Northwest Treasures (A REVIEW)

Today I am sharing with you a resource for all things geology. Northwest Treasures offers a lot of curricula and information for various geological topics including rocks, minerals, dinosaurs, fossils, and volcanoes. We were given Dinosaurs and the Bible A Six-Part Class for our main course to review, and we were also given Taking the Mystery Out of Geology for a short introduction to geology. These are a part of their online class offerings. Some of the other crew members have received Geology and Apologetics A Six-Part Class for their main course.

Dinosaurs and the Bible

This six-part online class is split up into 6 videos, giving a total of 1-hour and 49-minutes of "class" time. There are worksheets to go with each video, and each video ranges from 16-21 minutes long. The videos, once purchased are available via vimeo to watch for a 6-month period from date of purchase.

The video topics include: How we got the modern view of dinosaurs, classification, the dinosaur rush, extinction of dinosaurs, dinosaurs and the ice age, and fossils. The recommended ages for these videos are Grade 5-adult. I'd very much agree with this as it is a lot of information, hard words, and concepts not easy to understand.

My very incomplete worksheet of questions from lesson 3. I missed some points, and had planned to go back and fill them in. This shows what the worksheets look like, and how much detail and information is in the videos. It is a lot to catch and remember. A comprehensive exam is at the end of lesson 6.

How did I use this? I watched these videos myself. I wanted to see what they presented before I showed my children, and I'm glad I did as there are some things belief wise that we don't agree with. With that said though, I learned a lot. I really like how he presented the information with lots of slides, pictures, and visual aids, and it all gave me something to think about. I learned some interesting things about paleontologists from the past that I didn't know, and just general facts about dinosaurs, fossils, and geology that I found fascinating. If you have beliefs that differ from his, it's still an interesting series of videos even if you just get some great facts about dinosaurs and the history of paleontology.

Taking the Mystery Out of Geology

This video is a 20-minute video that outlines the basics of Geology. It lays it all out there. Some of the big scary and weird words that Geologists use, and the basic beliefs that you need to realize when studying Geology. A good portion of this video talks about the timeline of the creation of the earth, and a young earth view. I can't agree with most of this video, but it does give a good overview to prepare you for the rest of the Dinosaur and the Bible course, and the views that are presented in those.

What did I think of these videos and courses? They were very thought provoking, and full of information. While I personally wouldn't use these particular videos for my children, there are some other great curriculum resources from Northwest Treasures that I'd love to try out. They have kits of rocks and fossils. Like real ones. For example, they have a Geology for kids sample kit with various rock samples. That looks pretty amazing. If you are a Classical Conversations family, they offer kits to go along with those studies. They also offer a Pre-K-3rd grade series Geology for "Little Eyes."

If you'd like to see what others had to say about this curriculum you can click on the banner below.