I must express an opinion different from all the other reviewers so far. I purchased this book for our daughters to use, and came away very disappointed. Granted it has lovely pictures, and good diagrams and the activities are interesting....if you can make it long enough to get to one. The writing style is not what Charlotte Mason would have approved of. She had no patience for twaddly textbooks that moralised everything, which unfortunately this book does. The style is boring and pedantic, and even my younger children disliked it. I personally want to give the glory to God for His creation, but stressing every few lines the awesomeness of His creation soon becomes hollow. His creative glory should be self-evident to your children, because they are actually out there looking at it. This textbook requires you to read portions for days before you ever come to an activity. It especially bothers me that the book is written in a sing-songy conversational manner, as if the author were in the room leading a class. This annoys my kids, because when the text asks them if they've ever heard of a botanist ("BAW - tan - ist") they look at me like, "why are you asking us such a dumb question Mom?". Obviously, as their teacher I know what they've already studied, and it sounds really silly to be speaking to them as if I've never met them before.
Charlotte Mason would have had the children read a PRIMARY source work, not this kind of predigested moralised stuff, she would have had the children go outside and look at a flower, draw it, observe its changes, not sit for days on the couch reading from a textbook. We finally gave up on this book, as my girls were becoming very bored, and starting to dread "science" time. We decided to change to actually doing science, with activity based explorations they will remember as they grow up and will truly know that God is awesome from what they see before them. Reading eight pages and then doing a quiet notebook page is not doing science. If you decide to use this book, I strongly suggest you read it aloud, skipping all the pedantic nonesense, and get to the real subject matter, and then right away do an activity that will engage your children. I wish I could be more positive about this book, I had such high hopes for it.