Reading

May has a cute friend, Katie. Both of Katie's parents are librarians. Lucky!!!!! Whenever May starts reading a series of books or a bunch of books by a certain author and she mentions it to Katie, she finds that Katie has already read the books. I made the comment tonight, "Your goal is to find and read a book that Katie has not yet read." May said simply, "No, my goal is to follow in her footsteps."

Humility. I've got to work on that.

Lang Lang: Playing with Flying Keys

A few weeks ago, I decided that I had been wasting a lot of time. In the morning, there was the time after I dropped all the kids off at school until I got home again. In the afternoon, there was the time before I got to the school. I decided to fill this time with a book on CD of my own. I can't believe how much I enjoyed having a book of my own in the van!

I had been trying to check out some music of the famous Chinese pianist Lang Lang and accidentally got his memoir instead. I'm not sorry. It was wonderful! The dedication of both Lang Lang and his parents to his success is amazing. But, it also includes information about how difficult this was and how he suffered under the sometimes dictator-like style of his father. I cheered at his successes and felt sad when things didn't go well for him.

It was interesting to hear his perspectives on America and also his ideas about how East and West can meet. It left me wanting to see him play in person. Thank goodness for YouTube!



Now, I need to find something new to inspire me in my free, driving time!

Napkin Folding

My kids have been having a great time with a roll of paper towels (need to get some cloth napkins) and this book:

It happened again last night

As I sat devouring a book about hiking in the Upper Peninsula (imagining myself there), I suddenly looked up and scanned my living room. Joseph was reading a book that Nathan had brought home from school (part of his current language arts project) called "The White Mountain" and was occasionally telling me about the parts of it that Stephenie Meyer stole to write her book "The Host." Nathan and Elijah were sharing a book called "Children from Austrailia to Zimbabwe" and talking about what they were reading. Brigham was going from person to person asking them to read his favorite book "Trucking" by Donald Crews. Sariah and May had to go to bed early, but if they had been up, they would have been reading too.

This is one of my absolute favorite family activities. I love to look around and see everyone in the family present and reading a good book!

Before bed, Nathan and Elijah persuaded me to read a few stories from our current read-aloud, "One Voice, Please" by Sam McBratney. It was a good night.

"Authors are such kittle kattle....

I wouldn't trust your description of any of us."

(Katherine Brook) Anne of Green Gables, the movie

---

I don't really feel that way.

My sister has been reading The Host by Stephenie Meyer. She was talking about hearing something the author said about having lots of stories inside her head. We are both amazed because that's just not the kind of heads we have.

My brother told me that I should write and illustrate a children's book. I'll keep the topic secret in case I eventually decide to do it. I think it's funny that he said that because it would be great to write and publish a book, but even when I think real hard about the topic, nothing comes to mind. When I leave the topic alone, nothing floats into my mind. I might be a hopeless case.

I am amazed as I think about some of the authors my kids and I have been reading aloud and listening to on CD. Some of the ideas we hear about are rehashes. Some of them are brilliant rehashes, but rehashes nonetheless. Some authors, namely Andrew Clements, have the cleverest ideas I've come across in modern children's literature. Of course, that's just my opinion. They aren't classics (yet), but they should be. Clements is particularly wonderful because he creates believable characters that are honest, smart, and good leaders. We've listened to Room One: A Mystery or Two, No Talking, and we are a few chapters into Frindle. The reader for those first two is exceptional and we were all a little bummed when Frindle started with a different reader.

So the thing I'd like to understand is how authors and poets and artists, even, get the ideas into their heads. I'm a little jealous.

---

Speaking of authors, one of my sons wrote this spectacular poem at school.

Sea Shell

There are 30 flys
That never stop flying
Making watery sounds
In a shell.

He may be one of those with stories floating in his head. WOW!!

Changed My Comments Settings

I decided to change the settings on my comments so that anyone, even anonymous users, can leave a comment. Some family and friends have told me that because they don't have a Google account, they don't comment. If you decide to comment under anonymous, just sign your name, so I know who it is!



