BOB Books are the current be-all, end-all of at-home reading instruction, but we've just made a family (parental) decision not to use them around here. I recently found sets 1 & 3 at (separate) used bookstores and snapped them up, excited to get such a discount. But then I took a second look at them, and at the "pre-reading" set I already had in storage, and I was mildly disgruntled. I shared them with my husband and my dad and none of us were impressed.
For us, the BOB books are just too tiresome and silly to be worth the effort. Both my husband and I cherish our read-aloud time with our kid, but so much of that joy comes from reading what Charlotte Mason called "living books." BOB books strike us as brain-dead books. I know that the BOB books have a lot to offer other families, and I understand the overall appeal, I just can't stand to read it myself or inflict it on my little kid. So no BOB books for us, even if it means we're missing out on a possibly valuable tool for enriching the kid's skill set.
Thursday, February 2, 2012
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Accidental Practical Life
In any case, we found the perfect color thread for fixing the hole in Dr. Knuffle Monkey and the surgery was a success.
Sunday, January 15, 2012
$10 Well-Spent
I had a few dollars burning a hole in my pocket on Friday so I went to the local children's resale shop to see if I could find some new puzzles for Jackson. We've been looking at the same four or five Melissa & Doug puzzles for over a year now, and they were wearing thin.
We came home with a dinosaur puzzle and a sea creature puzzle and instantly uncovered a puzzle-doing ability that has heretofore not been seen in the kiddo. He usually refuses to play along when I bring out the puzzles, but the newness of these ones has fascinated him and he loves putting the pieces in.
I'll hear a crash from the other room (pieces being dumped on the floor), and a few minutes later he delivers to me a completed puzzle with the announcement "all done all done." Whee!
We came home with a dinosaur puzzle and a sea creature puzzle and instantly uncovered a puzzle-doing ability that has heretofore not been seen in the kiddo. He usually refuses to play along when I bring out the puzzles, but the newness of these ones has fascinated him and he loves putting the pieces in.
I'll hear a crash from the other room (pieces being dumped on the floor), and a few minutes later he delivers to me a completed puzzle with the announcement "all done all done." Whee!
Saturday, January 14, 2012
American History
Recommended Books from Young Years Library: Mother's Guide to Children's Reading by Rachele Thomas, Parents' Magazine's Press, 1963. {LOC 63-15865}
Young Years Library was a five or 10-volume anthology of reading material for children. The product evolved over the years, but generally it was sold direct to parents who wanted to provide an educational or literary advantage to their children. Many of the great children's librarians of the day were involved, including the pioneering Augusta Braxton Baxter. My copy, published in 1963, includes a 72-page list of recommended books for various ages and stages. To my eye, many of these books have long since been forgotten, not least because of the revolution in children's literature that took place following the publication that year of Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are. I'll be transcribing the sections of the Mother's Guide to Children's Reading reading list, one by one, in hopes of providing a starting point for modern mamas looking to explore more unusual, likely out-of-print book suggestions, beyond those usually included in generally available contemporary reading prescriptions. Copyright, of course, remains with Home Library Press.
AMERICAN HISTORY
For the Youngest
And There Was America, by Roger Duvoisin, illustrated by the author. Knopf.
Pictures and simple text tell the story
of the discovery of America.
Land of the Free, by Enid L. Meadowcroft, illustrated by Lee Ames. Crowell.
American history nicely simplified in
the form of episodes understandable to young people.
The Thanksgiving Story, by Alice Dalgliesh, illustrated by Helen Sewell. Scribner.
A Pilgrim family sails to the New
World, participates in the founding of Plymouth, and celebrates the
first Thanksgiving. A holiday companion book by the same author:
The Fourth of July Story
The Fourth of July Story
For the Nine-to-Twelve-Year-Olds
Abraham Lincoln, by Ingri and Edgar P. d'Aulaire, illustrated by the authors. Doubleday.
A moving story of Abe Lincoln's life,
beginning with his boyhood. A Caldecott Medal winner. Other excellent
biographies by the d'Aulaires of illustrious men and women in
American history:
Buffalo Bill
Columbus
George Washington
Pocahontas
Benjamin Franklin
America: A History for Peter, by Gerald
W. Johnson, illustrated by Leonard Fisher. Morrow. American history
in a brilliant trilogy:
America Is Born
America Is Born
America Begins: The Story of the Finding of the New World, by Alice Dalgliesh,
illustrated by Lois Maloy. Scribner.
A fine introduction to early American
history.
Childhood of Famous Americans Series.
Bobbs.
