Read Aloud Thursday - We Just Can't Get Enough!

I can't begin to describe how a wonderful story makes me feel.  Even better is sharing a wonderful story with my children and watching their faces light up and having them beg me to keep reading!   We've been reading A LOT this summer, and I'm just cherishing these times of us laying together sharing some awesome literature.    


It took my six year old a while to work up to listening to longer books.   Now that he is an avid Lego builder we are reading for much longer spurts.  We simply park ourselves with his Legos and he is content to listen for long periods of time while I read.  My almost 10 year old daughter could lay and listen for hours.  (Children are so different, aren't they?)


Read Aloud Thursday is the link up I look forward to the most.   I'm thankful for Amy's blog, Hope is the Word, and her great book recommendations.  When I visit Amy's site there is always something I can USE and it's packed with solid educational information!    Click over to Hope is The Word to see what other people are reading this week.




This week  we continue to be completely enthralled with the 26 Fairmount Avenue series.   We finished the first three books in the series a few weeks ago, and read the next two in just two days earlier this week!   In What a Year and Things Will Never Be The Same, Tomie dePaola has  a way of writing that grabs my children from the very first sentence.   Tomie as a six year old boy was just so precocious and sweet... with fears, dreams and antics that my children just seem to "get".   


 I also love the way he gives such a rich view of the times in which he was living (in these two books 1940-41).... from Scarlet Fever quarantines to Roosevelt's polio, culminating in the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1941.    I wonder what it would be like for my parents to read these books to my children, since they grew up in exactly those times.  It is an era when children came home from school for lunch and radio shows were great entertainment.   It was also an era of great fear for our country and loved ones.   I imagine what we felt  on September 11th, 2001 and the days that ensued were quite similar.  


We are fortunate to live just 45 minutes from Roosevelt's Little White House in Warm Springs, GA.   It is a great place to visit and is still a working rehabilitation center today.   I have scheduled a field trip for us there next week, so we can really step back in time with these books.    I'm thinking about asking my father-in-law to come along with us, because he remembers FDR traveling by train through this area when he was a little boy - he talks about seeing him on the train and waving to him.   I just love how we can make history almost come alive for our children!


At a book sale today I also picked up our read-aloud for when we finish the 26 Fairmount Avenue Series.   I've heard so much about this book and can't wait to start it with the kids.   Have you read this one ~ The Indian In The Cupboard?  

I'm soaking up these days reading to my children, because (as my daughter's 10 birthday is approaching on Saturday) I realize they aren't going to be with me forever and one day I will MISS THESE TIMES.    

Read-Aloud Thursday: Two Great Chapter Books

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Two great books this week, one we are reading aloud, and the other we are listening to on CD.

The first ~ a Newberry Award winner by Madeleine L'Engle, A Wrinkle In Time.    We are only a few chapters into the book, but it is already riveting!   

The second ~ a chapter book by Mary Ann Hoberman.  You may know her for her picture books,  and this is her first chapter book.   It is especially good for my almost 10 year old, because the story is about a 10 year old girl (Allie) who faces challenges typical to this age child.  

If you have a great read-aloud, hop over to Hope Is The Word and share it for Read-Aloud Thursday! 

Read-Aloud Thursday: Five In A Row

We're spending time this summer with our beloved Five in a Row titles.   They lend themselves to relaxing summer reading, and it's a compact unit study that can be completed in just a week (or two, if you have to squeeze it in between swim lessons and playing with friends!)  You can NEVER go wrong with a FIAR book.    Since I have an almost ten year old and a six year old, I decided to choose a title from FIAR Volume 1, and also a title from Beyond FIAR.    The beautiful thing is that both children are doing both books!   

Grandfather's Journey is a beautiful story about the author's grandfather and his journey from Japan to America and back again (many years later).   Through beautiful illustrations and seemingly limited text, Allen Say writes about feelings we've all had at one time or another.   

These small thumbnail illustrations don't really do the actual book justice, but to see a preview, check out the book through Google books.... it's a treasure. 

The book is a Caldecott Medal winner for excellent artwork.  We have just scratched the surface in the past two days with activities to go along with the book.  The lapbooking elements from Homeschool Share are printed and we've cut them out - now to start assembling our book!   Once we finish, I will be writing a full post to put on my Five in a Row page!  

Thomas A. Edison, Young Inventor, is the title we are working on with Miss B.    My parents live very close to Thomas Edison's winter home in Ft. Myers, FL, so the memories of visiting his home last year are fresh in her mind!   We also traveled to some areas in NY (specifically the Erie Canal and some of the Great Lakes) last summer that are talked about in the book as well. 

As I read each chapter aloud, we follow the study guide carefully and read about any possible science, art, history (etc..) connections.   Today we learned all about the steam locomotive in the mid 1800s.   We're also learning about how inquisitive young Tom Edison was and perhaps this curiosity led him to become one of America's greatest inventors.  

This book also has a lapbook available through Homeschool Share, which Miss B is working on and I'll share with you in another post! 

 
What are you reading aloud this week?  I'm joining Amy, at Hope is The Word, for Read Aloud Thursday ~ you can get some wonderful reading ideas by reading through her blog and then looking at the Read-Aloud Thursday posts!