As a side note, have you heard of Tintin? I never had, but was introduced to me through "The Read-Aloud Handbook" by Jim Trelease. Joseph read them as a kid. I asked Joseph and Nathan why Tintin is so great. Joseph, who is into learning about WWII right now, is intrigued by the issues raised in Tintin. It was written just post WWII. So maybe this is equivalent to the t.v. program "24," (made for a post 9/11 world) except it's primarily written for kids?? Nathan and Joseph both like the language used in Tintin's adventures. Nathan really likes the pictures.


Nathan spent his entire week reading Tintin's adventures. It's apparently my fault because I picked up the books on hold at the library and among them were four of the books as pictured above. Each adventure boasts at least 8000 words which is pretty darn good for a graphic novel. To paraphrase Jim Trelease, "Kids don't even realize how much they are reading." They are recommended especially for reluctant readers.

My New Social Networking Tool

Thanks to Melissa, mom of two of the cutest twins I've seen, I found Goodreads. This is a website where you can go and enter books you have read or are reading. You can rate these books and leave comments. In addition to all that, you can link up with your friends or add new friends who are interested in sharing about their recent good finds in literature.

My friend, Marni, uses her blog to list out recent books that she has read. I've been eyeing those lists for some time now, not only to get good titles to read to myself and to my kids, but also because I WANT A LIST. So, I'm working on my list over at Goodreads. Check it out!

P.S. I've added a widget to my sidebar that shows my incomplete list of books I've read in the last 6-8 months. If you mouse over the pictures, the title will show below. You can click through the three pages I have so far to see what I've been reading. The site also allows "bookshelves" for books you are currently reading and books you want to read.

The Read-Aloud Handbook

Every parent and educator should read this book! Enough said!

There are two parts to the book. Nine chapters are dedicated to talking about the benefits to children when adults read to them, what silent reading does for kids, and how technology distractions from reading, affect kids education and learning. The second part of the book is a read-aloud "treasury" where the author lists his book picks and spells out why he's chosen them for his list.

I learned a lot that I plan to implement in my home and I'll tell a little bit about that here.

Reading to your child(ren) is like advertising the importance of reading to them. The author, Jim Trelease, compares this "advertising" to McDonald's advertising. McDonald's doesn't rely on the fact that most people know who they are and where they are located. They spend loads of money year after year on advertising. If we read to our kids when they are small and then quit, what message are we sending them? I hadn't considered it this way before. I hadn't imagined myself reading to my teenagers, but after reading "The Read-Aloud Handbook" I'm excited to carry that idea through. I love the discussions that come from the books that we are reading. The way I look at it, this is a good way for me to have a connection with my kids, even through the sometimes difficult teenage years.

The author makes a good case for every child obtaining and using their own library card. I have resisted this because of the extra hassle of keeping those books (and cards) organized. Over the past several days since I finished "The Read-Aloud Handbook," I have decided to go ahead and make sure that each of my children has a card. In fact, we did the paperwork and applied at the library today for Sariah and Elijah. I decided that they would each have their own library bag (Joseph always brings a canvas bag from each conference he attends out of town for work). Just today I sewed some little drawstring bags and attached them to the canvas bags. These are for their card, so that we can keep track of them. I took pictures of the process of making these bags (see post above).

I had been thinking of reducing the number of books in our house and using the library more. I'm now convinced that it's better to keep most of the books. Trelease also encourages spreading the books around the house (even a basket in the bathroom!). I felt happy as I thought through the rooms in the house and realized that there are books in each room. The previous owners also put a magazine rack in the bathroom which would otherwise be too small for any collection of books. We don' t use that rack, but I might be more open to it!

Around Christmastime, my brother Todd gave us an Amazon gift certificate. I frivolously spent it on magazine subscriptions so that each child would have a magazine of their own. When January came, I began to regret this purchase. I realized that magazines will pile up and make clutter and couldn't I have spent my money in a better way. "The Read-Aloud Handbook" says that the more forms of print available, the better the chances to get kids reading.

