We wrapped up what we came to call our ‘summer of reading’ with a read aloud of Who Was Jonah? which is a part of the Kingdom Files series by Barbour Publishing. This review book along with another book in the series Who Was Mary, Mother of Jesus? proved to be a great fit for our family. These are fun and fairly short chapter books that feature a biography of a Bible character, an investigation into their lives, and lessons that we can learn from those stories.
We read Who Was Jonah? together and really enjoyed it. The book starts with a Fact File that gives basic information about Jonah. I really appreciated this because even as an adult I sometimes struggle with the timeline of events in the Bible . Then comes the Action File. This section of the book was the story of Jonah and included great illustrations and clues that you could apply to your own life and to help you understand the story of Jonah. For example, “No matter what you’re going through, your heavenly Father sees you and accepts your prayers. That should be as comforting to us today as it was to Jonah. ” There were also some very well done black and white illustrations of the story in this part of the book.
Another feature of the book that I really enjoyed are the scripture references for the portion of the story that he was telling. The story of Jonah was told through the words of the author but the references allow you to go and read the actual scripture for yourselves and compare it to the book. I found that the book did a great job of following scripture while also using a writing style that was very engaging for the children. In the Power File section, each ‘Power Up’ or lesson has a memory verse as well.
For Who Was Mary, Mother of Jesus?, I had my daughter read it independently. The short chapters and engaging narrative made it an enjoyable read for her. This book was set up in the same style as Who Was Jonah? with the Fact File, Action File, and Power File. While she enjoyed reading it and I think these books are fine to be read independently, I really think that they worked best for our family when we read them together. There were so many great lessons to be learned that I felt it was ideal to be able to pause after the chapters and have family discussions about what we were learning. I did not get a chance to use them for this reading (which we began while we were on vacation) but Kingdom Files has some great educator resources and games that you can print to take your study even further. These include word searches, creating trading cards, and mapping activities just to name a few.
These biographies can be read independently (recommended for ages 8-12) or used as a family read aloud or part of your Bible study time. I highly recommend checking out this great series. Our family is hoping to purchase some others in this series, particularly Who Was David? and Who Was Esther? Tell us in the comments which book you think your family would most enjoy and check out the other Crew Reviews below!
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