Homeschooling preschool links

This is a handout I provided to attendees of a session I did about Homeschooling Preschool at the 2010 VaHomeschoolers Conference, which I updated for the 2013 conference

Homeschooling Preschool

Helpful Websites:

VaHomeschoolers -- The Organization for Virginia Homeschoolers has a page with tips and links for homeschooling preschoolers

http://homeschoolnewslink.com/ -- The Link is now a website with an e-newsletter that has many resources and ideas for homeschooling; I especially loved this preschool article, Wax On Wax Off from Vol. 7, Issue 3

http://www.universalpreschool.com/articles/time_and_freedom.asp - an article about considering the preschool decision; this was the first article I read that lead me to choose not to send my child to preschool

www.unclimber.blogspot.com. This is my personal blog. Posts labeled preschool, resources and reading lists will have the most useful information. Posts labeled homeschooling tend to be about educational philosophy and can be emotional. You've been warned. If you like my writing but find my unclimber persona a bit abrasive, check out my posts (and those of others) on Life Without School. I was far better behaved over there.

Books to inspire or support you:

Miseducation: Preschoolers at Risk by David Elkind -- this may put you at ease if you are worried about that your child may be left behind by skipping preschool.

How Children Fail, Learning All the Time, Teach Your Own by John Holt. How Children Fail is more of an indictment of school and how the system can be harmful to children. LAtT and TYO are more helpful as to how to homeschool.

Local support groups: whether you consider yourself a homeschooler and plan to continue homeschooling beyond preschool, you may find support groups helpful. The VaHomeschooler website has a listing of Support groups

On-line support groups. If you are not are not familiar with yahoo groups, it is easy to sign up for a free account. VaEclecticHS is an especially good group. You can also find local and specialty groups on yahoo.

General Preschool:

Scope and sequence - what preschool kids should be learning; World Book, other websites

Get Set for Kindergarten Series by Rosemary Wells - these are set in a school environment, but will cover typical preschool subject matter.

Helping Your Child Learn - free publications from the Federal Government

            Available on pdf at http://www2.ed.gov/parents/academic/help/hyc.html

Homeschooling the Early Years by Linda Dobson

Preschool Power videos - kids engaged in Montessori activities; we found these at our local library; YouTube has a channel with clips from the series; you can order the DVD with all the episodes

Games: dice, playing cards, board games, puzzles, play dough, arts and crafts

Placemats - Wal-Mart and K-Mart are good sources, as are toy stores.

The public library - you can likely find books on any subject you'd like to study. Befriending the librarians is not a bad idea, either.

Math:

American Library Association list of picture books that teach math concepts

Math Start series by Stuart Murphy

Anno's Counting Book - or anything by Anno; many of his books are wordless

Swan Harbor by Laura Rankin -- a counting book but also ties in nature themes

Loreen Leady - author of many math picture books

Eenie Meenie Miney Math, Math Play for You and Your Preschooler by Linda Allison and Martha Weston

            out of print, but the library may have it. Helping Your Child Learn Math from the Federal Government is similar.

Reading:

The Read Aloud Handbook by Jim Trelease

Book lists - Chinaberry catalog; Sonlight catalog - the curriculum is Christian but includes many books that are not, click "included items" to see a listing of the books; other search terms to use are "living books", "Charlotte Mason", trivium, classical.

Videos for learning to read: Read Alee Dee Da Lee; Leap Frog - Letter Factory, Word Factory 

Scholastic books videos are read-alouds; turning on the captions may help some kids learn to read

Stories and books on tape

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/freedom-learn/201002/children-teach-themselves-read

            "The general assumption in our culture is that children must be taught to read...., Here [] are seven principles relevant to the question of how children teach themselves to read without formal instruction."

           

Fine Arts:

Classical Kids CDs - we've enjoyed introducing our kids to classical music through these. They pair the music with a story; most of the stories follow part of the composer's life in a tale directed at children. One exception is Mozart's Magic Flute, which tells the story of the opera rather than the story of Mozart.

My blog has a post listing storybooks exposing young children to the world of art (9/21/2004).

Cross-curricular:

Charlie Needs a Cloak by Tomie dePaola -- takes you through the process of making a cloak -- shearing the sheep, spinning, dyeing the wool, weaving, sewing. What’s also nice is that it takes you through the seasons of the year. Available as a book and in a Scholastic video

Pancakes, Pancakes by Eric Carle -- Jack wants pancakes and he has to cut the wheat, get it milled, get eggs, milk, etc, all the ingredients of pancakes.

How to Bake and Apple Pie and See the World by Marjorie Priceman - a trip around the world to get ingredients for an apple pie.

Books featuring kids that do not romanticize school or take place outside of it:

Prairie School by Avi. A skillful teacher fosters a desire to learn in her pupil, without forcing lessons on him. Set in the 1880s.

Sailing Home told by Gloria Rand. Out of print, unfortunately, but may be available at your library. This is such an interesting story and a beautiful book (the Rands have many books to their credit and I've enjoyed those that I've read). The schooling aspect is that the children learn their basics from their mother; after that, a tutor is hired. I liked the idea that perhaps the tutor wasn't necessary and that structured learning can be tedious while life itself can be far more educational.

Abigail Takes the Wheel by Avi. Another sailing book set in the late 1800s. In this one, a girl takes the helm of a steamship boat in New York harbor. There is a brief mention of a test at school, but I felt like this book showed how much more interesting and important real life is than being in school.

The Art Lesson by Tomie dePaola. I found this book to be deliciously anti-school, though I'm not sure it was the author's intent (maybe it was and its point is to encourage kids to overcome the obstacles that school presents). The story is about a young Tomie who has to wait until he is in first grade for art lessons at school and then is bitterly disappointed by the lack of artistic freedom the lessons entail. A workable solution is found, but the blaring message I got is that institutional school only pens in your true talents.

