A Net in Time

Curriculum and book reviews, faith, homeschooling and more!

Books for Children

Using Books to See Canada

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Just wanted to share with you some books we are using in our study on Canada.  We don’t use them all the time, nor do we use the entire book.

Books that my son reads and then narrates.  The point of these books is to introduce the lad to some great Canadian people over the years, from scientists through to engineers or history makers.  Courage, conviction, patience, strength…many virtues to be seen.

Seeing Canada Overall, Catching glimpses of our great nation.   Sometimes walking through the provinces, other times just seeing specific moments or places.

Seeing Canada through the annuals of history.  Several of these books are quite good, others we need to pick through.   The Story of Canada is fascinating, and Canadian Exploration is an easy read.  Vimy Ridge we haven’t gotten to yet because the World Wars haven’t been reached yet.

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©2006-2017 A Net In Time. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. A Net In Time/

Review: The Amazing Animal Adventure

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The Amazing Animal Adventure is a large, hardcover book, filled with illustrations from all around the world.  A look and find book that teaches about different ecosystems.  Let me show you through this book eh?

This is such a neat book, one of the things I like about it is, it doesn’t just talk about the typical ecosystems, it does mention the taiga and the rainforest and systems like that.

BUT it also ventures into the lesser known ecosystems like the Japanese Hot Springs, the mountains of the moon and hydrothermal vents.  I have NEVER seen an ecosystem book talk about hydrothermal vents so I was most impressed.

21 different ecosystems, each with a two page spread.  Each system has a small write up about it and numerous items for the reader to locate.  Along with another challenge to complete.

It’s simple enough for a child to complete, yet challenging enough to intrigue older people as well.  Some pages I really had to hunt to find the hidden items, and other pages were fairly simple.   It’s all in how the eye looks and the brain processes what it is seeing.

As you can see, each two page spread is in full colour, with lots of details added.

The teaching block is written clearly, with good lettering and size.  Making it easy to read along with your children if desired.

I very much appreciated how each of the items you are search for has a picture beside it as well as a brief description with it.  Did you know that the burrowing owl uses old prairie dog burrows?

I found the add-on challenge a nice little touch, giving the reader an extra item (or three) to look for when they are done the main search.

This is a great resource to have on hand if you are studying ecosystems.  You can easily give to a student and, depending on age, ask them to find out more about any of the systems in the book and give you a report on it.

You could use it with younger students to simply introduce the huge variety in ecosystems that can be found on this great planet of ours. 

If you are concerned that you won’t be able to find all the hidden items, there is a solution page at the end of the book as well as additional resources such as animal world records, endangered animals and how animals are classified. 

It’s a wonderful book that we won’t be letting go of quickly as it’s fun to have around and gives me ideas for research subjects for the lad.  🙂

Just as a sidenote: the book binding was superb.  It’s very sturdy, my lad noticed the yarn showing through on the pages and said “neat!”.  Not something often seen in a book now. 

The Amazing Animal Adventure: An Around-the-world Spotting Adventure
Illustrator: Brendan Kearny
Publisher: Laurence King
Pages:  64
Age Range: 6 and up
Size: 10.55 x 14.1

Reviewed for: Raincoast Books

 Amazon.ca: The Amazing Animal Adventure: An Around-the-World Spotting Expedition

Amazon.com: The Amazing Animal Adventure: An Around-the-World Spotting Expedition

Art Series: Sister Wendy’s Story of Painting

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It is my total delight to introduce DoodleMom to you, also known as Kirsten to the blog today. I put a call out for people to do an art book post for the blog and Kirsten stepped up to the challenge. 🙂

Kirsten blogs at  DoodleMom’s Homeschooling Life and is a new to me blogger this year.  Let me tell you…she is a gal who makes me think and ponder in a way I sometimes don’t expect and that is a good thing eh?  🙂  Keeps me from being stagnant and who wants that eh?

 Sister Wendy’s Story of Painting

I did not notice until recently that a very proper and very, very smart nun with a history of teaching English and Art was also a master of polite sarcasm. 

My kids and I were watching Sister Wendy’s Story of Painting (available free on Docuwatch) and reading another chapter in her book of the same name. Art history with Sister Wendy reinforces and makes additional connections to the events and people of the history the kids are learning, as well as helping them to understand composition and technique. And Sister Wendy is also teaching my kids the fine art of polite sarcasm. 

