Over the past year, Chicago Review Press has quickly risen to the top of favorite publishers for me. My particular favorites are the beautiful, softcover publications that feature biographies of important historical figures, and an assortment of activities for young readers to experiment with, build, and perform. This month's featured is Alexander Graham Bell For Kids - His Life & Inventions with 21 Activities, and it is as wonderful as the others that our family has read.

The book has one hundred and thirty-one pages, with seven major units, divided into anywhere from two to four sections. A Timeline of the major events from Mr. Bell's life can be found in the first few pages. Were it not for the many fantastic photos included on most every page, this book might be mistaken as a fictional story. The text is conversational, and easy to understand for younger readers. Sprinkled throughout the pages, and in between the text, are an assortment of historical facts of the nineteenth century, blurbs about science, and more than a few experiments that are meant to be performed. Conveniently, most if not all of these require a minimum of materials, the majority of which are probably in every home.

I'm sure you're wondering what types of experiments/activities are included, so here is a sampling:

- Make an Ear Trumpet
- Learn the American Manual Alphabet
- Singing Straw
- Feeling Sound
- Sound Power
- Pie Tin Telegraph
- Electromagnet Magic
- Four Cent Battery
- Pizza ox Phonograph
- Speak Like a Scot
- The Aim of Ailerons

I am not typically drawn to science experiments, although I do find them interesting and enjoy the experience during our lessons. For some reason though, perhaps because they are fairly simple to assemble, those suggested have been very fun to complete. I think it also helps that my science loving daughter is a natural leaderand enjoys jumping in and experimenting. She definitely gets that from her science savvy father. I have to say that my favorites were the activities that included an everyday battery. More bang for your buck. For example, the electromagnet experiment had us winding copper wire around a screwdriver, with opposite ends hanging out. After removing the insulation from the ends of those two ends, we connected them to a nine-volt battery. What happened?  That screwdriver became a magnet, that's what. Simple, but fun.

Now those were enjoyable, but it was the biography part of the book that we really found engaging. I never realized how little I knew about Alexander Graham Bell. We probably all naturally think of the invention of the telephone, but that is only one of the accomplishments of his life.

I had not known that Bell was a teacher to deaf students. His mother was nearly deaf, which sparked in him a fascination with the way we comprehend speech, and how sound is created and moves. The way that his mind was able to create such amazing inventions, and ultimately the telephone is something that my average brain finds difficult to comprehend. It was amazing to my kids that his education would have been completed at age fourteen. We also learned about the devastation that tuberculosis caused in that time period, and that it not only caused the death of his brothers, but it also is how he came to reside in North America. 

Being a romantic at heart, I was interested in the love story between Alexander Graham Bell, and his wife, Mabel. Let me tell you, the beginning was not without conflict. A few more fascinating facts that I had never known:

- American inventor Elisha Gray was in competition with Bell over multiple telegraph and telephone, and they went to court over the dispute.

- Bell was lifelong friends with Helen Keller, and it was his belief that she could learn that led to Anne Sullivan becoming Keller's teacher.

- Bell opened a school for deaf children.

-He was a great supporter of women's rights.

This is a great book. I would recommend this to any family. This can be used as a part of your school studies, a supplement, or even as an extra read. Young or old, this book appeals to people of all ages. Our family has nothing but positive things to say about it.

-Product review by Laurie Gauger, The Old Schoolhouse® Magazine, LLC, August, 2018