Review: God's World News

God's World News sent us a subscription News Current magazine.

God's World News has a whole family of magazines for different ages, bringing the news, from a Christian perspective to children at the level they can understand. You can see their mission statement, and beliefs here.

As with so many educational things, we struggle with deciding what "grade level" the girls are at, since they learn at their own pace, not based on a specific grade level. After looking at the sample editions available online, I decided that News Current, for 5th and 6th graders, would be the best fit for Lexie and Ashlyn.

We were sent 2 back issues, August and September, along with a nice big wall map of the world, a few days later, our October issue came.

Meanwhile, we were getting ready to go on a trip, so I tossed all 3 issues in my car bag and, when the girls needed something to do in the car, I handed one to each of them and I read one too, then we traded, though I think I only ever saw two of them.

The articles are quite diverse, and before long, both girls were telling me "Mommy, did you know . . . " that's always a good sign! LOL.  You can see a sample issue for yourself here.

One thing that was fun was reading about how knitters had made big yarn "panels" and decorated a bridge in Pittsburgh, which was where we were heading as we read it. The girls were bummed to see that the bridge wasn't STILL decorated, but still thought it was cool to read about the city we were going to.

I was excited about the map too! I've wanted a good world map for awhile, and couldn't wait to hang it in our school room, YAY!!

One thing to be aware of, there's a page of political cartoons that are definitely leaning strongly toward conservatives (which we are), so if you have any (politically) liberal leanings, this magazine probably isn't the one for your family, you can easily see the political leanings in the sample issue, mentioned above.

In addition to 10 issues of the magazine, your subscription ($28) includes a bunch of extra resources, including access to biographies, quizzes and answer keys (we're not really a "quiz" kind of family, so we haven't used this, but it's a nice option for those who do use quizzes), an opt-in newsletter for parents and teachers, with links to the .pdf files of current and archived issues, quizzes, answer keys, etc. and an interactive website for kids with content that can be used, not only online, but also on a tablet or smartphone. The website gives your child access to grade-specific content, including stories from the print magazine, as well as extras only available on the website.

I think this magazine wouldn't be for everyone because of the political views, honestly, while I like seeing a magazine that isn't full of the liberal bias so prevalent in the media, I'd prefer to see a more politically neutral stance, as close to "unbiased" as it is possible for humans to be, but since I haven't seen anything that comes close to even attempting that, this is, at least, Christian, and conservative, and can lead to discussions about politics with our children as they grow older and more aware of what is happening in the world around us.

To see what other members of the Schoolhouse Review Crew thought of this, and the other magazines that God's World News offers, click the banner below.

All prices are accurate at time of posting.