This post is a review of the book Peoples of the World
The Summary
This book exposes the reader to various aspects of culture have they are addressed by many different people groups. Topics that are addressed include
For each of these cultural topics, several people groups provide examples of how they address this. For example, for the cultural topic of money, different examples of money our given. You get to see the Russian rouble, Malaysian sens, and Greek drachmas. There are even examples what is not traditional view as money in the west such as the use of salt for money as well as bartering.
This pattern of an aspect of culture followed by examples is repeated throughout the book.
The Good
This book provides a great deal of exposure to cultures that most students are not familiar with. The illustrations are adequate. There are also activities every few pages for the students. Examples include how to wear a sarong, sara, turban, how to make wax pictures, as well as how to make a pinata.
The Bad
There is a lot of small text on the pages. This makes the book unreadable for younger students. In addition, there are no learning tools or support. This leaves it up to the teacher to determine how to scaffold this material for their students. For younger teachers, this can be much more challenging.
The Recommendation
I give this book 2/5. There is just a lack of “wow” when looking at this text. Nothing was done to make this book stand out from the crowd. It’s worthy of the library but not valuable in terms of teaching and instruction. Let the kids enjoy the pictures and for the more academically incline to actual read it.