Follow This Link: Holy Week and the Tree

Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written: Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree.  Galatians 3:13

The God of our fathers hath raised up Jesus, whom you put to death, hanging him upon a tree. Acts 5:30

In honor of Holy Week I thought I would share some resources especially, as it turns out, about trees and the Cross.    I am going to have my younger boys read The Tale of the Three Trees and my high schooler read Dream of the Rood,.

 General:



This free Easter Lapbook looks beautiful and covers Palm Sunday, Holy Week and Easter Week. 

Sanctus Simplicitus' Lenten Lapbook might have some resources for Holy Week and beyond.

Here is an interesting Treasure Map of Holy Week (Orthodox)

The Tale of the Three Trees



The Tale of the Three Trees:  A Folktale for Good Friday.
This is an online text version of the venerable legend.  

An online Bible Study based on the Angela Elwell Hunt picture book of The Tale of the Three Trees (which is the version we have).

Another Bible Study:  Three Trees Companion Study Guide

HomeschoolShare has a lapbook/unit study!

A book review on a Pauline Media picture book version of the story.  .at Stuart's Study.

Dream of the Rood



I am having my 11th grader read Dream of the Rood.  You can read a bit more about this medieval English poem here.     I made a sort of mini-unit-study for my son's notebook here:  Dream of the Rood (PDF)  Dream of the Rood (ODT))

It is interesting to compare this beautiful poem to the Legend of the Three Trees.   Both are from the point of view of the tree.  

November 2012 Picture Book Challenge -- Willa

 For this month's Take Up and Read Picture Book Challenge,  I happened to find a stack of picture books my 9 year old had on his bed.   Very good!  It appears he is not past browsing through a picture book now and then when he doesn't have his nose in a chapter book or his Kindle!  There weren't quite ten, so I added a few that have been for one reason or another, often-requested favorites of my pre-readers.

Since we are getting quite a bit of snow up here,  I think I will call this month's theme for the Ryans:

Cuddle Up and Read Together November Theme

Here they are all together.    Now I will take pictures in smaller groups and add a short description.  I've linked to related resources in a few cases, ranging from philosophical to somewhat mystifying. 

Crocodile and Hen.  I think my kids loved this for the rhythmic language and the odd, surprising and funny way it proceeds.  But it also brings in, quite naturally, a beginner's taxonomy concept.  Here's a discussion page from Philosophy for Kids. 

Yellow and Pink.   All my kids liked this one, but it wasn't an oft-requested one.   It's one of the ones I found on my 9 year old's book stack.   William Steig is an interesting, quirky author who has published some classics as well as some rather strange books.     Teaching Children Philosophy:  Yellow and Pink.

The Greedy Man in the Moon.   A Chinese folktale with a lesson.  Fun reading.  The illustrations are OK, not great.  The author is an oral storyteller.   There's a resource page here.   Storytelling is a valuable art that has lots of applications in daily life; and it's fun and part of our literary heritage, as well. 

Brave Irene.   I think this is my favorite William Steig story, showing the courage that comes from love (a lot of Steig's stories are about how love overcomes all sorts of challenge).  Weirdly enough, the resource I found for this one is a Youtube retelling by Al Gore.  Yeah, uh, no.   But definitely in the "what's up with that?" category. 

Anatole and the Piano.   There is a whole series of Anatole books by Eve Titus.    They are so cute.  Anatole is definitely my hero, as he is musically talented, very intelligent, has a lovely wife and six little mouse children whom he is devoted to, and is incredibly brave.  Eve Titus also wrote Basil of Baker Street, about a mouse who tries to be like Sherlock Holmes (made into an animated movie which my older kids loved as children).    I will have to see if the library has any of the Basil books.

Leo Lionni, Six Classic Stories.   Leo Lionni is another childrens' author who has written many, many books of variable quality.  Some are classics, some are sort of odd, some are both.   Random House has Lionni resources here:  100 Years of Leo Lionni.    There's a Lionni teacher's resource guide (PDF).  I found this book on Paddy's bedside, but I am wondering if Aidan would like it, because the stories are quirky and somewhat rhythmic.

Be Nice to Spiders.   You can't really go wrong with Margaret Bloy Graham.   I can remember my little brother loving the Harry books, as did my kids.   This one is one of her lesser-known ones, not in the Harry series, but with the same "look", obviously.   There is a bit of a natural-history lesson here, gently presented.   You can find a lesson plan for Be Nice to Spiders here. 

The Church Mice Adrift.   This is one of a series by Graham Oakley.   Full of British humor, the pictures complement the story and are intricately composed.  You can find more information about the series here.    Graham Oakley packs more onto a picture book page than practically any author I know. 

Little Fur Family.    Margaret Wise Brown is better known for classics such as Goodnight Moon and Runaway Bunny.      Like Goodnight Moon, this one seems to bring you into another universe, one of gentle contemplation.   So it is perfect for lulling a toddler at bedtime.  There's a nice pictorial review here.   The half-poetry of the words is complemented by illustrations by Garth Williamson.    You can't really read this book and stay stressed; or at least, I can't.

