TOS Crew Review – Five in a Row

I have been, or can be if you click on a link and make a purchase, compensated via a cash payment, gift, or something else of value for writing this post. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers.

We love books in this house. I can see the love of reading having been passed down from my mother to me and now to my boys. Rather than a security blanket, my boys all went through a stage of sleeping with their favorite books. I still can find them stashed all around their beds as they now read them in bed before going to sleep.

Even before I began homeschooling the boys, I had encountered a Five in a Row book at the small, local Christian bookstore. There was something so appealing to me of the idea that through repeated reading of a book coupled with related activities your child could learn and thrive. I flipped through that book on more than one occasion in the store, but held off buying as the boys were attending parochial school. When we made the decision to begin homeschooling, I snagged a used copy of Vol. 1 and perused it with excitement. But, the more formal curriculum I’d chosen for our spine took over my time and the FIAR volume sat on the shelf.

So, I was happy to learn that the TOS Crew would be receiving a copy to use with their family and review. Our family received Five in a Row Volume 3. Flipping through the pages, I was reminded as to how strongly I felt pulled towards this resource. What child doesn’t like to hear a good story over and over?

Each FIAR book (volumes 1 – 4) is set up the same. After an introduction to this approach towards learning, the individual book titles have pages of suggested activities over five categories: social studies, language arts, art, math and science. Some of the activities are discussion based (e.g. what is onomatopoeia? which we recently did on our ‘row’ of The Bee Tree by Patricia Pollaco.) Others are more hands-on in approach (e.g. a scavenger hunt for things in nature while studying The Salamander Room by Anne Mazer.)

One downside to these volumes is that occasionally you will encounter a featured book that is out of print and/or not available in your library system. From the 15 titles in Volume 3, I was unable to find only one: Henry and the Castaway. I will add that I did look over three different library systems I use to find all the other titles. Some homeschool families may not be as fortunate when doing interlibrary loan.

Overall, this is an approach to learning that the boys are thoroughly enjoying. The boys ask to hear the story again, even if we’ve read it those 5 times in a row. Not only might we dust off our copy of Volume 1, but I might look into the other volumes as well.

Before Five in a Row is for the preschool crowd and not one we’ll most likely use. Our local library has a copy on the shelf for me to borrow and peruse and I recall the book Blueberry Sal being among the titles studied.

There are also guides for older elementary students (ages 8 to 12) under the Beyond Five in a Row series. Each title has four books to row with the idea to finish the titles in one semester. I have a copy of Volume 2 sitting on my shelf that will be dusted off for the older boys to use.

For the middle school student, they have Above and Beyond Five in a Row. This resource focuses strictly on the book Hitty: Her First Hundred Years by Rachel Field and is written to the student rather than teacher.

Having now used Five in a Row in our homeschool, I can see why I was so drawn to the title years ago. This really is a gentle way to school your child with so much flexibility to add as desired and follow those rabbit trails. I just wish we’d started using this wonderful resource before now!