Homeschooling Preschool - article

I wrote this article for The Organization of Virginia Homeschoolers and it appeared in the Summer of 2008.

Adventures in Arithmetic

This is a post I wrote for the community blog, Life Without School. It tells about our approach to math. I notice that one link in the post is dead, but I will update it here.

The excerpt from my post with the working link:

I also found a great article in Book Links, a publication by the American Library Association, that lists and summarizes a number of books that help preschoolers through elementary aged kids learn about math.

Shifting Paradigms Through Books

this is an article I wrote for the community blog, Life Without School.

Because there are so many books about school or set in school, I wanted to share books with my daughter that showed other ways people learn and have learned over the years.  School has been the norm for a long time, but it hasn't always been that way and there are others even today who choose a different way to educate. Some of the books we've enjoyed are listed [in this post]. 

And Now for Some Book Recommendations...

I should stick with what I know, but sometimes I can't help dabbling in a bit of social commentary.

I was just writing with my friend and recommending some books his daughter might like and thought that I should go ahead and post what I recommended. Its amazing how quickly I forget what we've read and loved in the last few years. I used to read to my kids a lot, then I stopped because of the protests of the now 3 year-old. I'm just now getting back into the swing of reading. I love it -- its my favorite part of homeschooling (okay, its really my only part of 'homeschooling' other than finding resources).

So, here are my most recent recommendations:

Charlie Needs a Cloak by Tomie dePaola -- about Charlie, a shepherd, and it takes you through the process of making a cloak -- shearing the sheep, spinning, dyeing the wool, weaving, sewing. Whats also nice, is that it takes you through the seasons of the year, so it reinforces that learning. (Sorry, Mike, I got the title wrong and misspelled the author's name)

Pancakes, Pancakes by Eric Carle -- Jack wants pancakes and he has to cut the wheat, get it milled, get eggs, milk, etc, all the ingredients of pancakes.

I love those books because its neat to learn how things are made.

How to Bake and Apple Pie and See the World by Marjorie Priceman -- a trip around the world to get ingredients for an apple pie.

My DH loves The Magic Wings and another book, The Seven Chinese Brothers (I find it a bit violent, but my daughter has always enjoyed it). Oh, if you're into Zen, try anything by Jon J. Muth.

If you're interested in Latin, you might want to see if you can find any Roman myths -- though I think it might be easier to find Greek myths, but you could probably work in that the Romans copied the gods and gave them different names. We have a few books about this but haven't started reading them yet. Fairy tales can be fun, too -- we get non-Disneyfied ones, often in storybook treasuries with gorgeous illustrations.

A great resource for excellent books is Sonlight. They sell homeschool curricula with 'living books' but you can order individual titles. I find the on-line catalog hard to use, but recommend their printed catalog. I have great affection for Sonlight -- though I don't use their curriculum, when I felt panicky about homeschooling a few years ago, I find great comfort in their offerings. I did order parts of their Pre-K curriculum and I love the books, but I found the schedule a bit stifling. Still, I should throw some business their way by buying some of their books.

Curriculum?

We don't need no stinkin' curriculum.

I was asked a couple of times yesterday what curriculum we're using. I really don't see a need to use a curriculum for kindergarten. I'm not quite sure a curriculum is ever necessary.

I am terrible at answering questions about our homeschooling. Awful. I blather on about natural learning. I get blank looks. So I mention the stuff we have in our house -- books, toys, items that can be used as manipulatives. More blank looks. Okay -- we've got workbooks -- thats like a curriculum -- and when Suzanne is interested, she does work in them.

The trouble with curriculum is a grade-based curriculum would not work. Suzanne is far beyond what it taught in language arts and social studies (with the exception of handwriting, where she's probably average or a bit behind). For math, I think she's probably dead-on -- she's interested in more advanced things, but I don't think she gets it. Then again, I'm not sure that she learns everything in a sequential manner, so why make her suffer through boring lessons if she gets to the 'clicking point' by other means?

Another big problem is that we are not home enough to homeschool in the way that many non-homeschoolers view to be homeschooling. This week, we had a couple of days at playgrounds with other homeschool kids, we ran errands and we visited my mom. What did Suzanne learn? I don't know, but she was playing chess with my dad last weekend -- does that count for something? In the car on the way somewhere, she was rattling off various time measurements -- 60 seconds in a minute, 60 minutes in an hour, by increasing unit up until decades. I had to help her out with centuries. Thats got to count for something. [She learned all this from reading Me Counting Time by Joan Sweeney].

But wait a second, I'm the one who doesn't want to count anything.

Word got back to me that a mom (who doesn't read this blog) and whose child is in a local Montessori school is amazed at the progress I'm making with Suzanne. Whats even more amazing is that I'm not making any progress with her. She's doing it on her own, with assistance from me when requested.

My DH keeps reminding me that our curriculum is similar to the response given by Napolean Dynamite at the beginning of the movie when he is asked what he's going to do that day. What are we doing today? I already told you. Whatever she wants. Gosh!

Gifts for Kids

Am I the only person who gets a little stressed out when choosing a gift for a child having a birthday party? I usually have a bunch of ideas and I end up with option paralysis. Then, I start questioning whether its actually a good gift that a child will enjoy or whether I'm just some sort of anti-commercial, anti-school, anti-social wacko who has no clue what children like. The goody bags for Suzanne's 4th birthday party included cards, dice, and dominoes because I thought these all represented great, fun ways for young children to learn about and get comfortable with numbers. But maybe I'm really weird and all the kids want are playdoh and Barbie stickers. Hmmm...this year how about 'make your own butter' kits -- some heavy cream and a baby food jar for shaking?

Anyway, I'm feeling sort of pleased with my recent birthday gift selections and thought I'd share them with you for your information and commentary.

As a bibliophile, I absolutely adore reading book lists and finding interesting books for my children. I don't know how many others are obsessed with children's books and there is always the danger that the recipient already owns the book, but I figure if I get obscure enough, its unlikely that they will have the book. But maybe my selections are not obscure, maybe everyone reads the same book lists and buys the same books.