My children sat on either side of me, magnifying glasses in hand so they could investigate each tiny detail of the paintings discussed in the text. We were looking over Sister Wendy’s comparison of illuminations from England, France, Ireland, and Spain, all from the same rough time period.
And we came to this statement, “Like the Irish monks, the British also produced manuscripts of great beauty, this being one of the very few periods in which the least visual of national groups, the English speakers, attained international fame as artists.”
“Hmmm,” I thought to myself.
As we continued, my children began to pick up on the sarcasm as well. 

We got to the section discussing the Bayeux Tapestry and Sister Wendy wrote, “It displays the same jerky animation that we find in English manuscripts. A sort of Anglo-Saxon glorified comic strip…”
Finally we read through the section on French illumination in which Sister Wendy wrote, “A lovely missal survives…,” and “…with a magnificent pictorial “O” and…”
“OK,” said my son. “She definitely likes the French best and the English least.”  While her sarcasm stings and is quite apparent, it is also exceedingly polite. A grand way to show her preferences and dislikes. 

And, once my children recognized her sarcasm, the whole activity of studying art became an interactive one. First understanding Sister Wendy’s preferences, the reasons behind them, enjoying her wit, and finally forming their own opinions on the art or artist in question.
All in all, a perfect way to study art.

Where to Find More

Book:
Amazon.ca: Sister Wendy’s Story of Painting

Amazon.com: Sister Wendy’s Story of Painting

Documentary: Sister Wendy`s Story of Painting (6 episodes)

 

 

About Kirsten

Kirsten West is a Christian Homeschooling Mom who blogs at DoodleMom’s Homeschooling Life. 

This post may contain affiliate links – using affiliate links from A Net in Time helps fuel this blog and our homeschool – thank you!

©2006-2017 A Net In Time. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. A Net In Time/

Review: Found – Psalm 23

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 Found, a board book based on Psalm 23, is filled with the quiet peace and awareness of the care that the Shepherd of our lives watches over us all the time.

A Sturdy book to put in the hands of our littlest one, this is a tender story of how a shepherd takes care of his sheep, even the littlest, more way ward lambs. 

Many of the full-colour pictures show a young lamb cavorting around the shepherds feet, or being carefully carried.   Jago does an excellent job of illustrating this faith-based board book.

Put together by the same folks who did the Jesus Storybook Bible, it is simply a great book to share with young children. 

Isn’t the detail on the page just lovely?   See the care the shepherd has for his lamb?

It’s a book of verse, but not mindless trying to rhyme it all verse, it’s verse the speaks of the simple truths found in Psalm 23. 

With Easter coming up, wouldn’t it be great to introduce your young ones to the true Lamb of Easter.  Check out the book Found: Psalm 23.  Let the gentleness and peace of the Saviour come to you this season.  

I just love this scene of the shepherd running to mind that little lamb all lost and alone.

Found: Psalm 23
Author: Sally Lloyd-Jones
Illustrator : Jago
Pages: 20
Age: 1-4 years
Publisher: Zonderkidz

Reviewed for: Booklookbloggers.   

You can also find this book on Amazon.com: 
 

This post may contain affiliate links – using affiliate links from A Net in Time helps fuel this blog and our homeschool – thank you!

©2006-2017 A Net In Time. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. A Net In Time

Draw & Discover by Yasmeen Ismail

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 I have a DELIGHTFUL series of books for you to learn about today.  Draw and Discover books by Yasmeen Ismail.   Each book has it’s own theme from emotions, directions, or even perspective. 

I have got to walk you through these books that are geared for the younger crowd! 

One of the aspects of these books that I like is they use simple drawings and text to allow children the freedom to explore the meaning of a word using whatever they want to draw to do so. 🙂   Great paper… a thicker quality that will resist leaking through, ripping, and multiple pencil erasures.

 
The pages leave plenty of room for drawing and colouring. 

There is so much room given for children to express their creative side while learning new words.     Why not use art to help teach?

Each book is 56-64 pages long with a two page spread to help explore a single emotion (excited, sad, proud etc), or opposite words (up/down, push/pull etc). 

