Wordly Wise 3000 is a vocabulary development curriculum available for grades K-12. I reviewed Book 5, which would be the fifth-grade book. I received the whole set for Book 5, which consists of a 168-page student workbook with 20 five-part lessons (15 new words each); a teacher's resource book containing helpful information, review exercises, tests, and answer keys; and a set of five CDs that contain audio recordings of each lesson's word list, definitions, comprehension questions, and reading passages with the vocabulary words used in context.

At the beginning of the Teacher's Resource Guide is a lengthy (and persuasive) section explaining the benefit of improving a student's vocabulary so that the student will improve in reading comprehension. In my personal experience, I found the use of audio books, increased reading time, and reading drill workbooks to be the best way to increase reading comprehension in our home (and, yes, I did try some vocabulary workbooks). What is impressive is the completeness of this curriculum. It includes many of these things that I tried, such as audio reading passages and reading comprehension drills. So if you feel that vocabulary study may be the way to improve your child's reading comprehension, I am certain you would not be able to find a better-written or more effective curriculum than Wordly Wise 3000.

Each lesson for the student begins with a word list, which the student can hear on the audio CD. Each word on the list is followed by its phonetic pronunciation guide, its definition(s), and one or more sentences using the word in context. Following the word list are five activities.

(1.) "Finding Meanings" instructs the child to combine two phrases (choosing from a list of four) to form a sentence that correctly uses one of the vocabulary words.

(2.) "Just the Right Word" lists several sentences, instructing the child to replace the highlighted portion of each sentence with the appropriate word (or its corresponding form) from the vocabulary list.

(3.) "Applying Meanings" is a section of multiple-choice questions confirming comprehension of the word meanings.

(4.) "Word Study" covers synonyms, antonyms, word roots, prefixes, suffixes, and more.

(5.) Finally, each lesson ends with a "Reading Passage" that uses all the words in context. The passage, which can also be heard on the audio CD, is followed by some comprehension questions.

After every four lessons, the student workbook provides a review consisting of various activities, such as crossword puzzles and hidden message activities. In the Teacher Resource Book, there is a fill-in-the-blank review for each lesson, as well as a test for each lesson.

Wordly Wise is a program of the highest quality, and I feel it most definitely would improve reading comprehension for every child. The only drawback is the expense. On the company's website, the combined cost of materials for grade 5 is $110 (Student Book, Audio CDs, and Teacher Resource Book). The student book is $11, the teacher book is $44, and the audio CDs are $55. However, the good news is that, in my opinion, the student workbook alone could be used very effectively (more effectively than many other vocabulary/reading comprehension workbooks I have seen), and the student workbook can be found on the Internet for less than $10 new. The next time I need reading comprehension help in our homeschool (five children), the Wordly Wise student workbook will be on my list--sans teacher's guide and audio CDs.

Product review by Camilla Anderson, The Old Schoolhouse® Magazine, LLC, May 2009