Family Reading #2

A few of the reads we've been enjoying in our household lately...

A photo from the archives - taken in when we were in Australia when Elizabeth was born in 2010! Michelle was 4-1/2 and James was not quite 2!

Picture Book Highlights
Interestingly enough, the most requested picture book among all of the kids lately has been from the pile of French books we brought home to our local library.  We have two different books about a little mouse family that we have read over and over again:  La famille Souris prépare le nouvel an (The Mouse Family Prepares for the New Year) and Une nouvelle maison pour la famille Souris (A New House for the Mouse Family), both by Kazuo Iwamura (and I believe translated into French from Japanese, interestingly enough.)  Michelle even wanted to do her copywork out of one of these this week...

Michelle's Reading (Age 6-1/2)
Michelle says the most interesting books she has read by herself in recent weeks have been Busy Times and More Busy Times, two of the second grade level readers in the Pathway Readers series.  May I commend these to you if you are looking for material for your early readers?  These are simple stories about the children in a large Amish family and often emphasize good character and 'reaping what we sow'.   And given that they are Michelle's pick of the week, you can see that she gives them a thumbs up too. =)  She is currently reading More Busy Times out loud to me, but often picks up both of these volumes for free reading as well.

Featured School Book
Our current book for character development studies is Missionary Stories with the Millers, and was also Michelle's pick for the "most interesting school book we read from this week."   We're only a couple of chapters in, but so far we are enjoying the stories of people who have trusted God with their very lives.  We've chosen to include missionary biographies as part of our character development studies because I personally find them encouraging and inspiring in my Christian life, and I hope that the kids will find them inspirational as well.  We read this once a week as our special read aloud on our 'project day'. 

Bedtime Read-Aloud
We are reading and loving Heidi right now.  Such a sweet story about God working all things together for good.  Highly recommended!

On Mama's Nightstand
Okay, if you didn't already think I was nerd enough for admitting I have been reading history for fun in the last book post, you will think I'm a nerd now when I admit I enjoyed reading Uncovering the Logic of English by Denise Eide.  It is part a description of what is wrong with reading instruction in the modern USA and therefore why there is a need for a greater understanding of phonics and spelling rules, and the rest a handy reference and explanation to how to use those rules, with lots of charts and such included.  Really, very interesting stuff, and useful to me as James is close to entering the beginning reading phase.  I expect it will be a very handy reference since I like to teach reading sort of organically rather than following a strict phonics curriculum. (But how I teach reading is a post for a whole other time.) You can read some quotes and comments from this book here if you are intrigued...