Some recent book selections (that demonstrate math concepts) include Anno's Counting Book and Anno's Mysterious Multiplying Jar. The counting book is awesome, its wordless and shows a countryside scene. For each number it adds additional features and increases the number of features already shown, such as houses, children, trees, birds, etc. It counts up to 12, depicting the number in cubes in a sidebar. Going to 12 makes a great tie-in to the months of the year and the daytime hours of the day, so the pictures show the progress of the seasons and the changes in light at various times of day. I got this for a child who will be turning five, which may be the upper age for this book, but as an adult, I enjoy looking at it, so maybe there is no upper age. The Multiplying Jar book I have not yet seen, but I love Anno's books (check out his historical/geographical journey books). I got the Jar book for a child who will be turning seven. This book has a wider age range, the older kids will understand more about it than the younger ones, but I think they can all learn something. I'm looking forward to getting this book so I can glance at it.

Non-book gifts: the Uncle Wiggly Board Game, a counting game with numbered squares up to 100. The concept is similar to Candy Land, where you draw a card to tell you how to move. In Uncle Wiggly, the card has a simple little poem with a large number to tell you how many spaces ahead to move (or with an arrow pointing to the left and a smaller number to indicate how many spaces back). The directions emphasize that pre-readers can enjoy it because the large number directs them and an adult can read the poem. Its a great game for practice with counting and eventually addition and some subtraction. I got this gift for a five year-old.

Classical Kids CDs, I got Mozart's Magical Fantasy: A Journey through the Magic Flute for a seven year-old. This was a hard call for me as I know the child hears lots of classical music played in her house, but since this CD is more of a story CD than a music CD, I thought it might be fun. We have most of the Classical Kids CDs, but this one is our favorite.

Book Recommendations

We're dabbling in Juvenile Fiction these days. Some of the JuvFic books are very similar to Juvenile Picture books just with more prose. For some books, it seems like a coin was flipped to determine whether to classify them as JuvFic or JuvPic. We've really been enjoying books by Emily Arnold McCully recently.

We'd read the Mirette and Bellini series, about a couple of aerilists (tight-rope walkers). Those are classified as JuvPic. There are at least three of them and they are enjoyable stories, if a bit suspenseful for those who don't like heights.

Our recent McCully selections have been from JuvFic, though they look pretty similar to the Mirette and Bellini books. I think McCully writes a nice story in a historical setting.

Beautiful Warrior -- The Legend of the Nun's Kung Fu is an enjoyable read about a young girl in China who must marry the leader of the local gang. She seeks out a nun to teach her Kung Fu. There is a lot of Eastern philosophy and how to deal with adversity in this book.

The Bobbin Girl is about female factory workers in the 1830s. They work under harsh conditions and when the factory owners try to lower wages, they protest. There's a nice little reference to Emerson and self-reliance in there and a peek at labor before it organizes. I can't say that my 4 1/2 year-old was moved, but I was.

The Ballot Box Battle references one woman's attempt to vote and society's preference of boys over girls. Its a nice story in how it shows the indifference of a young girl who gradually understands why an older friend of hers desires to vote and that there is no reason for women to be inferior to men.

I checked my library's holdings and there are plenty of other books by Emily Arnold McCully.

Its Beginning to Look at lot like Christmas

We're having our first snowfall of the season, I believe (we have have had brief flurries but no accumulation). My eldest is asking for her snowpants and dying to get outside. I am not a fan of winter or the cold, but if its going to be both, we might as well have some snow. Of course, in our neck of the woods, lots of people freak out when it snows -- have they called for early school closings yet? I just hope this doesn't mean we have to reschedule our dishwasher repair.

Gotta go get suited up for the snow so we can run around for 5 minutes, get cold, come inside, peel off our wet clothes, change into dry clothes and drink hot chocolate. Maybe we can read some books about snow -- The Big Snow, The Snowy Day, Katy and the Big Snow, Winter Days in the Big Woods, Sugar Snow, and Winter on the Farm, I hope I can find them.

Just another day in paradise.

UPDATE: Didn't make it through all the books, but did read a few. Kudos to the 2-year-old who actually sat through one next to me and who didn't yell while I read the others (a vast improvement over her ususal behavior). Couldn't find Sugar Snow, but we read Sugar on Snow, an excellent book about how Maple syrup is made. We're looking forward to attending a syrup boil-down in February at a local park.

Learning Log -- December

Not too much to report this month. Suzanne (4 1/2) has been very interested in doing art projects and has asked for one almost every day-- she's painted, she's colored, she's painted and colored. I don't give her projects, I just ask her what she wants. I'm sort of anti-projects to the extent that I think its nice to let her choose what she wants without showing and telling her what to do, but I'm also lazy and don't feel like going to the trouble of setting up a project in which she may or may not be interested. Though she does enjoy that kind of art as well, but she gets that at Sunday school and library story time. One piece of note -- she received a stuffed dog and named it Fetch. She decided to make a house for Fetch. Luckily I'm a sloppy pack-rat who keeps boxes and paper towel tubes and sundry items on hand in case they are needed, but frankly, I like the look of empty boxes cluttering up my hallways... I showed her various boxes and she made some choices and started coloring Fetch's house. After that, she wanted to make a blanket under which Fetch would sleep. Now, while I don't set up activities for her, I'm always reading preschool activity books so I have ideas floating around in my head. One of these ideas is for weaving paper and I suggested to Suzanne that she could do that and thats how she made Fetch's blanket.

We've read books -- lots of Magic School Bus Books. I'm a member of the Scholastic Book Club so we always have new books coming into the house. I figured the MSB books were a good buy because she loves them and the library copies are all pretty worn. However, I don't really enjoy reading them, they exhaust me. As to other books, I enjoyed Squirrel and John Muir by Emily McCully, but I don't know that Suzanne got much out of it. Beautiful watercolors of Yosemite. Another book we enjoyed is Frida, about the artist, its a bit intense but Suzanne liked it.

