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Beautiful Feet Books Review & Giveaway

Big Kiddos, Book Reviews, Giveaways, Homeschool Reviews, Homeschooling, Reviews

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Beautiful literature books are my love language!  I am a living book enthusiast!  Using beautiful books about the world to teach history, geography, and character is a no brainer!  Thanks to the passion and dedication of Rea Berg, Beautiful Feet Books was created.  She is a homeschooling mama with a Masters in Children’s Literature and a desire to teach her own kiddos using living books.  The mission was to create a curriculum around classic books from amazing authors and the result is spectacular.

From History to Geography and Character to Classic Music, Beautiful Feet Books brings the best of a Charlotte Mason style lesson and top quality literature selections together.  It creates an easy to teach, comprehensive curriculum in a variety of subjects.  For this review, we received the Geography through Literature Pack- and we couldn’t have been happier!  From the amazing books to the beautiful maps to the easy to follow instruction guide, the entire curriculum exceeded our expectations.

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So How Does It Work?

The Geography Through Literature Pack includes: The Instruction Guide, Geography Map Set, and four beautiful books by Holling Clancy Holling.  The guide is set up so that you can complete one lesson per week to complete the curriculum in one year or 2-3 lessons per week to complete it in one semester.

For us, one lesson a week is perfect.  I want to be able to take time enjoying the rich literature and completing the beautiful 18″ x 24″ art quality maps.  Along the lines of the Charlotte Mason approach to teaching, narration is encouraged to aid little learners to more fully understand the information presented.  Reading aloud and then allowing your student to retell the information in their own words is a great way to help them truly grasp more complex content.

In addition,

it is recommended that the notebooking approach be used so the student has a record of what they are learning.  I could even see using the information to create lapbooks to further delve into the topics discussed.  The books themselves are comprehensive enough to allow for multiple options in teaching.  They stand alone as a solid geography curriculum or you could include some study on historical figures and events to encompass a history component.

You could also further investigate the scientific aspects of the books to include a science component, and the notebooking, narration, and vocabulary options allow for comprehensive Language Arts learning as well.  With all these options, this curriculum is an amazing addition to any homeschooler’s toolbox.

Our journey into geography with this curriculum has been such a delight!

From day one, the books have been by far our favorite part of our experience.  The rich stories and beautiful, full color illustrations are so enticing and the biggest struggle we have encountered so far, was not wanting to stop reading!  I planned to stick to the one lesson a week schedule, but it has been SO tempting to read ahead and not stop to answer the questions or work on the maps.  That’s not to say the map work hasn’t also been fun- these maps are so well drawn and my kiddos have so very much enjoyed adding to them and coloring them as we go.

One tip- invest in some good colored pencils, the maps are such high quality that we will be posting them on our walls when we complete the lessons.  All in all- we’ve really enjoyed our time with this geography curriculum and I know these books will be treasured for a long time coming.
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In addition to the geography curriculum,

there are so many other great offering from Beautiful Feet Books.   We are very excited to add the following to our curriculum list for next year:
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Around the World with Picture Books is top of the list for my youngest learner.  This introduction to world cultures and geography is accompanied by the most amazing selection of picture books!  It is designed as a read-aloud approach to discovering the treasures of the world and geared toward K-3rd grade learners.

 

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Teaching Character Primary is another great option for K-3rd grade learners.  Using beautiful read aloud books, discussion questions and scriptural references, this curriculum offers an alternative way to help your little learners grasp important lessons in morality.  It truly takes character development to a new level.

 

And you can see below a chart of all the curriculum offerings from Beautiful Feet Books and the grades/ages they are suggested for:

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What Did We Love?

  • We LOVE, LOVE, LOVE the books!  They are the heart of these curriculum packs and they are amazing!
  • The easy to follow instruction guides are amazing.
  • There are beautiful maps and they contribute seamlessly to the curriculum.
  • Geography can be so much more than memorizing states on a map!
  • The discussion questions in each lesson allowed for additional learning and really put our brains to work.
  • We love the multiple curriculum options that Beautiful Feet Books offers.

What Did We Not Love?

The only thing that I could say we didn’t love about this curriculum was that the maps came rolled up in a tube (to protect them in transit) and they were a bit of a struggle to get to lay flat at first.  We had to put some books on for a few days to get them to lay flat enough to work with, but once they flattened out, they were great!

