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Using Little Passports for Homeschool Geography (Little Passports Review)

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Quick! What’s a kid’s favorite thing about traveling? Seeing the beautiful scenery. Visiting new and exotic places. Learning the history, culture, and geography of the places he visits.

Yeah, right. Who are we kidding? It’s the souvenirs.

Little Passports 1

Sometimes, though, it’s the fun stuff that gets kids interested in the fun placesThat’s what makes using Little Passports for homeschool geography such a great possibility.

Little Passports Review

Little Passports lets you travel the world, collecting all kinds of fun little artifacts that encourage kids to learn more about the places they’ve visited.

Well, sort of. Actually, Sam and Sophia do the “traveling” and each month they send Little Passport subscribers a goody bag, geared towards kids ages 5-10, full of souvenirs and facts about each place they visit.

The first month, kids receive a sturdy Little Passports suitcase to store all their goodies in. The suitcase is much more durable than I expected it to be. It’s made of a heavy-duty cardboard-type material with a metal handle and latch. Barring any serious abuse, I’m expecting it will hold up quite well for a long time.

Megan Little Passports

They’ll also get:

  • An introductory letter from Sam
  • A huge, colorful wall map to locate each country visited and to map their adventure
  • A passport book
  • Stickers
  • An activity page
  • A boarding pass with an access code to play games on the Little Passports website

Each month after that, subscribers get a package from a different country. Our first package was from Brazil.

Little Passports Brazil

It came with:

  • A fact sheet about Brazil
  • Stickers for Megan’s passport, her suitcase, and her map (a push pen to show where you’ve “visited”)
  • A photo of a uakari monkey
  • An amethyst
  • An activity sheet
  • A boarding pass to unlock a new area in the Little Passports member section

Megan was super-impressed with the photo because, “It’s a real picture. You can tell from the back.” However, the amethyst was her favorite because it was “really pretty with all the crystals in it.”

I had no idea amethysts were mined in Brazil and I’ve never heard of a uakari monkey, so I learned something, too. I love learning alongside my kids!

Megan, surprisingly, didn’t spend as much time as I thought she would on the online site (which is probably directly related to the fact that I don’t share well when it comes to my laptop and when she gets online she has to go to another certain online site and feed all her animals or they’ll die {ahem}).

She jumped right into the activity sheets, though. She loves stuff like that.

Little Passports Activity Pages

Using Little Passports for Homeschool Geography

It took a little encouraging to get her to read a bit more about Brazil in the library book that I immediately ran out and borrowed, but once she started she kept saying:

“Mom, this is so cool…”

“Hey, did you know…”

“Mom, listen to this…”

My favorite was, “Hey, Mom, listen: The Amazon River is the longest river in the world.” Followed by, with much suspicion in her voice, “You already knew that, didn’t you?”

It just made me laugh the way she said it.

She’s already looking forward to the next package, which is exciting to me because, even though it may take a little encouragement for further study, Little Passports is a perfect opportunity to sneak in some fun, low-key geography.

LP Brazil

I’d like to continue using Little Passports for homeschool geography this year. I’m thinking that when the packages come, we’ll locate the country on the map and on the globe and just read a simple fact book about it, like the one we found on Brazil – big text, simple sentences, lot of pictures…nothing complicated, so that it stays fun for Megan. Just enough to capitalize on her excitement and Little Passports’ educational value.

Megan Brazil

You could, of course, use each Little Passports package as a jumping-off point for a more in-depth geography study. You could do a mini-unit study, create some notebooking pages, color the country’s flag, learn about its animals (always a must around here), make a related meal…there are dozens of possibilities.

Little Passport Suitcase

No matter if you decide to keep it low-key or go more in-depth, Little Passports provides a quality, exciting learning opportunity for young kids. I’ve already told my sister and my cousin that they need to look into Little Passports for their kids because this is stuff that gets moms — homeschool or otherwise — excited. Kids anxiously watching the mailbox for educational stuff that they just think is fun? Yeah, I’ll take that.

Have you tried Little Passports before? Did you kids love it as much as Megan has?

I received this product free for the purpose of reviewing it. I also received monetary compensation for the time invested in writing the review. The opinions expressed are my personal, honest opinions. Your experience may vary. Please read my full disclosure policy for more details.This post contains affiliate links.

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Kris Bales is a newly-retired homeschool mom and the quirky, Christ-following, painfully honest founder (and former owner) of Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers. She has a pretty serious addiction to sweet tea and Words with Friends. Kris and her husband of over 30 years are parents to three amazing homeschool grads. They share their home with three dogs, two cats, a ball python, a bearded dragon, and seven birds.