My 2 year old, Gabrielle, has been enjoying the video Richard Scarry's ABCs and she seems to be picking up some letters. I'm a big believer in learning by video. Suzanne learned the ABC song from I don't know where, but she was watching lots of PBS (bad Mommy) and I think Barney may have had something to do with it.

Which reminds me, we all enjoy Mister Roger's Neighborhood. Its calm and soft and soothing and has wonderful piano music in the background throughout. Its pretty interesting as there is often a short video detailing how something is produced in a factory (it was toilets today, but we've seen apple juice, fig bars, paper bags...). If not that, then they might examine music or artwork. The land of make-believe might be a bit much for adults, but I think the kids really like it because much of their world is their own make-believe.

We've been listening to Classical Kids CDs, when Gabrielle is not screaming for Bruce Springsteen (more on that in a future post). I really like these, they overlay a story onto the music of a particular composer. We especially like Mozart's Magic Fantasy based on his opera The Magic Flute. We've been listening a lot to the Christmas album put out by Classical Kids, it has a lot of Christmas lore on it and explains the genesis of some of the songs and traditions.

Finally, just a bit of truth in advertising -- these Learning Logs encapsule about 15 minutes or less of each day. While our home life is fairly pleasant, it isn't all sunniness and sitting around reading. I'm no paragon of patience, I lose my temper constantly and yell a lot. But there are these little moments in the day, and thats what I choose to write about. But there will be a future post on my parenting style, which I've dubbed Old Testament parenting.

UPDATE: I forgot to mention playing Dominoes, playing with stickers (great for fine motor development) and all things ballet (DVDs, books).

The Magic School Bus books

The Magic School Bus is a series of books and a television show that addresses science in a story format. This is important to me as I find science textbooks and non-fiction writing to be deadly dull (and my father is still upset about the C+ I earned in Earth Science as a high school freshman. Did I mention I got an A in phyics? No, he doesn't care about that.) Anyway, science stories are far more appealing to me. The MSB is set in a school classroom with a very enthusiastic teacher who is always taking her kids on fantastical fieldtrips to learn about science subjects on a bus that is able to do all sorts of amazing things -- so there is a strong dose of fantasy with regard to the trips they take. I'm not thrilled about the school setting, being a homeschooler, and some of the kids are a bit snotty, but its not too bad. The science covered in each book is interesting and digestible, at least to me.

There are several kinds of Magic School Bus books -- I believe the originals were simply books by Joanna Cole. Later, a series of television shows were made and there are some MSB books based on episodes of the show and not written by Joanna Cole. Being an anti-television snob, I automatically assumed I'd prefer the Joanna Cole books, those being 'pure' and not an adaptation of a TV show. Well, I actually prefer the adaptation book. The original Magic School Bus books are very distracting to me -- there is the text of the story, dialogue and thought bubbles within the illustrations, and 'school reports' on the sidelines. There is a lot to look at and read on each page and thats very unsettling to me. I think it might be appealing to the more kinesthetic learner because it allows the eye to jump all around the page whereas such a learner might find the more traditional picture book a bit boring. In the adaptation books, there is a lot less going on -- there is text and fewer thought/dialogue bubbles but there aren't reports sprinkled throughout, simply one report at the back of the book after the end of the story.

The MSB is expanding with different kinds of books. There are chapter books which we have not read because I think they might be too much for us. There are also readers which are simpler than the original series. The stories might be a bit too simple, but there are lots of little fact reports that give it some substance. I think my favorites are the TV adaptation books.

We have not seen any of the TV shows or videos. I don't think our PBS affliates carry the shows, I wouldn't mind seeing some, but I suspect Suzanne might be a bit young.

Learning Log -- October 27, 2004

[I keep a handwritten journal, which is why some of my posts are a bit dated]

We received a book order in the mail today which included the Scholastic Atlas of the United States. My 4 year-old was flipping through that and was inspired to work on her U.S. map puzzle.

Suzanne seems more interested in reading again -- she's been asking me to read aloud to her as well as reading a lot on her own (she's still at the developmental stage where she reads out loud to herself. If I don't hear her, I assume she's just looking at the books). We've been reading Nate the Great and Magic School Bus readers, which are simpler than the usual MSB books. She really likes Even Firefighters Hug Their Moms by Christine Cole MacLean about a boy and his sister engaged in all sorts of imaginative play.

My 2 year-old gets short shrift in this blog. Her favorite books include Goodnight Moon (I can hear her saying 'moon' now), Corduroy's Party, Wibbly Pig's Presents, Baby Bop's ABCs, and Spot Looks at Colors. She says lots of words but isn't really talking in sentences yet, so she's a bit behind where her sister was at this age. However, Gabrielle has very good fine motor control, almost as good as her sister's at age 4 1/2. Its interesting to see the differences and appreciate that we are all unique.

Skipping Preschool

Are we homeschooling preschool, homepreschooling or skipping preschool? Take your pick. An interesting article on preschool and the home appeared in the most recent issue of The Link, by a mom who sent her son to preschool but withdrew him because he was bored. [if the link to the article doesn't work, try this one, its a different article, but she mentions this about halfway through it.]

I appreciate all the resources available on the web (many are also available in print, but its so easy to websurf). I like checking the World Book scope and sequence to see if we're missing anything. By their list, we're on target except for writing -- of course, this doesn't really help me because I'm not going to push writing, her muscles aren't ready yet. I think its a natural drive to want to communicate with others and I'm certain she will write when she is able -- she's at the scribbling stage where she claims its writing (though she knows it isn't), a developmental stage on the road to writing (just as pretending to read a memorized book is a step on the road to reading). At least the list gives me something to look at to see if there are any dreaded gaps (learning gaps is a fun topic on the hs e-mail groups).