Important Links from the Website:

  • The FAQ page has some great questions that will help you better understand the curriculum.
  • There are a great selection of Sample Pages for you to try out.
  • There is an Articles page that has an amazing list of great information for homeschoolers.

Pricing:

The Geography through Literature curriculum pack is offered at $67.95.  This includes a 17% discount and you receive FREE shipping!  Truly a great deal!  The Teaching Character Primary set sells for $109.95 which is a 9% discount and also offers FREE shipping.  Around the World with Picture Books Pack set sells for $184.95 which is a 10% discount and again offers FREE shipping.

Final Thoughts:

I am so happy that we were able to work with Beautiful Feet Books for this review.  Although I had heard of them around the homeschool circles, I had never taken the plunge and tried any of their curriculum.  It is now one of my favorites and I am excited to incorporate even more of their beautiful books into our homeschool in the coming years!

 

Purchase Beautiful Feet Books

 

Giveaway!

 

a Rafflecopter giveaway
 

** We received a full curriculum set from Beautiful Feet Books to assist us in this review.**

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Comments

  4. I love the character unit and we are looking forward to our Christmas books. I would love to have a chance to use the geography unit. It looks amazing! thank you!

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  12. I have been looking at this curriculum for over a year now, imagine my surprise when my sister in law, who lives many states away, said her daughter is using this at her classical school and loving it! Now I really want to try it in our homeschool!

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  13. Our favorite living book is Pagoo. I have wanted to try this curriculum, but knew with a baby we wouldn’t get to as much reading as necessary. It is on my radar for next year!

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  14. We have a few of their books, but I love that they have an easy to understand curriculum package and chart based on grade

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  16. Oooo…so many living books…but if I had to choose a favorite, I’d pick Carry On, Mr. Bowditch, with The Bronze Bow, as a close second. 🙂

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  17. We started the Early American Primary from BF this year and are really enjoying it. I especially love how my literature world has expanded because of BF. I have been able to find so many beautiful books for my children, just from looking at their curriculum sets. I am slowly building up our personal library to use with their guides over the coming years.

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  22. We live beautiful feet and just finished Benjamin Franklin! I think that’s one of my favorites. I learned so much about him.

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  23. We are in the early American set and LOVE it. I keep seeing posts of the beautiful maps for geography and look forward to when it comes time to go thru that series!

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  26. As a first year homeschool family I am so excited to learn about Beautiful Feet Books. Thank you for the information as these are all going on our wishlist!

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  32. One of our most favorite living books is The Year of the Horseless Carriage, 1801 by Genevieve Foster. With so many people included in this one book, it seems to rarely stay on the shelf for very long!

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  33. We just now found beautiful feet and we love it! I’ve been wondering about this study. Thanks for the review! We love Archimedes and the Door of Science.

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  35. We have never gotten a BFB. I keep meaning to, but when money is tight, we only buy used books and these are always snatched up before I can get one! I am going to have to make plans to buy some soon.

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  37. What a fun curriculum. I am at the beginning stages with preschoolers only. We started wth BFiAR and loved we are going on a bear hunt. We are switching to PP as my son is done with bunnies!!

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  38. Thanks so much for this review! I’ve been considering the Geography pack for our school day and it’s so helpful to hear from folks who have used it!

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  42. A recent favorite of ours is Understood Betsy. A sweet simple story of allowing a child to experience different things, make mistakes, and learn to think through situations without a micro manager. We also really enjoyed Paddle to the Sea and I can’t wait to read it with my second child. Thank you for your review and the giveaway!

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  43. We love books and we really love beautiful feet books! One book we have recently finished is Miss Rumphius. My daughter really enjoyed the story.

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  48. I just discovered Beautiful Feet Books this year and we are loving the early american unit, and the character unit. Wilfred Gordon McDonald Partridge is a newly discovered favorite for our family. It’s so nice to have a source where I can be confident in the quality of the literature!

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  49. We have the character guidebook and the Early American History pack. So far, our favorite is Benjamin West and His Cat Grimalkin!

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  55. I struggle with making geography fun! This sure looks promising. Haven’t tried any of these books. Would love to this library visit.

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  57. Thank you so much for sharing all these amazing books! It will be my first time homeschooling…and it gets overwhelming. So im happy i found your site to make things easier.

