C.S. Lewis is one of our family's favorite authors, so we were very happy to be able to read Perelandra and use the e-Guide from Progeny Press to help our teen understand the material at a deeper level. Progeny Press offers "study guides for literature from a Christian perspective" with hundreds of e-Guides available from The Josefina Story Quilt e-Guide geared towards grades 1-3 to the Perelandra e-Guide for grades 9-12 which we reviewed.
The Mission of Progeny Press is "To teach our children to think clearly, to understand literature, and to rely on the scripture for truth and values, and enjoy themselves while they do it!"
You can watch this video from Progeny Press to learn more about the company.
Each study guide takes approximately 8-12 weeks to complete which means your child will complete about one page per day. Guides for younger children can take less time. As Perelandra proved to be a difficult text for our teen to read, we are working through the e-Guide more slowly to ensure that he understands the material that he is reading.
The Perelandra e-Guide contains the following elements:
- Synopsis of Perelandra, background information, and a Synopsis of Out of the Silent Planet (the first book in the trilogy)
- Since our teen has not read Out of the Silent Planet yet (my husband has read it), it was great that he could review the events on Malacandra and Ransom's encounters with the Sorn and Hrossa.
- A biography of C.S. Lewis
- I love having a brief biography of the author as it prevents the need to go to the Internet to look it up.
- Activities to complete prior to reading Perelandra
- While we didn't complete the prereading activities, they are quite good. I really like the idea of researching the mythical origin of Mars and Venus as well as that of 1930-1950s science fiction. These are just two of the six activities suggested.
- Vocabulary words and a variety of activities to introduce and teach the new words
- Vocabulary activities range from sentences from the book with the new words to discussion of mood and tone to searching for antonyms. With a variety of ways to learn vocabulary, students are sure to find at least one way which suits their learning style.
- Examination of literary techniques
- There are questions pertaining to metaphors, similes, descriptions, and imagery to name a few.
- Examination of moral lessons and character values
- Through a variety of questions, we are able to discuss the difference between Weston and Ransom as we read quotes from the Bible and examine their decisions. I think this has been one of my favorite aspects of the e-Guide – we can have good conversations with our son with Perelandra as a starting point.
- A variety of activities and writing assignments
- There are typical essay assignments available, as well as art suggestions, and research papers to pick from for culminating activities.
- Suggestions for further reading
- Having a suggested list of books written by C.S. Lewis to look for and other books that relate to the series takes the guess work out what to read next. And the great thing is our son has already read some of the other books such as The Martin Chronicles and The Hobbit.
What Our Family Likes
My husband and I have been enjoying the fact that while we are discussing Perelandra with our son – and the answers to the vocabulary and other questions – we are also getting the opportunity to discuss real world events as well as the concepts of morality, right and wrong, and other topics in relation to the Christian view we are trying to instill in our son.
I also like that my husband is reading the book via an online application that allows him to search for key words as we discuss the various questions in the e-Guide. This way we can find the exact phrase or quote that a question brings up and find the reasons within the text for the answer suggested in the answer key. One specific instance would be that of the question pertaining to "emergent evolution" and the Force in Chapter 7. Our son had difficulty with that question, so in addition to giving him hints from the answer key we were able to re-read that portion of the text aloud to discuss whether or not Weston is presenting a paradox or a contradiction.
There is also an interactive feature to the e-Guide that allows your children to type their answers directly into the e-Guide. We chose to print out the unit study so that we could all be able to look at it while discussing the questions.
As our younger two children, who are being homeschooled, move forward in their reading journey, I look forward to relying upon Progeny Press for their e-Guides. Within the next year, we could use Frog and Toad Together e-Guide for our 5-year-old son. If our teen makes the decision to homeschool in the future, we will be looking for others such as Hamlet e-Guide, Introduction to Poetry: Forms and Elements e-Guide, and The Screwtape Letters e-Guide.
In addition, if you are curious, Progeny Press does offer an e-Guide for Out of the Silent Planet, if you would rather read Book # 1 in the Space Trilogy first and complete that e-Guide with your child. There are also sample pages from the various e-Guides to help you decide if it is a fit for your family.
I also like that my husband is reading the book via an online application that allows him to search for key words as we discuss the various questions in the e-Guide. This way we can find the exact phrase or quote that a question brings up and find the reasons within the text for the answer suggested in the answer key. One specific instance would be that of the question pertaining to "emergent evolution" and the Force in Chapter 7. Our son had difficulty with that question, so in addition to giving him hints from the answer key we were able to re-read that portion of the text aloud to discuss whether or not Weston is presenting a paradox or a contradiction.
Going Forward
There is also an interactive feature to the e-Guide that allows your children to type their answers directly into the e-Guide. We chose to print out the unit study so that we could all be able to look at it while discussing the questions.
As our younger two children, who are being homeschooled, move forward in their reading journey, I look forward to relying upon Progeny Press for their e-Guides. Within the next year, we could use Frog and Toad Together e-Guide for our 5-year-old son. If our teen makes the decision to homeschool in the future, we will be looking for others such as Hamlet e-Guide, Introduction to Poetry: Forms and Elements e-Guide, and The Screwtape Letters e-Guide.
In addition, if you are curious, Progeny Press does offer an e-Guide for Out of the Silent Planet, if you would rather read Book # 1 in the Space Trilogy first and complete that e-Guide with your child. There are also sample pages from the various e-Guides to help you decide if it is a fit for your family.
To learn more, please visit the following:
The Homeschool Review Crew also reviewed the following e-Guides:
To see more reviews, please visit the Homeschool Review Crew!
To see more reviews, please visit the Homeschool Review Crew!
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