Broadly speaking, the World Book scope and sequence for preschool lists skills pertaining to: size, shapes and colors, numbers and counting, reading readiness, position and direction, time, motor skills, and social-emotional development. There's really not all that much to it and nothing that requires any specialized tools or teaching. Most of this stuff can be learned by a child on her own or with demonstration and a few pointers. I love 'strewing,' so when I read on some list that preschoolers should know their address and phone number, I simply left a lot of at-home cards (business cards with our name and address on them) lying around for her to find -- it worked.

There are plenty of other lists out there. My state has its Standards of Learning listed on its Board of Education website and I imagine many other states do as well. There are also numerous differing philosophical approaches to education and most of them have skills lists. I was going to post a link to another list, but when I was going through the various homeschool websites, I was overwhelmed -- there is a lot of information out there.

Other items I've seen on preschool skills lists include: major holidays, days of the week, months of the year and seasons. We've learned these through reading lots of books that either directly address the subject or that include the subject. For instance, Eric Carle's The Very Hungry Caterpillar is about a catepillar's diet and his eventual change into a butterfly. The book progresses through the week as the caterpillar eats different things (On Monday...., On Tuesday...). Eric Carle's A House for Hermit Crab does something similar with months of the year.

As to writing, how are we working on that? By sitting with a pencil and workbooks, of course. No, just kidding -- by playing with playdough and cutting and pasting. Peeling and sticking stickers is another great way to work on fine motor skills. Its interesting, she can zipper and button, but her drawings are definitely in the abstract phase, though I can see her progressing -- she just added arms and legs to her figures.

Finally, who can ignore the importance of socialization? I don't think any homeschoolers disagree with the importance of socialization, we disagree with the assumption that proper socialization occurs only at schools (or that proper socialization even occurs at schools). Socialization opportunities are provided through playdates and park days and library story time, dance class and visits to the grandparents and Sunday school. How will she ever learn to sit down and be quiet -- not that it takes all that long to learn this important skill -- library story time and Sunday school. What about waiting in line? Go to the bank or the grocery store or almost anywhere. Take turns? Have a sibling or play with other kids.

One deficit we suffer by not going to preschool, we don't get invited to anywhere near the number of birthday parties that our preschooled friends do.

NOTE: this post is a work in progress, I plan to add more books to the subject areas noted above. I'm just sick of saving this post as a draft. If you're looking for books, check for updates or e-mail me.

NOTE to DH: your 2 year old nudie daughter just peed on your office floor. Apparently, she's untoilet-training herself. I preferred her sister's method of training after the age of 3 but with no accidents. Sigh. But I'm sure glad I'm not in an office somewhere doing real work. Grrrr.

An Interesting Picture Book -- energy

My Light by Molly Bang is a picture book about how the sun's energy creates electricity using water power/dams, windturbines, solar panels and also discusses how plants use the sun's energy and how this created coal. The author includes a few pages of notes about electricity at the back of the book -- good for adults and older kids, for whom the picture book might be a bit simplistic. The author states within the notes that she had more but that her publisher urged her to shorten it, however, she's posted the deleted portion on her website, www.mollybang.com.

Transcendentalism for Children

D.B. Johnson has written and illustrated several picture books based on the life and writings of Henry David Thoreau. My 4 year-old enjoys the stories about Henry, who is a bear in the books, and his various adventures. I'm not sure how much sense the books make, but many children's picture books are silly stories and these books are fun for me to read. There is a page of notes in the back of each book that tells the background of the story, including where it appears in Thoreau's works, and an inspiring quote. From the notes to Henry Builds a Cabin, an excerpt from Walden:

"Most men appear never to have considered what a house is, and are actually though needlessly poor all their lives because they think they must have such a one as their neighbors have."

Art Appreciation for the Very Young

The following is a list of picture books that are helpful for exposing young children to the world of art.

Story books:
Laurence Arnholt is the author of several books, including The Magical Garden of Monet and Camille and the Sunflowers. These are cute books about a child who meets an artist. The child differs in each book, sometimes its a boy (Camille, hey, he's French), sometimes its a girl. The illustrations are derivative of the painter's style and also feature some of the famous works.

James Mayhew also has a series of books, such as Katie and the Sunflowers and Katie Meets the Mona Lisa. Mayhew uses the same child in the various titles. Katie has adventures that involve going into the pictures she sees at the art gallery. The characters Katie meets are the subjects of the various paintings. Katie sometimes meets the artist himself, though this is only incidental to the story (as opposed to Arnholt's books where the story centers around the child meeting the artist).

You Can't Take a Balloon into the National Gallery by Jacqueline Preiss Weitzman and Robin Preiss Glasser. This is a wordless book in the format of a comic book about a girl who visits a museum and her balloon that escapes and the adventure that ensues. There are lots of pictures of works of art as well as illustrations of various parts of Washington, D.C. and events (the Cherry Blossom parade, picketing at the White House, a session of Congress, etc.) This book is especially fun for those familiar with the city. This series also includes You Can't Take a Balloon into the Metropolitan Museum (New York City) and You Can't Take a Balloon into the Museum of Fine Arts (Boston) [I may be a tad off on those titles].

Non-story Art Books:
Julie Aigner-Clark of Baby Einstein has produced a few art books such as The ABCs of Art and Master Pieces. The ABCs of Art is pretty simple, one painting per letter and a couple of simple questions about the painting. Master Pieces is an oversized board book which features only five paintings, each with several questions and answers in a lift-the-flap format. These books are fine, but I'm not a big fan of Baby Einstein, I'm especially suspicious of them since they've been acquired by Disney, that behemoth of children's entertainment. Have no doubt about it, folks, Disney is trying to steal your money and your children's minds.

Lucy Micklethwait has lots of art books. Micklethwait has a series of I Spy books about art -- I have I Spy an Alphabet in Art, this is very similar to Aigner-Clark's book, one painting per letter, but without any questions. She also offers a few other themes in her I Spy series -- I think she has I Spy with transportation in art. A Child's Book of Play in Art is an oversized book, with several paintings per page, grouped by a common theme. A fun book for an adult to peruse, though I can't say that my 4-year-old has shown any interest in it yet.