This series consists of fictionalized
biographies of the important episodes in the childhood of outstanding
Americans. The more popular books in the series are:
Dan Beard: Boy Scout, by Miriam E. Mason
Dan Beard: Boy Scout, by Miriam E. Mason
Buffalo Bill: Boy of the Plains, by
Augusta Stevenson
Daniel Boone: Boy Hunter, by Augusta
Stevenson
Kit Carson: Boy Trapper, by Augusta
Stevenson
George Carver: Boy Scientist, by
Augusta Stevenson
Tom Edison: Boy Inventor, by Sue
Guthridge
Henry Ford: Boy With Ideas, by Hazel
B. Aird and Catherine Ruddiman
Nathan Hale: Puritan Boy, by Augusta
Stevenson
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.: Boy of
Justice, by Montrew Dunham
Cyrus McCormick: Farmer Boy, by
Lavinia Dobler
James Monroe: Good Neighbor Boy, by
Mabel C. Widemer
Paul Revere: Boy of Old Boston, by
Augusta Stevenson
Pocahontas: Brave Girl, by Flora W.
Seymour
Sacagawea: Bird Girl, by Flora W.
Seymour
Sitting Bull: Dakota Boy, by Augusta
Stevenson
Booker T. Washington: Ambitious Boy,
by Augusta Stevenson
Wilbur and Orville Wright: Boys With
Wings, by Augusta Stevenson
The Columbus Story, by Alice Dalgliesh,
illustrated by Leo Politi. Scribner.
A good biography of the great explorer.
Daniel Boone, by James Daugherty.
Viking.
Stirring biography full of hair-raising
adventures.
Frontier Living: An Illustrated Guide to Pioneer Life in America, by Edwin Tunis.
World.
Life as it was lived on the American frontier. Other good historical portrayals by the same author:
Life as it was lived on the American frontier. Other good historical portrayals by the same author:
Indians
George Washington: An Initial Biography, by Genevieve Foster, illustrated by the author. Scribner.
The first of an excellent series of
initial biographies of American Presidents. Others are:
Authentic facts about the Indian tribes
whose territory centered in the State of New York, imaginatively
presented. Others in the Indian tribe series by Sonia Bleeker:
Minutemen of the Sea, by Tom Cluff, illustrated by Tom O'Sullivan. Follett.
Five days before the battle
of Bunker Hill, a British ship was captured of the coast of Maine by
the townspeople of Machias. And thus was the first blow struck for
American liberty upon the sea. This is the story of a little-known
event in the early days of the American Revolution.
A remarkable biography for
young people of a very remarkable man. Other fine biographies of
illustrious Americans by the same author.
Story of the Presidents of the United States of America, by Maud and Miska Petersham, illustrated by the authors. Macmillan.
Excellent biographical
accounts of the political leaders of our country.
Story of the Totem Pole, by Ruth Brindze, illustrated by Yeffe Kimball. Vanguard.
The fascinating symbolism
and history of the totem poles of the North American Indians.
How Do You Tell If a Toddler Is Color Blind?
Anyway, I swear I'm more than happy to do colors by osmosis, but Mayim's cautionary tale has been Haunting Me. Happily, the Internet is prepared for this contingency!
I found a site offering a special (free, hallelujah) color blindness test for children and toddlers. Kids need different tests than adults, because the traditional Ishihara color perception tests for color blindness (plate one is pictured above) are based on identifying a number hidden a field of colored dots. Kids who don't know their numbers yet would be confounded by this, regardless of their color perception.
The kid's color blindness test (which apparently originally appeared in Field & Stream magazine) has a bunch of cute little animals, and Jackson found the bear, the deer-cow and the bunny with no problem, so we're almost certainly in the clear. Yay!
Thursday, January 12, 2012
Door Chain & Latch Activity Board
I really am on a break but I did get this done today, so yay me!
Don't say I can't learn things. I used two things I learned working with my mom on the first board--taping the drill bit and guesstimating the drill-bit size--to put these together. I've been saving these small square cutting boards for about a year after having gotten them as swag at old job, and I finally got around to screwing on some lock hardware as another attempt at entertaining J. (He loves playing with our door chain!) These don't actually offer the satisfaction of unlocking a door, a la the Melissa & Doug Latches board, but it's better than nothing, and these are very nice and light and portable.
Don't say I can't learn things. I used two things I learned working with my mom on the first board--taping the drill bit and guesstimating the drill-bit size--to put these together. I've been saving these small square cutting boards for about a year after having gotten them as swag at old job, and I finally got around to screwing on some lock hardware as another attempt at entertaining J. (He loves playing with our door chain!) These don't actually offer the satisfaction of unlocking a door, a la the Melissa & Doug Latches board, but it's better than nothing, and these are very nice and light and portable.
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Taking a Bit of a Break
We're still here, just taking a bit of a break for recuperation from the holidays, planning the year ahead and settling back into a routine, which has been sorely lacking of late! Should be back up to speed by the end of the month. Cheers! ~j
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