Chester Comix provides the one thing that a lot of homeschool history curriculum options are missing: Fun!
One easy way to add that missing ingredient to your homeschool history lessons is to use these comics as a supplementary resource. When you notice your child’s eyes glassing over with boredom, you can pull out a fun comic that grabs their interest and pulls their focus back to the lesson at hand.
There are currently 28 titles in the series, and each book features 24 pages of history-based comics. There are four comic history lessons in each book, but you can use each page of the book as a standalone story as well. Take one page or one chapter and incorporate it into your history curriculum according to the needs of the lesson and your child. You can even use Chester Comix to blend history, reading, writing, economics and other subjects.
Meet Chester the Crab
The original Chester comic books are based on a friendly crab named Chester who goes on exciting travels to explore various moments in history. He grabs the attention of readers at all levels and passes on the information he discovers. In each of his adventures, basic historical information is uncovered.
Use Chester’s one-page storylines to introduce topics to your child in a fun way, or have your child read an entire chapter to gain a more in-depth understanding of the information presented. Each page features a timeline that orients the child to other events taking place at the same time in history. Chester is flexible, so you can skip between lessons according to your primary history curriculum.
Chester the Crab may occasionally take a storyline from different points of view. This is a creative way to show children that there are sometimes multiple ways to view a historical event. As Chester moves through history, he encounters problems that allow children to think about economics as well as history.
Fun for Kids, Easy for Parents
Chester the Crab opens your child’s mind to history in a fun way, but it also opens the door to easier history lessons for you. Teacher guides available in PDF format through the Chester Comix website offer a variety of puzzles and games as well as ideas for projects and lessons related to the material in the comic books. You can use these ideas to further supplement the lessons taken from your primary history curriculum.
What to Expect from Chester Comix
The Chester comic books are not based on any religion, but they are also do not go against any religious beliefs. Since it is designed as a supplement to other homeschool curriculum, religious views can certainly be added to lessons even if they are not mentioned within the comic text.
While each book features new content, there is some overlap in the lessons. You may find some individual pages repeated in multiple books, but the overall chapters in each book should contain unique content. This overlap may actually help if you do not intend to purchase the entire collection of comic books.
Prepare to go through the pages of the books and identify those that directly correspond to the lessons you are teaching through your primary history curriculum. If you want to use the suggested lessons and projects featured in the teacher’s guide, download the PDF in advance so that you can prepare to incorporate those elements into your lesson plan. You will need to purchase materials for each project since this program only offers the comic books and teacher guides.