Grrrl books

As the mother of 2 girls, I like books with female characters doing interesting, non-gender-stereotyped sorts of things (never mind my law degree gathering dust while I play house with my babies -- feminism is about choice and this is mine. Wearing a tiara is fun).

Anyway....

Loud Emily by Alexis O'Neill. A picture book set in a seaside town in the mid-1800s. A fun story about a girl with a loud voice, viewed as a flaw in many circumstances, but for which she ultimately finds an important use. Cute story about turning weaknesses to strengths with a tad of history thrown in through the setting and in a few endnotes.

Keep the Lights Burning, Abbie by Peter and Connie Roop. A juvenile reader with lots of illustrations. Also set in the mid-1800s at a lighthouse. A young girl helps her father maintain the lighthouse and must take full responsibility when a storm hits.

Clipper Ship by Thomas P. Lewis. Another juvenile reader with lots of illustrations. Mid-1800s again. Set on a ship sailing from New York to California, the captain is accompanied by his family. An interesting story and the grrrl part is when the father becomes ill and mama takes over sailing the ship.

Abigail Takes the Wheel by Avi. Juvenile reader. Another sailing book set in the late 1800s. In this one, a girl takes the helm of a steamship boat in New York harbor.

Great children's book -- counting and more

I plan to do longer lists in the future, but I ran across a book at the library today that I've checked out before and love.

Swan Harbor, A Nature Counting Book by Laura Rankin. This is a beautiful picture book but its more than merely a counting book. The illustrations are detailed and the setting is lovely. What I really like about this book is that, in addition to counting, it takes you through the seasons of the year, so there are plenty of details to notice and discuss. Also, one quickly notices that as the pages progress, a hint of the next picture is given. For example, one sees a bird flying to a nest in a tree, 2 shows the baby birds in the nest in the tree and you can see a squirrel peaking out. For 3, you see 3 squirrels, and so on. There is probably a term that succiently describes this...I'll have to look for it. Alison Jay also does this in some of her picture books -- there is an alphabet book, I'm thinking of specifically....

Children's Books -- Christmas

I love books. I read a lot to my dds and I keep notes on some of the books I like. The following is a list of Christmas books for children that I started keeping last year and thought I'd share.
To read more, click the Xs...

The Christmas Story from the Gospel According to St. Luke, Illustrated by James Bernardin. Picture Book. Good for all ages, picture book using the Christmas story from the Gospel of Luke, KJV. Beautiful, realistic illustrations accompanying short passages. My daughter, who was 3 years at the time, enjoyed it.

The Christmas Story According to the Gospels of Matthew and Luke (KJV). Illustrated by Gennady Spirin. More extensive than the book above. Each page of text has verse references. Lovely illustrations in a Renaissance style. The story is longer and the style of the illustrations may not appeal to young children as much as the book above. You may want to look at a library copy to see if it appeals to you and your children, if so, its worth owning -- a beautiful book.

Christmas is... by Gail Gibbons
Cartoonish illustrations with bright colors. Explains various aspects of the Christmas celebration: nativity story, Santa Claus/St. Nicholas (how the history of St. Nicholas evolved into the story of Santa Claus); Christmas tree, Christmas lights, gift giving. Shouldn't spoil Santa for kids who believe in him (told as "some people think"). While this book doesn't necessarily forward the story of Santa, neither does it dismantle it. Probably a good choice for those with young children looking to explain the various aspects of Christmas celebrations.

The Golden Books Treasury of Christmas Joy, complied and edited by Skip Skwarek. A beautiful book and collection of "stories, poems, carols and more." Cross cultural celebrations, Christmas ABCs, activities, religious and secular. School-age children. Get this for $6 through Daedalus.

Christmas by Alice K. Flanagan
Cartoonish illustrations. Explains all aspects of Christmas -- religious, secular, pagan origins of the winter festival. May spoil Santa Claus for those who still believe in him by giving so much history. Glossary and resources in back. Elementary, good explanation of all the various aspects of Christmas -- she sums it up by saying, "On Christmas, many people celebrate two holidays...the birthday of Jesus Christ...[and] the arrival of Santa Claus." I thought this was a pretty good way of distinguishing the two (personally, I'm not into Santa Claus, I can tolerate him, but I'm not going to the trouble of talking about Santa coming and what he's bringing, etc, etc. My dd gets enough of that from the culture).

Christmas, A True Book, by Dana Meachen Rau. Textbook-ish, lots of photographs and other illustrations. Basic information (history, gift giving, trees, cross-cultural) presented in a dry format. Mid-elementary aged children.

The Tasha Tudor Christmas Book, Take Joy
Songs, stories and poems. Older elementary aged children.

A Time to Keep, Tasha Tudor
Not a Christmas book. Recounts the year's activities. Set in an earlier time period. Beautiful picture book, goes month by month.

The Very First Christmas by Paul L. Maier *
Lovely picture book -- realistic illustrations on one page with text on the facing page. Setting is a mother explaining the nativity story to her school-age son (8 years old) and answering his many questions about it. Bible passages about the nativity story are interspersed with dialogue between the mother and son. Lots of background information and questions, the scripture takes up a much smaller part of the book. Looks like a great book for school aged kids.

The Nativity, Mary Remembers by Laurie Knowlton
Picture book -- illustrations on one page with text on the facing page. The nativity from Mary's perspective; good for elementary age kids, probably -- whatever age when kids can empathize. A nice way to make the nativity more meaningful.

The Christmas Story by Carol Heyer
Picture book. Realistic illustrations, bold clear clean lines, a bit stylized, may be too intense for young children. The nativity story with a brief follow-up of Jesus' live and ministry. Nice way to tie in nativity to the importance of Jesus and what he did.

