An eight year old boy shouldn't be screwdriver adverse!
See
http://www.americanradiohistory.com/Archive-Bookshelf/Author-Groups/G.C.Dobbs/Learnabout...%20Simple-Electronics-Dobbs.pdf for what a bright child could be expected to handle in the days before the internet made parents excessively risk-adverse and cheap Android devices turned most kids into couch potatoes.
If I was revising it for modern components, I'd stick a small solderless breadboard in the middle of the baseboard to avoid most of the hassle with extending leads, with the screws and screw-cups round the outside for larger parts and off-board wiring. I'd also substitute current production NPN silicon transistors with a Hfe of about 200. TO-92 2N2222 equivalents should do nicely. The only other component change would be for the amplifier circuit on page 23, where the lower resistor in the base bias divider should be increased from 10K to 15K to compensate for the higher Vbe of a Silicon transistor v.s. the original Germanium one.
That construction method has been obsoleted by the solderless breadboard, but is still good for kids experimenting with basic circuits. The screw-cups need to be brass or heavily brass plated, but the screws can be ordinary steel ones, which has the advantage that the slot in their heads is stronger. You may need to prepare the baseboard for him, pre-drilling the holes, and running a screw into each to form a thread in the wood - which only takes a few seconds with a reversible battery drill and a long screw of the right diameter, with its head cut off in the chuck as a thread forming tool. Its also worth spending a bit of time sanding the ends and edges, and giving it a coat of wax melted into the surface with a hot air gun, then wiping off any excess.
Teach him that pre-drilling to just under the root diameter of the thread + waxing the screw on a candle makes it much safer and easier to put screws into wood. For drilling holes, I strongly recommend a pistol grip hand drill. e.g.
https://www.drapertools.com/product/13841/8mm-or-3-8inch-Chuck-Pistol-Grip-Hand-Drill, and a small set of good HSS bits with several spares of all the ones 3mm and under. Make a house rule that the drill may only be used at the workbench.
Get him some good screwdrivers with comfortable handles that are sized to fit his hands, make a house rule that anything mains powered, or worth more than $20 can only be worked on under your supervision and teach him to attach the choc-block connectors to a wooden board, as the biggest risk is stabbing one's palm or finger when attempting to turn a stiff or jammed choc-block screw while holding the choc-block. For safety and efficiency, the screwdriver blade *MUST* be a good fit in the screw slot, as thick as will fit properly and about 90% of the width of the head.