I was amazed to read the many creative ways that parents and other concerned adults have promoted reading in households, schools, and communities. It's phenomenal to me that people care enough about our children to form reading campaigns, gather and redistribute gently used books, and create libraries for at-risk kids. Examples are at work in my own community, but previously I hadn't recognized them for what they were. When we brought our last two babies home from the hospital, with them came a book. I mentioned in a previous post that May's third grade teacher holds a book bingo every year. People bring their gently used outgrown books and they are redistributed. We've been to several library programs and other community programs in the last two years where each child leaves with a new book. All I can say is "THANK YOU!" I love it that others are concerned about my children's literacy. This author did a good job of motivating me to keep at it and stretch myself to do more. He quotes a lot of research and relates anecdotes of success stories.

The second half of the book is a wonderful listing of ideas for read-alouds. The author makes that point that not all books are good read-alouds. Some have too much dialog (listener can't follow) or too much description (listener's interest wanes). There are several categories of books: wordless books, predictable books, reference books, picture books, short novels, full-length novels, poetry, anthologies, and folk & fairy tales. Jim Trelease explains that his list is in no way comprehensive and even refers out to websites with more lists.

My previous post called Reading List for Children has a list of the (few) books we've read out loud (not including the hundreds of picture books!) We are currently moving on to Anne of Windy Poplars on cassette (for drives in the van), Way to Be by Gordon B. Hinckley (for when we are waiting to send a kid into choir), and Carry On Mr. Bowditch (for before bed). Sariah isn't always able to sit through the chapter books, but I love to read picture books to her at night and that way the other kids are still exposed to picture books.

What Packable Snow Can Produce

I cannot believe how exhausted I am from building a snowman. Well, I also started a pile of snow for a snow fort, having been inspired by Heidi's post yesterday.

It's been a while since I helped build a snowman. A few years ago, Joseph and I stole out one night after the kids were all tucked into bed to recreate a scene from Calvin and Hobbes I was secretly hoping to play up Nathan's magical thinking stage at the time and make him believe that there really were Snow Goons--stranger things have happened--when he asked me where the tooth fairy lived I told him that she lived on a mountain of teeth in the Himalayas. I told him I would prove it by doing a Google search. You can prove anything to a 6-7 year old with a Google search. I showed him how many hits we had for the three words: Himalayas, tooth, and fairy. I had him convinced, without visiting the sites listed, which would have surely been my downfall.

Back to Calvin and Hobbes. If you haven't read "Attack of the Deranged Mutant Killer Monster Snow Goons, " it's a must. Beyond hilarious, it will make your sides hurt. Joseph and I built lots of mini snowmen. Some were two headed, or "deranged" in other ways. It was a blast!

Comics are considered an o.k. reading source for kids (therefore, adults!), according to "The Read-Aloud Handbook," so plunge on in!

Though None Go With Me

I saw a preview for this movie last month and decided to see if my library carried it. I found that it was a movie adapted from a book. Since I had to get on a waiting list for the DVD, I decided to read the book.

It's by a Christian author, Jerry B. Jenkins, and is about the life of Elizabeth Leroy. She has a difficult life and over time loses many of the people that she loves. It is a story of courage and faith which begins just before the time of WW1. I didn't like the writing style much and some of it seemed a little far-fetched (but then, so does the story of Job), but I still found it inspiring.

The movie is different from the book in many ways, mostly things that would have taken too long to portray. For those who live in MI, both the book and movie are set in Three Rivers, MI. It is set in the early 50's at the time of the Korean War. As in the book, the heroine goes through many life wrenching trials and comes out victorious. I recommend it because it is good and clean. A good family show.

Media Review: The Great Escape

The Movie

The Great Escape movie is perhaps my favorite movie of all time. Perhaps it is because Steve McQueen's American Airman character is as sarcastic to the German Kommandant as I have sometimes wanted to be to a few tyrannical authorities. Or, it could be that I appreciate watching a bunch of supposedly powerless men snubbing their noses at their captors. Or, it could be that
I have just watched it so many times I have been brainwashed. Who knows. I just like the movie.