Check your library for these books -- all of them came from my county's library.

Homeschooling Odyssey -- preparations

How I started thinking about Homeschooling, a Sparky exclusive.
These are my thoughts and research: began December 2002

Education is not a race [Elkind, Miseducation: Preschoolers at Risk]. Neither is competition necessary to learning. Id.

I used to think homeschoolers were nuts. We live in an expensive area, in part because schools are so good. Why live here and home school? Now, home schooling seems so desirable to me, I wonder why more people aren't doing it.
To read more, click on the Xs

I had always assumed I'd send my DD to preschool at age 4, maybe even at 3. Conventional wisdom holds that its difficult to get a spot in a 4 year old class without having been in 3 year old program resulted in my considering preschool at 3, but I'm a gambling woman and would be willing to roll the dice (really, its not impossible to find preschools, though you might not get your first choice and might wind up in the dreaded afternoon program). Then I began questioning the necessity of preschool and ultimately rejected the notion of preschool. I read articles about choosing whether or not to preschool.

I had some casual discussions with DH that we could probably home school through junior high but don’t know how to handle HS level math and science. I met a woman who home schooled to high school. Suddenly the concern about higher level math and science disappeared, the kids could always go to high school.

I had some concerns over unnecessary competition in school; unwanted socialization experiences and possible, though perhaps not probable results - eating disorders, stress, having life controlled by school [day at school, homework, projects].

So I started reading about preschool, what goes on in a typical day, etc. I read Miseducation: Preschoolers at Risk by David Elkind and moved to from there...

Books I’ve read as I considered home schooling:

Home schooling Almanac by Michael and Mary Leppert – nice overview, easy to read, no need to read sequentially. Lots of information and interviews with parents and even one with a college student. Resource review.

Kingdom of Children by Mitchell Stevens – sociologist’s dissertation on the home school movement. Neither pro nor con, really just reporting and interpreting the social movement of home schooling and looking at the distinctions between “Christian” home schooling and the more liberal ‘unschooling’ movements.

This book gave me a wonderful sense of perspective on the subject as well as lots of information on the effects of homeschooling and the mechanics and history of the movement. Especially helpful was the information and background of the various support groups and homeschool organizations. Found the unbiased look at both the inclusives and the believers to be very helpful. -- I was later told by others that they felt the inclusive v. believer dicotomy oversimplified the movement, but I found it helpful, a good starting point.


Rebecca Rupp books – Getting Started on HomeLearning and HomeLearning Year by Year. California crunchy and well-educated. Level-headed and easy to read. Encouraging but also intimidating when you read about all the questions her kids were asking. Completely non-religious. Like her style, agree with her philosophy, lots of quotes. Year by Year book has curriculum for each year.

The Essential Montessori by Elizabeth Hainstock (recommended by my good friend, The Barely Attentive Mother). While this really wasn’t about home schooling, some of the statements really struck a chord with me. “The time that we spent learning together gave me the chance to work closely with my girls, laying the groundwork for a continuing rapport in their later years. I was able to watch each of them develop into a unique individual and learn infinitely more about them than would have been possible in any other situation. I felt that their emergence as individuals was more readily apparent to me because of our shared Montessori experiences than it would have been if I’d just given them a cheerful good-bye and sent them off to nursery school each morning. [p.7 explaining her teaching experiences with her preschool children].

Home schooling the Early Years Child by Linda Dobson – A good book, non-religious, maybe too how-to before I’m ready for it. General how and why, lots of tips.

Home school Manual by Theodore Wade – collection of articles, Christian, some by HSLDA leaders; dated look, didn’t really appeal to me, but seems comprehensive.

Teaching Montessori in the Home: The Preschool Years by Elizabeth Hainstock –
“Education need not be imposed on the child; given a learning environment he will be free to act and to develop himself along the lines of his own inner direction.” p.8
“Far too many schools today are also guilty of not allowing our children to think for themselves. Children are too often being forced to submit to an unimaginative curriculum in an environment where the teacher makes all the decisions, while the children suffer under the delusion that they are really learning. What they are getting is shallow, superficial learning that profits neither the teacher nor the pupil. Today’s children need far more stimulation than they are being given. They are learning by rote, responding to stock questions with stock answers; too seldom are they allowed to use their minds imaginatively and creatively. On the few occasions when a child or young adult is suddenly presented with a “thought” question, he is unprepared to cope with it – his thinking processes have become stagnant from disuse. It is a pathetic fact that too many young people today are able to think and talk only in vague generalities and abstractions. Is it the fault of the child that he is ill prepared, or does the fault lie within the structure of our present-day educational system and indeed, with the parents themselves, for placing too much emphasis on dependency?” p.14

For the Children’s Sake by Susan Shaeffer Macauley – an overview of Charlotte Mason’s philosophy. Love it! Religious but not overtly fundamentalist Christian – religious as in, we are all God’s children and each deserve respect. Hates ‘twaddle’, watered down, uninteresting texts used by school to teach. Emphasizes the importance of living books, ones that captivate the imagination and give children something to think about. Give them good books, give them books you may think are too old for them, they will learn and take something from them and want more.

A Charlotte Mason Education by Catherine Levison – brief and spotty, not as much of Mason’s philosophy but more quick summaries of how-tos [not fleshed out, not always coherent]. Author is a conservative Christian [talks about covering up ‘objectionable’ parts of art with post-its].

The Way they Learn by Cynthia Ulrich Tobias – not a home schooling book, just talks about learning styles and environmental preferences and how we remember. Its more than just the modalities of learning [aural, visual, kinesthetic, etc], its got lots of different theories and has references to many other books.

EasyHomeschooling Techniques by Lorraine Curry – fundamentalist Christian, a quick read and not bad if you ignore a lot of her religious beliefs [Creationism and disdain for evolution; ‘unacceptable’ art featuring nudity]; talks about setting up a scope and sequence, choosing good books, etc.

