matter and Chemicals; Energy, Motion, and Machines; Electricity and Magnetism; Light and Sound; Earth and Life; Space and Time; and Scientific Experiments relating to each of the previous six sections. Although not highly in-depth, it has all the elements of over 800 photographs and bright illustration arranged attractively among snippets of reading information, which are so poplar with modern science reference books and textbooks.
This hard back book of 248 pages is high quality with an eye-catching holographic picture integrated on the cover. I believe it is best suited for children in grades 4 to 6, but it could easily be used for grades 3 to 9. An added plus, many of the 60 experiments can be done with household items on hand or easily found at local stores--no need for fancy equipment!
I received this book for free from New Leaf Publishing Group in exchange for my honest review.
