Today's book review will be on Grandfather's Journey by Allen Say. Grandfather’s Journey By Allen Say. I recently got this book from my downtown library and really enjoyed reading it to my youngest, Gabriella.
I'm not sure if I've ever mentioned that I love picture books.I especially like picture books that
focus on true events.It seems to
be a perfect way to impart some history into the little ones and to be able to
explain the difference between reality and fiction.
Grandfather’s Journey is the sweet story of a Japanese man
who ventures to America and falls in love with the country.The story is written by his grandson
and is a beautiful account of their cross-cultural experience.Through the illustrations you can see
the differences in the countries and the cultures and gain an appreciation for
both.Since we were just studying
Japan in our homeschool history this book arrived at the perfect time.
The illustrations were quite beautiful! Here are a few:
This book is based on an old counting song.It is a rhyming book (my favorite) that
builds up in quantity page by page.The first pages are about one animal of some sort and the build up to
ten animals on the last pages. I
enjoyed reading this book to my daughter and exploring the patterns that it
contained.We quickly realized
that the quantity was increasing by one with each page we turned.We also made an accurate guess as to
what number of animals we would encounter. It was ten of course.
I like the illustrations in this book and the little animals
that are featured.Between the
illustrations and the sweet rhyming story, this is definitely a book that has
that “Let’s read it again” quality.
I found this great video that can go along with this book. It really is meant for a different book called Over in the Meadow. The song is catchy and can go along with both rhyming story books!
I read so many books that I forget just where I first heard about them That is the case with Living Color. I have no recollection as to how I came to know about this book, but it is a beautiful book that I would like to own. The illustrations are bold and beautiful. Each color is broken up into a section and features animals that are that particular color.
For example, the pages for red are captivating and draw you into the book as they display a scarlet percher dragonfly and then tell you a few sentences about the magnificent creature. There were many animals that were new to me and I really enjoyed the brilliant colors and the style of the illustrations as well as the information provided for each. We did not read this book straight through. We read it in two sittings due to the detail given in each page.
This is another book that I would highly recommend reading. It would also make a great gift for young animal lovers.
Hello! I just love this poem. My daughter Olivia had to read it in Literature last week. I fell in love with it immediately. :)
The Naming of Cats: by T. S. Eliot
The Naming of Cats is a difficult matter, It isn't just one of your holiday games; You may think at first I'm as mad as a hatter When I tell you, a cat must have THREE DIFFERENT NAMES. First of all, there's the name that the family use daily, Such as Peter, Augustus, Alonzo or James, Such as Victor or Jonathan, George or Bill Bailey-- All of them sensible everyday names. There are fancier names if you think they sound sweeter, Some for the gentlemen, some for the dames: Such as Plato, Admetus, Electra, Demeter-- But all of them sensible everyday names. But I tell you, a cat needs a name that's particular, A name that's peculiar, and more dignified, Else how can he keep up his tail perpendicular, Or spread out his whiskers, or cherish his pride? Of names of this kind, I can give you a quorum, Such as Munkustrap, Quaxo, or Coricopat, Such as Bombalurina, or else Jellylorum- Names that never belong to more than one cat. But above and beyond there's still one name left over, And that is the name that you never will guess; The name that no human research can discover-- But THE CAT HIMSELF KNOWS, and will never confess. When you notice a cat in profound meditation, The reason, I tell you, is always the same: His mind is engaged in a rapt contemplation Of the thought, of the thought, of the thought of his name: His ineffable effable Effanineffable Deep and inscrutable singular Name. Happy schooling! Blessings... Krista
In our homeschool we are using The Story of the World for our history spine. I really value the activity book that comes with this because it recommends lots of additional books you can read to learn more about the period. It includes both fiction and non-fiction in its lists.