The Book

Cindi brought home a book from the library entitled "The Great Escape: Nine Jews who Fled Hitler and Changed the World" by Kati Marton. It chronicles the lives of nine secular Jewish Hungarians who lived in Budapest in a golden age of tolerance and education before World War I. These nine men included the following:

1. Two photographers who first developed photography as an art form rather than as potraiture. One became the greatest war photographer yet known, and the other became an icon of texture, motion, and form.
   
2. Two director/producers who created some of the most beloved films of all time and transformed the British and American movie industries
3. Three physicists who worked under Oppenheimer to create the atomic bomb in the Manhattan project. Two of these understood that the combination of Einstein's E=mc² and Niels Bohr's atomic model implied that a nuclear chain reaction could be achieved, creating a superweapon. They recognized these implications of seemingly innocuous German experiments, alerted Albert Einstein and U.S. policymakers, resulting in the Manhattan project.
4. A famous mathematician/lobbyist who developed the ENIAC (the first electronic computer) that made possible the calculations needed to design the atomic bombs created by the Manhattan Project in the race with Germany to develop superweapons
5. One of the world's most influential political novelists.

This is really an exceptional book. It chronicles an incredibly productive time in history when a small area produced remarkable genius of many types which influenced the world in many ways, not all of them good.

One of the things that I got from this book is the drive that was instilled by (1) education, and (2) crisis. All nine of these men lived through a golden age of Budapest in which education, discovery, and creativity were seen as the point of life; but then saw a rapid descent into blaming the Jews for Hungary's problems. I saw how most of these men changed their names to erase their Jewishness, at least politically. The ethnic ties still remained strong, but the conflict that being Jewish in a time of severe repression is very clear in this book. Each of these men was tortured and driven by the experience.

Though I admire the ingenuity and tenacity of these men who survived setbacks most men would find completely disabling, I also took from this book a lesson on spirituality. These men were raised in the golden age to rely on their own intelligence, discovery, and creativity to solve any problem as clearly secular persons. The problems they faced could not be resolved simply through personal strengths. The torture could not be reasoned away, or channeled away into discovery or creativity. There is a certain powerlessness in the stricture that solutions to life's problems must come through human ingenuity. I lived this life for many years, not reasonably understanding the futility of trying to overcome intractable problems through personal exertion. As I read this book, and now as I write about it, it is so clear to me that the torture described is because of the powerlessness of man to control so many interconnected actors.

It makes me grateful to have learned (albeit the hard way) that God wants me to understand that I need Him to make life work--that intractable problems are indeed intractable to all but God who desires that I acknowledge my inability to solve my problems alone. It is good to have a Savior.

Marx indicated that religion is the opiate of the masses. I feel sorry for persons who believe that because it places an impossibly large burden on people, no matter how brilliant, courageous, or creative.

Little Boy Dancing

This show brought to you by these sponsors:

Brigham Benjamin
& The Wonder Pets

The "Cabinet of Natural Curiosities" by Albertus Seba comes in handy as Brigham's stool while he dances, but inside is a whole spectacular world of animal artwork! Check it out from the Oversize section in your library.

Reading and thinking

I've been trying to get on here and write about some of the things I've been reading and thinking lately. I get writer's block as soon as the empty blog screen shows up!

First off, I'm more interested in politics than I've ever been. Joseph has always listened to the news and what's more he retains it for years and years. Previously, when I wanted to know about politics, I would just drill him and he can almost always answer the questions I have, about most any topic (he's got a brilliant mind). I have a few dear friends who have challenged my political thinking over the last few years and I've been pushed out of my box. My brother is also very active in thinking about the political system and writes a good deal on his blog about it. I'm very much confused (maybe that's how it's meant to be in this bipartisan system!) and there are issues where I'm not making any headway in making conclusions for myself. I had already decided my positions on some of these issues, but, I'm starting over.

All of this thinking has led me to the Middle East to ponder about what has gone on there and what is going on there. Some months ago, my friend Kristen, recommended a book called "Inside the Kingdom: My Life in Saudi Arabia" by Carmen bin Ladin. (As a side note, if you look up this book, you will see the picture of Carmen bin Ladin on the front of it. I believe I have found the person whose look Michael Jackson has tried to imitate!) She is the sister-in-law to Osama bin Ladin! But the bin Ladin family is very large and though Carmen does have comments about Osama bin Ladin, she was not close with him. In her book, she gives detail about life in Saudi Arabia, particularly for women. The author also gives background to the government and it's workings.