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15 Comments

  1. This looks really interesting, Kris, and I think my girls would really enjoy it. But can you tell me if there is much evolutionary content (i.e., do they often – or at all – mention about “millions of years” in terms of the creation of the landforms), either in the materials or on the website? Also…is it fair toward Judeo-Christian beliefs (i.e., mentioning the true religious make-up of the countries studied)? I totally don’t mind my girls learning about other religions – we’ve already done that and will continue – but I don’t want Christianity marginalized (as happens in public school materials). I’m also okay with using stuff from a non-Christian company, as long as the worldview and origins topics are neutral. Thanks in advance for helping me sift through those questions!

    1. All I know is based on what we got in the one packet on Brazil. All the material had was information on the uakari monkey (it’s endangered) and other animals found in Brazil and the fact that amethysts are mined there. As far as I know, the focus is on geography, not creation or the religion beliefs of the country. With the ages it’s geared toward, I would be surprised to find that the material touches on any of that at all.

  2. Ok, I just signed up for the 24 month membership! I first started reading your blog in January when I started homeschooling. Since then you’re the reason I bought Trail guide to learning for this school year! and now I signed up for little passports… You’re reviews are awesome and they help a lot to moms like me that are new to the homeschooling life. Hopefully they work out and if not, I’ll try something new. 🙂

    1. Yay! I hope your family enjoys both Trail Guide and Little Passports as much as we have! I appreciate the compliment on my reviews. I always try to include what I would want to know if I were considering purchasing the product. I’m glad you’ve found them helpful. Hope you have a wonderful school year!

  3. Hey Kris, do you think it would be okay to order 1 kit to share among 2 kiddos? My older kids are 6 and 7.5, and I know they would LOVE this, but I’m not super keen on paying for two kits. On the other hand, I’m not super keen on dealing with bickering over who’s souvenir is who’s, kwim?

    1. That’s a tough one. I can totally understand not wanting to pay for two subscriptions. I’m not sure how the sharing would go over at my house, though. Maybe if you approached as part of school and you’ll be learning together so you have to share the goodies?

  4. I just wanted to post a review from someone who actually ordered the product. Personally, I was very disappointed. I could have easily gotten the information included in the kit from Wikipedia, downloaded a couple of activities, and picked up a rock from a local curio shop…ba-da-boom! I basically had the kit we were sent. I suppose if you have no time to do these things, the kit could be worth it. However, for our family, I would rather put in a tiny bit of effort myself, and save the $28/month to actually travel someplace cool with my kids. By the way – we got both the US and World editions. They come in different containers (the US one is quite flimsy and my son felt cheated out of a cool mini suitcase, so I wound up ordering one from amazon anyway). I do like the way you have expanded on the information in the kit to make a complete geography lesson…but if you are willing to go to those lengths, it’s not much more difficult to just research the countries yourself and mail some things to your kids so they get a package every month. Just my thoughts.

    1. Thanks for sharing your thoughts. I think that’s true of most anything – that you could put it together yourself with some time and research. Unfortunately, I find myself stretched way too thin right now, so having time to pull all that together wouldn’t work well for me. The extra effort on my part just required a trip to the library, so it wasn’t that much extra work. Plus, my daughter loves getting that package in the mail each month. I love seeing the smile on her face when she sees that she got some mail. 🙂

      Oh, well. To each his own. Thanks for sharing a different viewpoint for those who are researching the product.

  5. You lost a sale as while trying to order your site tells me email is not valid. Trying to get for my grandsons for xmas. Just sucks

    1. Hi, Tina. I’m sorry that you had trouble ordering with Little Passports. I’m not quite sure where you tried to order. I don’t sell Little Passports. They just provided me with a set to review four years ago. I’m not affiliated with the company in any way. To order, you need to visit Little Passports. If you’re having trouble, I’d suggest contacting them through the contact form on their site. I hope you can get it straightened out. I’m sure your grandsons would love receiving the packages each month. Best wishes!

      1. When you use auto fill for the email box, an error code box appears saying it’s invalid. This is a common security measure. Simply type out your email address. Thanks for the review btw. I’m using My Fathers World Exploring Countries and Cultures and will be purchasing a 6 month subscription from Little Passports.

  6. I bought the state addition for my son. Unfortunately, the customer service is terrible and renewing the subscription is even worse. The maps aren’t detailed and I feel like information is lacking. The price is the same if you want one for each child. Customer service is only through email and it takes days and weeks to possibly resolve an issue. However, my son enjoyed getting the kit (although it only comes once every other month and not every month like they state). VERY disappointed.

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