TOS Crew: Vocabulary Cartoons SAT Word Power

This year's voyage is off to a great start! Our next port of call is with the fine people from New Monic Books, Inc.  As part of the TOS Crew, we were sent a free copy of Vocabulary Cartoons SAT Word Power Learn Hundreds of SAT Words with Easy Memory Techniques, in exchange for our honest opinions... and here is mine....

First, let's talk about what are Vocabulary Cartoons? Are you familiar with mnemonics? A mnemonic device helps you learn something new, by using something that is familiar. Usually a picture and some sort of 'saying'. We, as a family, have used these to teach  geography and math, so I was excited to try this with my kids.

The purpose of Vocabulary Cartoons is to help your high schooler, really any age child, to remember unusual words that will be found on the SAT. Click here to see a few pages from the book.

As you can see, these 'Vocabulary Cartoons' are a lot of fun! Kids really do retain much more when they are having a good time!

How is this book used.......  (from the book introduction..)

" Each page has five elements:

1) The main word.  The word you wish to lean. It is followed by the phonetic pronunciation, part of speech, and a definition.

2) The link word. The link word is a simple word or phrase which rhymes or sounds like the main word.

3)The caption.  The caption connects the main word and the link word in a sentence.

4) the cartoon. The caption is illustrated in a bizarre or humorous cartoon which incorporates the main word and the link word into a visual mnemonic.

5) Each cartoon is followed by two or three sample sentences."

When you put all of these elements together, it really is a successful combination!

Now.. how did we use this book?

I simply handed the book, to two of my teenage boys. the instructions I gave them was to work on  2-3 words a day, and work their way through the book. To test each other, and do the little quizzes that are throughout the book.

The boys enjoyed the book, not only were they learning the words that were in the book, they had a good time doing it! They will never forget those visuals!  And in the end, they really did retain more words than they typically do! That scores points in my book!!!

And to top it off... the book is available at the ultra affordable price of $12.95!  Be sure to check out New Monic Books to see their whole line of vocabulary helps! Create a milieu of words in your home!

Take a moment, and visit the crew blog to see what my crew mates have to say about this neat product!