The Question of God by Dr. Armand M Nicholi, Jr.
Not a homeschooling book, but talks about C.S.Lewis’ experiences as a student at a private boarding school. I imagine that some of his critiques might be applicable to the public school system.
“If the parents in each generation...knew what really goes on at their son’s schools, the history of education would be very different.” “I have never seen a community so competitive, so full of snobbery and flunkeyism, a ruling class so selfish and so self-conscious, or a proletariat so fawning, so lacking in all solidarity and sense of corporate honor.” The environment fostered pride and arrogance and the tendency to look down on others. Lewis’ father eventually withdrew C.S. to study with a private tutor. The years he spent with his tutor were the most formative and happy of his life. He spent many hours of each day delving into books of his own choice. Every afternoon he was free ‘to read, write or moon about in the golden-tinted woods and valleys of this country.’ pp. 8-9.

Should I Home School? By Elizabeth and Dan Hamilton
A very helpful book, examines the question of whether to homeschool recognizing that its not the right choice for everyone [especially families where the spouses disagree]. Christian, assumes curriculum use. Likes Magic SchoolBus educational software.
Begins with educational options available – public school, parochial school, private school, Christian Day School, homeschool. Continues with questions to ask – developing an educational philosophy and determining which of these options most closely follows. Consider your time, interest and availability to homeschool [planning and teaching]. Consider your personality and your child’s [whether homeschooling would lead to or contribute to conflict with a difficult child]. Very helpful in providing questions to consider for those who feel pressured to homeschool [especially if for religious reasons].
Gives an overview of available curriculum and urges the reader to consider how much planning they would be able to do for homeschooling. Some curricula offer more structure and guidance which may be helpful or stifling – this structure corresponds to the availablity of the teacher to prepare assignments. Some curricula are heavy on review and drill, some move at a faster speed. She suggests Cathy Duffy’s Christian Home Educator’s Curriculum Guide and Mary Pride’s Big Book of Learning as resources.

Christian Home Educator’s Curriculum Guide by Cathy Duffy
Comprehensive. Discusses learning styles and teaching styles. Gives an overview of different homeschooling methods. I enjoyed this a lot but it was overwhelming.

Mary Pride's Big Book of Home Learning is another great resource.

Very pleased with the products offered by Sonlight Curriculum. Based on a living books approach, it offers a scheduled curriculum using real books [as opposed to text books]. Liked their philosophy – decidely Christian but more ecumenical, not Western culture biased.


The Relaxed Homeschool, Mary Hood
I really liked this book; its short [just over 100 pages] and easy to read. Mary is called the Christian unschooler by many. She has a Ph.D. in education which certainly lends credence to her opinions. She dedicated this book to Charlotte Mason for ‘who taught me to respect my children.’ This book is not a nuts and bolts how-to, though it does sort of help you get started. She urges you to determine your philosophy and some long range goals as a means to guide you. She mentions that she is Christian and it comes up during the course of her book but in a very low-key manner – no hammering away about God’s will nor sprinkling her book with Bible quotes. She highlights some of the shortcomings of institutional school without attacking them. She is a proponent of using living books but doesn’t get into details. She touchs on the teaching of different subjects but since she uses the living books approach, she doesn’t really approach teaching from a view of separate and distinct subject areas.
She discusses the importance of having a general daily schedule but isn’t a slave to it. The schedule is important, because even if you scrap it every day, it allows you to see areas you may be missing. Also, she does not have separate blocks of time for the various subjects, but simply an hour or two for academic subjects, some quiet time, chore time and time for activities.
She does a funny aside about unit studies – she basically says that she is more child directed and literature based while unit studies tend to be parent driven and activities heavy. This was helpful to me as I decide what approach I want to take.
In Chapter 4, she illustrates the lunacy around ‘teaching reading’ by comparing it to teaching kids to talk. Basically, kids are motivated on their own and provided a rich environment, will learn just fine without all the high priced gimmickry of experts. She points out that motivational techniques actually kill the intrinsic desire to learn [reading is made drudgery through dry, dumbed down textbooks and then made to answer questions, write reports and dissect them until reading is no longer an enjoyable experience]. She gives an example of how her son read great books but every summer, would turn to short dumb books to rack up points for the library’s summer reading program.
I was also interested in what she said about teaching science. She mentioned that people tend to approach it in one of two ways, either from a textbook approach [which tends to be very dry and not always clearly relevent] or an experiment driven approach [which tends to be disjointed as you learn about various parts of science without any obvious connection; ie magnetism to chemistry]. She prefers a literature based approach which involves checking out books from the library on subjects in which her children have shown interest and subscribing to various science magazines and just learning through living [gardening, etc].
Early math is also easily learned through living; one on one correspondance being very important. Cooking, measuring, math games. Purchased manipulatives aren’t necessary, use cheerios, popsicle sticks or other objects. If you want a text, use inexpensive workbooks.

So You’re Thinking about Homeschooling, Lisa Whelchel
A quick, easy read. Briefly profiles about 15 different composite families and uses a few pages to tell how and why each homeschools [single parent; harassed kids; unusual circumstances]. Of all the "families," only 2 homeschooled from the start, including the author. The 'families' are actually composites of many people she'd interviewed.

Teach Your Own, John Holt
Loved it – more substantive than a rah-rah homeschooling book. Holt seems to really like and respect children and emphasizes that they learn plenty on their own.

The Unschooling Handbook, Mary Griffith
More general, lots of encouraging quotes....

John Taylor Gatto, Dumbing Us Down and The Underground History of American Education are wonderful if you're feeling saucy. If you're unsure whether you want to homeschool they will either scare the heck out of you or get you started homeschooling immediately. Personally, I love them.

I am now a member of my state's inclusive homeschooling organization, subscribe to the Home Education Magazine, plan to become involved in monitoring homeschool legislation and hope someday to help with lobbying.
As my DH has said about our desire to homeschool, "Yes, we drank the Kool-Aid."