In addition to politics, I've always been interested in religion. More so, since we moved to Michigan, and have been exposed to a much wider variety of people. I decided to read "The Faith Club: A Muslim, A Christian, and a Jew--Three Women Search for Understanding." Ranya Idliby, a Muslim, wondered how she and her family would survive with the stereotypes given to those of her faith after the terrorist attacks of 9/11. She decided that she'd like to write a children's book which talks about similarities between the three main monotheistic religions. Suzanne Oliver (a Christian) and Priscilla Warner (a Jew) joined her in the project. They got together regularly to discuss and prepare their book. In the process, they did a lot of soul searching on their own and a lot of honest asking and answering in their group meetings. They decided to publish a book based on that experience. And thus, The Faith Club. I learned a lot that I didn't know and felt very challenged and stretched as I read. I wrote to the authors to ask where they were in the process of writing their children's book. They are hoping to publish soon. In the mean time they referred me to a picture book called "Jerusalem Sky: Stars, Crosses, and Crescents" by Mark Podwal. I loved this book and so did my kids. With this as a spring board, we plan to study religion this year in our home. I'm really excited about it! We're hoping to learn about and celebrate different religions holidays just to gain understanding of different people.

"The Faith Club" also included a lot about the politics surrounding Israel, because the area is so important for all three religions. Hearing the story from the different perspectives really opened up my mind. Upon finishing that book, I have a desire to study more about religion and history in that area to gain a greater understanding. It was interesting to watch a PBS special the other night called "Walking the Bible" in which Bruce Feiler (I believe he is Jewish) is traveling the area where the Bible is believed to have taken place. You can check it out here:

http://www.pbs.org/walkingthebible/

Have you ever watched "Gandhi?" I remember watching it as a teenager. I watched it a few years ago and then again in the last week. He was an incredible, brilliant man. I plan to watch this movie again and again, just to remind myself of what we are capable of both good and bad. Gandhi dressed and lived like his people while staging a non-violent revolution against the British government. I was again amazed at his intelligence as I watched this last week. This will help me in my quest for truth and knowledge.

Now, I'm reading about Iran. The book is called "Iran Awakening: Memoir of Revolution and Hope." The author is a lady named, Shirin Ebadi who was a judge in Iran before the 1979 Islamic Revolution. I've only read about a quarter of it and I'm eagerly awaiting my night-time reading time!

This post is somewhat disjointed and long, like my thoughts have been...

P.S. Here's a blog I came across that I like to read for an insider view of the war:

http://jeffreydenning.blogspot.com/

A book and a movie

The book "Gift from the Sea" by Anne Morrow Lindbergh was perfect for me. I read this small book on the first day of my two day vacation. Joseph sent me away to a B & B that also had spa services (I got my first massage and my first pedicure!) It is a book I hope to read again and again. It is for women, but I think men would benefit by reading it as well. The author touches on the subjects of love, marriage, motherhood, and the ebb and flow of life. Though the book was written over fifty years ago, it seemed timeless to me. A wonderful read, recommended by my friend Heidi!

Last night, Joseph and I watched a newly released DVD called "Miss Potter" (rated PG). It is the story of the author Beatrix Potter and how she came to publish her charming stories for children. It includes romance, but since it's a real life story, it doesn't have a fairy tale ending. I recommend it unreservedly!

Fall colors

I don't have Joseph's pictures downloaded yet, but here are a few of the pictures I took.

While we drove we listened to L.M. Montgomery's "Rainbow Valley." It's in the Anne of Green Gables series and is a very delightful children's book. I'm a little obsessed right now after having read the first of a series of three books. The first is called "Twilight." Next comes "New Moon," and finally "Eclipse." They are by Stephanie Meyer who is a graduate of BYU. They are actually teen books and they are about vampires. I prefer children's literature to adult anyway. The vampire part...well... Anyway, I've got the second and third on hold at my library and I JUST CAN'T WAIT!!