It is a sweet book that is set in Holland in 1421 and recounts a violent storm that blew in from the North Sea. We have been learning about the low level of the country in our history reading and how the Dutch were always fighting back the sea. This was a perfect way to illustrate that point to my daughter. Through the pictures and the story we have firmly set in our minds how life was during this period in time.
The faithful cat in this story is pushed aside when her owner marries and has a baby. Based on true events, the cat saves the baby when a terrible flood sweeps away the cradle.
If you like a story that is short and sweet and easy to read but has a bit of depth to it, you might enjoy Katje the Windmill CatI know we did! Have a blessed week... Krista :)
Okay.Let the
truth be told.I saw this book
title in a catalog and it immediately caught my attention.I am extremely drawn to rhyming
books.They are my favorite books
to read.I love poetry and reading
them is one of my favorite things to do in the whole wide world.I really appreciate the work that goes
into getting the perfect rhyme and I delight in the lines of well-written
rhymes.That being said, let’s
talk about Thelonius Monster’s Sky – High Fly Pie.I was pretty sure from the title that this would be a
rhyming book.
What I really like about this book, besides the wonderful
vocabulary words that are used and the pleasant poetry is the whole idea of the
story.The author, Judy Sierra
borrows from the story of There Was An Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly… but puts
her own spin on it.I really enjoy
this in a book.I like to see how
clever authors can be in their own versions of a well-known story and I was not
disappointed.
She also sprinkles each page with great vocabulary, which
really factors in to how much I will enjoy a story.The first page of this book has Thelonius urgently emailing
a spider because he wants advice from a savvy insider.I just love that line!
There is no lack of made up words that help keep the meter
of the poem as well.Again, I
really like when authors get silly.We get to see Thelonius addressing invitations to his most disgusting-est
relations.I love that word –
disgusting-est.And even though it
is not proper English, I have a lot of fun with my kids repeating some of these
funny made up words.The next page
has us meeting eleventeen monsters.How cute is that?That was
a word my grandfather used to use when he would joke around with me.I like being able to demonstrate that
we can create our own versions of stories and words to my kids through a story.If you like rhyming books, get your
hands on a copy of Thelonius Monster’s Sky – High Fly Pie.You won’t be disappointed.I give it two thumbs up!
On a side note, as soon as I finished this book I was trying
to recall who the author was.A
quick Google search revealed that she is the beloved author of another favorite
book of mine called Wild About Books.If you haven’t read that book you are missing out.Do you have some favorites that you
would like to share?I am always
looking for great new books to read.By new I mean that we haven’t read them before.They may be old books but new to us. Blessings... Krista!
I love learning new words and exposing my children to great vocabulary, and this is really easy to do if reading together is an activity you enjoy regularly. This is especially easy to do when reading Lemony Snicket’s book, 13 Words. I really like this book, as is evident by the number of times I have checked it out from my library.
First of all, the story lists the 13 words that will be introduced on the back cover and the inside cover. Some of the words are common knowledge, such as bird, cake, dog, busy and so forth. The fun part is the words that are not such common knowledge are used repeatedly throughout the story making it a cinch to remember the meaning of these words.
I recently read this story to my niece, and boy did we have fun with the word panache and haberdashery. We made up silly sentences for her to say to her mom using her new words. Anything that is fun and engages children is pretty much guaranteed to produce results. I always have fun reading this book, which transfers over to my kids having fun hearing it. My love of exciting new vocabulary words has definitely gotten my kids excited as well. Just yesterday my 6 year old began to tell me why she is not a hypocrite. We didn’t learn that word in this book, but we did learn it reading a book.
If you want to have some fun reading to your children and make it count by learning new words at the same time, check out 13 Words. I don’t think you will be disappointed. Now my next goal is to write a book in this style that is all my own. I will keep you posted!!!
(This post may contain affiliate links.) Hello! Today, I am sharing some wonderful ways to teach your children grammar!
