Previewing Children's Books

Most of the books I read to my kids, I get from reading lists (e.g., Honey for a Child's Heart) and from friends' recommendations.  I order these books from the library online `and they are stacked up and ready to go when I arrive.  But I also like to peruse the children's bookshelves and my kids love picking up books that look interesting to them.  I do not often preview read-aloud books.  Maybe I should do this more.  

There is a Thanksgiving book we have read over the years and love called The Night Before Thanksgiving.  It is a cute story of a family Thanksgiving celebration.  I recommend it!



The other day I saw a book with a similar title, 'Twas the Night Before Thanksgiving, and picked it up.  I read it to the kids today and half-way through realized it was total animal rights propaganda.  Children steal turkeys from a farmer in order to spare their lives.  (The farmer's name is Mack Nuggett.) At the end of the book, the children were "abounding in love." The children and their families feasted on "veggies with jelly and toast" and everyone was thankful (the turkeys were most)." In other words, it is okay to steal from a farmer who is trying to make a living but how dare you think you are better than a fowel and take the life of a bird for your sustenance! 



My kids took in every word of this book.  I continued reading it but, at the end, we had discussion Iabout the purposes of animals and whether eating animals is something that is wrong or allowed for in the bible and a part of God's plan.  We talked about whether animals are equal with humans or subservient and whether animals have a soul.  We also talked about people like Laura Ingalls who would have never survived a winter in the Big Woods if her pa had not killed animals for food.  

So, maybe I should preview books more.  But, I tend to err on the side of exposing my kids to stuff and then having conversations with them about what is Truth and what is a lie.  I would rather my kids grow up having lots of conversations with their mom about right and wrong, and knowing that their mom is not afraid to confront the lies the world offers, than my kids simply being sheltered.  

My two cents, for what is worth!  What are your thoughts?  

Reading to Your Kids

This is something I posted on my other blog for young moms in my MOPS group. Since it's something I'm very passionate about, I thought I'd post it here too!

During last meeting’s Mentor Mom Moment, Debbie encouraged all of us to read to our kids. Let’s face it, when you have preschoolers your day is often hectic and this is something that you have to be really intentional about or it doesn’t happen.

In our house, we place a high priority on reading every day. I love books and want my kids to love them too. In order to maximize the literature my children are exposed to, I have become a very liberal library user! We usually bring home at least a dozen new library books every week. And we usually have about 80-100 materials checked out at one time. My kids love having so many interesting picture books in our house.

If your goal is to read more books to your children, it’s absolutely crucial to have books out and available.

Here is what I do to ensure that we have a wide variety of quality children’s books in our house:

1) Get an annotated list of books for children. I personally love Honey for a Child’s Heart by Gladys Hunt. Debbie mentioned The Read-Aloud Handbook by Jim Trelease and I’ve heard that’s good too. There are also lists of books you can find online. Here is one, here is another, and here is one more I found through doing a Google search.

2) Take a pencil and draw a line after the 10th book on the list. You can also section off only one or two books and then do a search on other books written by that author. It’s fun to get all the books by a particular author at one time so kids can learn more about him/her!

3) Go to the library’s website and search (by title or author) for the books you want. The library will do all the work of finding those books. (You’re a busy mom! Take the help!) Then, a few days later, you can go to the library and pick up the pile of books that is waiting for you on the shelf. It’s easy!

4) Plan for a regular day at the library where you can return books and pick up new ones. Pretty soon, you’ll be cycling through lots of new books and discovering new favorites.

5) Once you’ve read through all of the books in the first section of your list, pencil-off another section. After a year, you’ll have read hundreds of new books to your children!

Happy reading!

Thanksgiving Book List

Here are some of our favorite Thanksgiving picture books. I got all of these from the library.

We love seasonal and holiday children's books because, along with decorating the house, it really helps our whole family get in a festive mood!

Thanksgiving is for Giving Thanks (Sutherland)
The Night Before Thanksgiving (Wing)
Turkey Surprise (Archer)
Thanksgiving (Murray)
Thanks for Thanksgiving (Markes)
An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving (Alcott)
Let’s Celebrate Thanksgiving (Roop)
Thanksgiving: A Harvest Celebration (Stiegemeyer)
Mary’s First Thanksgiving (Wargin)

Do you have any favorite Thanksgiving books to share? I know there are lots more!

Fancy Nancy

I think this book—Fancy Nancy—deserves mentioning on this blog because it has been Meredith’s favorite book for the past three months. Thanks to Fancy Nancy she sees everything in life as either “plain” or “fancy.”

In early December she observed that her grandma’s Christmas tree had yet to be trimmed. She then declared, “Grandma, your tree is plain. You need to make it fancy.”

After only a few weeks of reading this book aloud to Meredith, she memorized all the lines. So, basically, now she reads the book to us.

The illustrations in Fancy Nancy are just as enjoyable as the text. We highly recommend this delightful book for other young girls, and even older girls/women seeking to find their inner princess.