Homeschooling for the most part has been fairly easy for us. After all, I have been teaching our four kiddos for over 23 years! I plug in reading, writing, math, science and history to our schedule and off we go!
The hard part? Electives! All our kids are quite different and therefore have quite different ideas of what an elective should look like. Sometimes I let them chose and sometimes something catches my eye to try.
Such was the case with Medical Investigation 101, given to us by Timberdoodle Co to review. I mean, just the name sounds cool, right?
Medical Investigation 101 is comprised of a 247 page Student book, student work text, and teacher's edition. The subtitle- "A Book to Inspire Your Interest in Medicine and How Doctors Think" gives you a good idea of what this book is really about.
The book begins discussing the medical field and introduces many vocabulary words by talking about various kinds of doctors. It mentions some of the challenges of the medical profession (should be required reading for any current doctors) and encourages the reader to explore the world of medicine on their own. It then turns to medical complaints by the presenting of "patients", giving patient backgrounds, symptoms and such, and encouraging problem solving skills using the background information they have provided to diagnose the patient. As you proceed, more medical information is provided such as the role of blood, food-borne illnesses and common conditions including diabetes, respiratory illnesses and heart attacks. You can think of it as a mini science lesson!
The accompanying student workbook begins with a good amount of vocabulary review and then has corresponding pages to each medical case. After taking notes on each patient, further activities include vocabulary, fill in the blanks and matching activities, and word puzzles. Do not let the graphics fool you though, this is not fluff and will challenge a high schooler to use their brains a bit!
The teacher's edition is basically the workbook with the answers filled in (thank you!), but also has a short summary of each chapter to help you as a teacher keep up.
OK, every mom wants their child to be a doctor, right? ;) But this is not only a neat way to introduce the world of medicine to your student in a fun way, but also to challenge their problem solving. We often tell our kids they need to think outside the box, and that, I believe, is most certainly true in the medical world!
So yes, if your child is even the bit interested in medicine you will want to grab this set! It is also a great way to expose them to more areas in medicine than most of us are familiar with. I am a firm believer in our kids would have more choices deciding their chosen career if they actually KNEW what choices were out there! But even if you have a kiddo who does not long to be a doctor- this is a great elective offered in a fun, non threatening way that will challenge their problem solving skills.
Medical Investigations 101 can be found in the 11th grade curriculum kit offered by Timberdoodle, or ordered separately. I would recommend it for 8th grade and up.
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