Easy to Teach Canadian Social Studies: Apple Press Review


Are you looking for an easy way to teach your children about Canadian social studies? Apple Press publishes social studies materials, mostly about Canada, with an emphasis on map skills! They have over 30 titles, and some are available in French! Titles include topics such as Canadian provinces, landforms, community and map books. Although they do not have a web site, their books are distributed through a number of Canadian school supply companies throughout the country.

The covers of the Apple Press Canada Map Books

My Very First Primary Map Book

Grade Range: Kindergarten to Grade 2.

The cover of My Very First Primary Map Book.


Book Summary:


This easy-to-use activity book develops map literacy by teaching beginning readers the ABC’s of maps. Four fundamental map concepts are introduced: shape, symbols, position and direction. The imaginative topics will appeal to young people – cartoon –like animals and fairy tales with a twist! At the bottom of the page is a unique “Teacher Zone.” It offers meaningful activity extensions as well as specific learning outcomes deepen understanding.

What I liked about My First Primary Map Book is that it engaged my young children right away. The lessons weren’t long and wordy and they were easy to follow. It’s a win when my kids like it, it doesn’t feel like a chore and learning is happening! The cute characters in the lessons were a fun aspect to the books and my children loved coming up with names for the characters. The section on signs got them asking questions about other signs when we were out in the community and got them excited about signs they knew from their lessons. I love the fact that this book doesn’t come with lesson plans so it’s easy to teach and engages the children in all areas. My First Primary Map Book is available as an e-book or hardcopy, which is reproducible for your own family.

Our Community

Grade Range: Grade 1

The cover of the book Our Community by Apple Press.

Book Summary:

What is a community and how does it satisfy the needs of its members? This easy-to-follow activity book emphasizes the social and a physical need of citizens in a community relates those concepts the everyday lives of primary students. The role of cooperation, rules and responsibility are highlighted within the four sections: Community Needs, Community Places, Community Workers and Living and Working together.

Our Community was a great way to introduce communities to my young children. The book talks about what makes a community, things communities need as well as who works in our community to make it functional. There are lots of illustrations for my kids to colour in which always adds to their fun in learning. I particularly liked how they included a section on being a good citizen. We so often forget to remind and teach our children that there is more we are responsible for beyond just our home and that we can help take care of our community in so many different ways. Our Community is simply laid out yet kept my kids interested throughout the whole book. It is available as an e-book or hardcopy, which is reproducible for your own family.

Apple Press Canada Map Books Grades 1-6

Grade Range: Grades 1-6, with each grade having it’s own workbook

The covers of the books in the Apple Press Map Book series.

There are 6 books in the series that follow My Very First Primary Map Book, providing Canadian map and globe skills from Grade 1 to grade 6 level. We completed Map Books 1-6 with my oldest child through several years.

The map books are not a full geography program. However they work really well to keep Canadian geography skills fresh on years when you are not doing a full Canadian geography program. They also would make an excellent addition to another social studies program.

My daughter enjoyed all of the map books. She completed a page a few days a week until the book was done for the year. It was such a simple thing to fit into our homeschool! Best of all, she retained excellent map and Canadian geography skills.

The books are sold as an e-book or as a hard copy. Permission is given to copy within your household. What great value! The titles come in French as well.

Apple Press also publishes many other titles! They have workbooks for each Canadian province and territory, books about landforms, and a book about Pioneer Life.

I highly recommend that you check out Apple Press as a simple way to include some Canadian social studies and mapping skills in your homeschool.


Are you looking for other ways to easily add Canadian Social Studies to your homeschool?

Check out our store for products such as The Canadian Adventure, Canadian Geography Cards, or Canadian Geography Matching Game.

The cover image for The Canadian Adventure a Virtual Trip Across Canada.

This post was updated in 2023.

Alaina
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2 thoughts on “Easy to Teach Canadian Social Studies: Apple Press Review”

  1. I am trying to track down a table of contents for the My Very First Primary Map Book and can’t seem to find one on the internet at all. Do you have any idea where I could look? Thanks : )

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