Growing up in God’s Word: A Review

An Honest Review: Bible Curriculum

(Disclosure: I have received this product for free in exchange for an honest review. These opinions expressed are my own.)

We have used many different approaches to Bible study in our homeschool over the years. We’ve tried reading “round robin” and then narrating, using workbooks, and studying along with our history studies as they came about in chronological order, but we’ve never used anything quite like Growing up in God’s Word. This curriculum has made us really dig into the Bible, and we have really enjoyed using this guide thus far!

We have used the first five lessons in Growing up in God’s Word: Life of Christ, pt. 1.

I asked my children what they liked best about this new study and this is what they had to say:

Sister: “It talks about things that you’ve never thought about before.”

Brother: “It has more to it than just reading the Bible and then saying…we’re done!”

Each lesson is set up to be completed over a five day period. There is one topic and lesson text to be read and discussed, map work, research ideas, memory work, puzzles, games, crafts and review questions. We have not utilized every single activity every week, but I like that we are able to pick and choose what we would like to do with ease. I will list some of our favorite things so far.

1. Discussion

The beginning of each lesson lists the topic and text from God’s Word that we will be studying. It instructs you to read the Scriptures and then it gives great commentary-like comments after the text. We usually take turns reading the text and then I read the comments to the kids. This sparks some great discussions and makes us really think about what we have read. This is our favorite thing about this curriculum! It uses the Bible to study the Bible! I know that sounds odd, but there are many things out there which are written to teach the Bible without actually opening the Book itself!

2. Research

The “Digging Deeper” research ideas in this curriculum are great for my 11 and 13 year old children. They have done some online research and learned to use eSword Bible software in order to find the answers to the questions that were assigned to them. They learned about the angel Gabriel, the names of Jesus, the number of wise men that visited baby Jesus, the Feast of Passover, and the difference between the Pharisees and Sadducees. It’s been a wonderful learning experience for them.

3. Crafts

There are at least two crafts to choose from for each lesson. We have done a few and have really enjoyed them, but most are geared for younger children. A few years ago, we would have done them all, but the research has been better for us at this point in time.