If you have a singleton child it is definitely a use it up as you go book, or if you have multiple children, you could use it as a springboard to developing your own pages.

Each book has a hard fly (front and back)that could be used as a book mark or a “put behind the page” sheet to prevent leaking of paint or markers to the next page.
That fly contains all the words used within the book as well, making it a good “let’s look ahead page” or a “let’s review what we’ve learned page”. 

The three books are called:
  
Happy, Sad, Feeling Glad.  Cat and Dog lead the way of exploration.
Inside, Outside, Upside Down.  Bear, Rabbit and Duck are the guides.
Push, Pull, Empty, Full.   Rabbit, Duck and Bear show the way.

All published by Laurence King.   Geared for ages 4-7 years old.  56-64 pages long.  
Everything in these books is designed to get children thinking, doodling, drawing, colouring and learning.   An innovative series by a remarkable children’s author: Yasmeen Ismail.
 

This review is part of an Art series is part of an on-going series of Art books reviewed for your pleasure and resource.    You can find more books here and here. 

Review: The Kid from Diamond Street

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WOW!   Did you know there used to be professional FEMALE ball teams?   And that one of those teams travelled to Japan?  Mostly playing against male teams and doing well?!!?!

Can you imagine being 10 years old and playing professional minor league baseball?

That is what Edith Houghton did… using a safety pin to tighten her cap, and using a knife to make holes in her belt to hold her pants up. 🙂

She was by all accounts a wonderful player, playing first for the Bobbies and then for other teams, she became the first woman scout.

This neat book “The Kid from Diamond Street” tells Edith’s story from her first job through to her trip to Japan, playing baseball.   The Philadelphia Bobbies were so named because all the players wore their hair cut in a bob.

This is an informative and interesting book.   I had never thought there would be professional minor league baseball teams, much less one that would have been invited to Japan.   Add to that a 10 year playing on the team?   WOW!

The illustrations by Steven Salerno bring the story to life, you can just see Edith running after that ball with full determination.  The funny fit of her uniform, baseball practice on an ocean line and the fun they had in Japan.   Edith said “We were knocking balls out to sea.”

I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book and learning about the determination of a young lady playing a game that she absolutely loved.   She was by all accounts very good at her job.   She played a rough, and tough game, the kind of game you would expect a girl to play when she grew up playing ball with a bunch of boys.  

I would whole heartedly recommend this book.. particularly if you have girls that are sports oriented.   Showing them just what a determined girl can do.   Playing against the boys, becoming a scout when women just didn’t DO that kind of thing, and travelling to Japan when you are 13 years old.   Big stuff!  Important for girls to see and understand.  But then again…it’s good for boys too you know… to let them see the girls are ALL THAT as well.  🙂  

Get it for your children.  Read it with them.  Enjoy a good book.

 
I found this neat video on YouTube about Edith Houghton.

Author: Audrey Vernick
Illustrator: Steven Salerno
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Age: 4-7 years old
9.25 x 10.5
40 pages

Review: Really Woolly Easter Blessings

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Really Woolly Easter Blessings is a sweet board book to introduce your littlest ones to the joys of Easter. and the truth of the resurrection.

Bonnie Rickner Jensen has written a cute little devotional to use with your littlest children, it is a sturdy board book, just a lovely size to stick into an oversized pocket or your purse. 

20 pages of lovely illustrations, carefully filled in with bright colours, each page containing an image of a woolly lamb doing different things with his friends. 

Each two page spread has a simple bible verse (including the reference), rhyming verse (generally two verses) an a simple prayer to say with your children.

It is easy enough for an older child to read with a younger sibling, with much one the page to draw the eye of a child.

 
 As you can see…. beautiful illustrations carefully added by Donna Chapman, that fit well with the verse and poem.

Simple prayers that you can easily teach your children, starting them along the way to a great relationship with God.

 A sample two page spread.   See how the colour covers the whole page, giving you loads of things you can point out to your children.   Cute figures that should appeal to most children.

Really Woolly Easter Blessings.
Author: Bonnie Rickner Jensen
Illustrator: Donna Chapman
Publisher: Tommy Nelson
Pages: 20
Age Range: 2-5

Reviewed for: BookLookBloggers.