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  62. This is the first year we’ve officially used BFB for our history lessons (Early American Jumbo Pack for 2nd grade) and it has already proved a wonderful and valuable investment! Mommy loves the guide which has saved me much time and over analysis by dividing up all the reading for me and offering some great questions and additional resources for going deeper, and the kids LOVE the coloring pages in the picture packet download. They love to color while I read and then paste their photos in their notebooks. I would absolutely love to add their geography course to our schooling this year!

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  69. We love Leif the Lucky!!! (from the Early American History pack) These books make teaching history simple and engaging. I have loved adding Beautiful Feet books to our school this year!

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  80. I just started BFB modern with my oldest this year. So far we love it and wish we would have started earlier. My favorite living book is Five Little Peppers and How they Grew.

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  84. The more I read about BF the more I want to use it. Looking into our homeschool budget for next school year.

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  85. Our favorite “living book” is The Story of Ping, although we only read it in Spanish because that what I found at the Goodwill for a $1. 🙂

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  90. I’m not sure it was our favorite, but I have such wonderful memories of reading Swiss Family Robinson with my two oldest boys. Learning together through the language of the book and the intense detail of nature facts. I’m going to be starting BFB with the medieval history pack for middle grades and would to try this geography set with my middle kiddos.

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  91. We are using the intermediate Early American History unit… my daughter is generally eager during our homeschool but I’ve never seen her so excited for a subject until now! She doesn’t want to quit. She seems to especially enjoy creating her own notebook. It has already become a treasure. Plus I’m learning a ton! Never a boring moment. ? Hoping to start the Geography unit next as her love of maps has grown already through the note booking process. BFB makes homeschooling fun!

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  93. We absolutely loved the Teaching Character Through Literature and all of the d’Aulaire books we’ve gathered over the past several years.

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  95. We haven’t read many yet since it’s our first year with young kids, but we are enjoying the Marguerite deangeli books we have!

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  99. love all the living books! I’ve really wanted to try Beautiful Feet for a while now! We have a D’Aulaire book and love it.

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  100. Recently I have been enjoying Patricia Polacco books which may not quite be living books, but they have deep topics and cover stories from her family history. Beautiful Feet Books are fairly new to me, but I would love to experience them more!

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  103. What a lovely giveaway! I love the Holling C. Holling books, and imagine the rest of the geography pack would be just as lovely!

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  107. I would love to receive the Geography through Literature pack. My boys have enjoyed reading Paddle-to-the-Sea, and Pagoo. We are currently reading Minn of The Mississippi.

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  110. Thanks for the review! These look like amazing literature packs, and I love that they’re appropriate for somewhat broader age groups! Any time I find something that works for both my girls (18mo apart) at the same time, that’s a win!

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  118. How can I pick a favorite book?! Too many. This was a great series and loved the books. Did the horse series too and loved those also.

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  122. We have yet to read any of these books but they all look so amazing! My daughter is not quite 2 yet so we are just now getting into picture books instead of board books. I plan to purchase some of this curriculum when we get to that age though.

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  123. We’re in our first year of homeschooling. We’ve been using the FIar curriculum which also puts emphasis on education through quality literature. I would love to add this incredible bundle to our homeschooling journey.

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  125. I have looked at beautiful feet several times but haven’t tried them out yet….my favorite living history book that I have read to my daughter so far has been Mary on horseback.

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  137. How can I pick just one favorite living book?! 🙂 I guess I would say Squanto, because that was the most recent book we read.

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  142. We’ve loved all the D’Aulaires Books we’ve gotten through Beautiful Feet books. These sets look amazing and great for making these books come to life for my boys.

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  145. We loved reading Leif the Lucky. Actually have plans to do the BFB Geography study this summer! So excited (especially if we win…lol)! Thank you for this giveaway.

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  146. The around the world with picture Books is on my wishlist. I’m hoping to get it next year. My favorite living book that we read recently is the golden goblet.

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  153. This is on my homeschool wishlist, it looks so rich and fun! I love living books, it’s hard to pick a favorite. The D’Aulaire books as well as the Foster books are pretty high on the list!

    Reply

  158. I have a kindergartner who is 6 and a 4 year old who are doing many of the same things. I love the literature based programs because it works so well with multiple ages and learning levels!

    Reply

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