There was a little fur family

warm as toast

smaller than most

in little fur coats

and they lived in a warm wooden tree.

Hungry, Hungry Sharks.   We have quite a few of the history and science related Step Into Reading books around our house (we skipped the twaddly ones in the series).  They were very helpful in getting my second son into reading fluency (he struggled to get to the fluent stage, and preferred non-fiction to fiction until he was in his teens, so it was nice he could work on reading and learn more about his favorite topics at the same time).    As you can see, the book was falling apart from reading, and so I had to do that duct-tape repair thing to the spine.

So that wraps up my November Picture Book Challenge.

Chari and I would love to hear: 

What are some of your favorite cuddle together with a blanket picture books?

TUAR Picture Book Challenge: October 2012 -- Willa

This month for a Picture Book Challenge, I decided to focus on Aidan.   Though Paddy is the youngest, Aidan is the one still firmly in the Picture Book stage.  In fact, his favorites are generally board books.

I went through our family bookshelves and pulled out about a dozen that I remembered being favorites of his.  I left them piled on the floor while I went off to make dinner.  When I came back, they had all disappeared.

I looked around, wondering if my middle aged brain had deceived me again.  Then something made me go over to Aidan's bed to look there.

Sure enough!   I guess I was right about these books being favorites of his : ).

This time I will separate them out so you can see them better.

Dr Seuss, PD Eastman, and Theo LeSieg -- are they all the same person?

I thought Aidan might like to look through a counting book or two -- he loves pictures of groups of things.

 

Songs made into books... the Teddy Bear one is excellent, the Twinkle one is just ordinary art, but he loves the song.

I didn't photograph it because the cover is just blue and it's not really a picture book, but I also got out an old book of Mother Goose rhymes.   It's hard to ignore that Aidan's all time favorites universally have rhymes, a strong rhythm or at least a repeating verbal motif, so really, I should encourage that since really, nursery rhymes are the bedrock of language and literacy and folk wisdom.     A lot of punch to pack in 4-10 lines. 

Happy Picture Book Days during October!

Willa

TUAR Picture Book Challenge: September 2012 for the Bryans

 

 

 

 

I am very much looking forward to choosing TEN Picture Books every month for the Take Up and Read Picture Book Challenge.  For me, this walk down memory lane will be a delight.

 

 

And before I have even introduced the idea to my son......he has validated the plan.

 

I chose my ten books...or, rather, they chose me......  :)

 

I left the pile of books stacked in my room.  Later, my oldest daughter tells me that he comes in the room, spies Katie and the Big Snow and declares:  I just love this book! Music to this mama's ears.

 

A few days later.......he spies the stack again.  I am in the room and he shares:  I just love this book and this book and this book (two Virginia Lee Burton books...and Ping).  I knew I was sooooo doing the right thing for this boy.  I am thrilled to start making new memories with him with these books.

 

I decided that for this challenge......most months, I will choose five old favorites and five new books....probably all from my own shelves.

 

For this first month, I turned to my ultimate childhood favorite, The Little House by Virginia Lee Burton.  That led to just choosing all of her books....and then Ping caught my eye.  He loved doing our little Five-In-Row study on it when he was five.......and has been attached to Ping since then.  Well, that made me grab another Majorie Flack book...bringing my total to six.  When I looked at my stack of "new" books......ones I had yet to read to him or myself, I found three had the word

 king or queen in the title...one had both!.......so inspired, I grabbed one more book with queen in the title...........an old favorite around here by Mercer Mayer, a family favorite author: 

The Queen Always Wanted to Dance. I guess that means.....going with the inspiration.....I have, in the end, seven old favorites and three new.  Works for me and the crowd I am going to read to!

 

 

 

Here is is the sad realization:  no matter where I look.....I simply cannot find my copy of The Little House book. What the heck??? I have some vague feeling that the college student had borrowed it last year......but she has no memory of doing that.  I actually have to borrow a copy of my favorite book from the library???  Thank God for our library.  We almost lost it two years ago......so.......as soon as it arrives, we will read it!  My ten books are as follows......

 

 

 

 

 

 

     We have already read the first two Burton books......he was very happy to hop up on the couch and cuddle with me.  He chose Katy and the Big Snow first.  In fact, reading this book was the absolute first official schooly thing we have done this school year.  That was yesterday.  Today, he picked Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel.  From across the room, on the other couch.....his 15 year old brother saw the book and said:  I have not heard that book read to me since I was a little boy.  I invited him to come sit next to me on the couch for our read.  He came over to our couch and listened in with his lap full of freshman English books. 

 

Sweet moment. 

 

I have always read Picture Books to my olders......glad to see they still like it.  :)

 

 

+++++++

 

Even after reading only two of the books, I have already observed that because his ability to think has grown so much since he first read these books......we are getting more out of our reads than I could have predicted.  His comments and questions are so much more mature.  Nice.

 

 

 

Picture Book Blessings,

 

                                 Chari

The TUAR Picture Book Challenge

........................for the 2012-13 Homeschool Year

 

     Lately, I have been looking at my youngest child.........Malachy.......who will be eleven years old in October........and realizing that our days of picture books are on the wane.  He still loves for me to read them to him......but we never read enough.  Not enough for my tastes.  Not enough for his.