There has been some discussion recently about how to teach a young child grammar and if it makes sense to do so. As usual, there are different schools of thought, buy I know that my children enjoy it. My 6 year old loves to diagram sentences. We are currently using First Language Lessons Book 4 and she clearly states that this is her favorite subject. Sadly, this is the last book in the series.We started using this series when she was about 4 years old and we have enjoyed it a lot. First Language Lessons for the Well-Trained Mind: Level 1 (Second Edition) (First Language Lessons)It is very easy to use and teaches the parts of speech among other things. The lessons are completely scripted, so all you have to do is read the lesson to your child. It makes no difference if you remember grammar at all. It doesn't get much easier than that.
A game that all of my children have enjoyed is Madlibs. If you are not familiar with Madlibs let me tell you what they are. They are stories in which some of the words are left out. These words can be nouns, adjectives, verbs, and adverbs. The child is asked to provide words for the parts of speech that are missing. This generally results in a silly or absurd story, which they just delight in hearing, and leaves them begging to do another page. Everyone likes to learn when learning is this much fun. Check out some of the Madlibs at Amazon. Super Silly Mad Libs Junior.
My last recommendation for teaching grammar to young children would be to read to them Parts-of-Speech Tales: A Motivating Collection of Super-Funny Storybooks That Teach the Eight Parts of Speechor the delightfulGrammar-Land (Yesterday's Classics). I would start with Grammar Land before the Parts-of-Speech Tales. I have used all of these products and I really like them all. I am definitely partial to storybooks and Grammar Land is written is such a lovely way. It would certainly be at the top of my list because reading together is such a wonderful experience between parent and child. Once my child had an understanding of the parts of speech I would play Madlibs and have fun with that. I hope you realize that it is really easy to teach your child all about grammar and have fun while doing so, and no experience is required. If you have some resources to recommend, please comment below. www.monkisee.com
This post today is going to focus on the wonderful products that Brillkids creates. They have produced Little Reader, Little Math, and Little Musician.
I have been using Little Musician with all of my kids. My 17, 16, 14, 12, 9, and 6 year old. Even though Little Musician is meant and designed for toddlers, as I said, I have been using it with all of my children and each one enjoys doing it. Some of the clips in the program are meant for young children. In each lesson they use animated babies in diapers. :) When some of my older kids saw this, they cracked up! My children even though they all know how to play guitar, don't know how to read music. This program has given them a little boost in learning.
We try to do Little Musician every day. It doesn't always happen, but when we do it consistently, we find ourselves getting the review sections correct. It is like that with everything, the more you practice or do something, the more you excel!
The next product is Little Reader! I used this with my youngest - Gabriella. Honestly, I didn't use it very much with her because she already knew how to read. It is another GREAT product for toddlers or young children! From what I did use, I would highly recommend. The program teaches short, easy words at first, and then as you further in the program, it begins to use longer words. Also, it teaches phonetic sounds. Little Reader is a curriculum to learn English, but if you already own this program, you can download the French curriculum and the Chinese curriculum. I am so eager for them to release the Spanish curriculum!!!
Next! Little Math is deigned for toddlers to learn quantity recognition, counting, subtraction, addition, multiplication, etc... I also didn't use this product very much with my youngest. She is very good at math already. In that case, I didn't need to use it. For babies, toddlers, and young children who need to practice, learn, and review their facts, I recommend it to you! It repeats the review many times, thus causing your child to repeat and remember. :) It is a great program, as are all of Brillkids products.
I recently checked the book Chameleon, Chameleon out from the library. This book has stunningly beautiful pictures in it. I just marveled over our great God who created this magnificent creature. My daughter and I read this book several times and really enjoyed it. We enjoyed the narrative and we really liked the pictures. This is a marvelous book and I highly recommend it to all kids who have any interest in learning more about chameleons. There is another book by this same author called Red-eyed Tree Frog (Scholastic Bookshelf) I plan to locate this book right now to read with my children.
I plan to locate this book right now to read with my children.