      And then, for the past year, I have taken to perusing my picture book collection.....one that I add new finds to as I discover them.....and I realize that I need to move fast to get them read to my boy.

     At the beginning of this summer, in attempting to figure out how to inspire myself to read more pictures books to my little man.......various ideas crossed my mind. 

      Eventually, my idea came to include Willa and her two youngest boys.  Of course.  I do that.......drag her along with me, sometimes.  :)  And why not.....her two little boys are getting big, too.

The Plan:


     I challenged Willa to come up with TEN Picture Books a month, at the beginning of each month.......and then we would read them to our little ones.

Monthly theme or not.

Picture Books from our home library or borrowed from the public library.

Doesn't matter.  We just need to read. And read........and read.

I think it will be doable, even with my crazy life.  It has to be.....or it just will not work.

Possible themes:

A general subject........
Fall
Apples
Pumpkins
Water
Saints
Our Catholic Faith
Science Topics
History Topics
Biography
Art History
Composers or music
Black History Month
Woman's History Month
and so on........



Holidays...
Advent
Christmas
St Valentine's Day
Easter
and so on.......

Authors or Illustrators.....
Robert McCloskey
Virginia Lee Burton
Jane Yolen
Steven Kellogg
Patricia Pollaco
Jan Brett
Tomie de Paola
Allen Say
Bill Peet
Diane Stanley
Russell Hoban
Jerry Pickney
Bernard Waber
Maurice Sendak
Arnold Lobel
Munro Leaf
William Steig
Beatrix Potter
Paul Zelinsky
Marjorie Flack
James Herriot
Cynthia Rylant
and so on.....

     Willa and I are hoping to do this every month for this school year.......and we cordially invite all of you to join us.  We challenge all of you to choose TEN Picture Books a month....to read to the little ones in your life........or the big ones.......or even to yourself.  :)

     In the first week of each month, both of us will post our TEN Picture Book choices on Take Up and Read.  Please feel free to grab the Picture Book Challenge button shown at the top of this post to place on your own blog and link back to us.....with your TEN Picture Book choices.

     Are you ready to read?  Let's go, then!


Blessings,

          Chari & Willa

P.S.  We know that reading aloud to our younger set of children is not quite to the quantity of time or books that is was with our older set.....we hope this can make up for some of that deficiency and create lovely memories for our little guys.  Join us!

It's a Picture Book Day! Advent Style!

        I probably should say:

It is a Picture Book a Day!!!

     Living a literature-based life means, of course, that books picture in most parts of our lives......especially picture books.........and Advent is no exception. In fact, the only exception about Advent and books is that this season in our life is particularly picture book heavy. I would say that we own somewhere between 60 to 100 picture books themed on Advent & Christmas. I am pleased to say that most of them were found while treasure-hunting through every children's book section at every thrift store that I have ever visited.  I look at that section first.......of course.

     When my children were young, I worked hard to keep Advent on this side of Christmas.....saving Christmas celebrating for Christmas Day and beyond. I only brought the books out on Christmas morning and we did the best that we could to read these during the Twelve Days of Christmas.

     After about five years of this, I realized that we really were not getting to spend much time with the special books in the way that I desired. What to do???

     Funny that it really was so simple.......but it dawned on me that the children would be better prepared to greet their Infant Savior on Christmas morn if they had been reading about His coming during all of Advent. And I was right!

     Then, as our collection grew, setting the whole lot of the books out at the beginning of Advent was just too much. The children would look through all of the books over in the first week and then only at their favorites the rest of Advent.

     One year, I decided to bring about ten books out once a week, on each Sunday of Advent. That worked well. The children looked forward to their old favorites and made new friends with the other books.

     And then, my youngest, my wee fella, was old enough to enjoy the books. I came up with a plan to have his older siblings wrap up enough books for each day of Advent. I set them all under our home altar where he happily grabbed a book to unwrap each day. This was definitely a happy Advent memory in the making. 

     I usually put the older siblings to work wrapping those books for him. Makes it more likely to get done.....  In those few years when I have been unable to get the books wrapped, I let him pull a book out of the box with his eyes closed. That was an acceptable substitute. 

     Only a few more days to go.......and we will begin making new Advent memories, inspired by our old family traditions.


     Do you have any special ways of sharing picture books with your children during the Advent season?

Blessings,

               Chari

P.S. As I said on Facebook earlier this evening: God bless the husbands who -every single year for decades- get  the Advent boxes down from the rafters......including those four boxes of books.  : )

A Picture Perfect Childhood

Looking for inspiration to read more good things to your little ones, for book lists, and for tips and ideas on making quality read-alouds a bigger part of your life? 

A charming book, A Picture Perfect Childhood, by author Cay Gibson, is available in ebook (pdf) form at Lulu for only $1.99. 

This discount is in honor of November, Picture Book Month.  The sale ends November 30 so it's a good time to take advantage of a great deal! 

I have another book by Cay called Literature Alive! which I go to regularly for inspiration, and Picture Perfect Childhood looks like it will find a similar place in my collection.