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reading

Stories for Christmas

December 3, 2015 by Justin

Like most homeschool families, you’re probably taking off a large chunk of time during the month of December. That’s great since it gives everyone time for focusing on family and celebrating Christmas, but even on vacation, you’re looking for places to sneak in a bit of learning without your kids realizing it.

On those cold December nights when everyone’s inside, consider having a family story night. It’s a great way to get everyone together and can also be a huge benefit to a novice reader. The whole family can take turns reading part of the story. Here are some great Christian novel suggestions from our JourneyForth collection. There’s something for all ages, and the best part is all JourneyForth books are 40% off through December 16 (just use the promo code BOOKS40).

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Mice of the Herring Bone (Ages 6–7)

Two ordinary mice find themselves in an extraordinary adventure, including pirate sea dogs, a ship full of cats, and a sunken treasure. (If you’ve already read this one, check out the other titles in the same series.)

 

 

 

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Christmas Crossroads (Ages 7–9)

Just published this fall, Christmas Crossroads is a “choose your own journey” adventure. It puts you in control of the story as three children set out to visit Jesus on the first Christmas. The trip is perilous, and your decisions shape the outcome. Join your favorite Christmas story characters on an adventure to the City of David. When one journey ends, a new one awaits.

 

 

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Medallion (Ages 9–12)

A willful prince must learn the hard way that being a leader means being first a servant. Prince Trave encounters many dangers—such as an earthquake, monstrous skreels, and treachery from those he thought were his friends—before he faces the biggest challenge of all—proving he is indeed worthy to rule his country. (Medallion has a prequel called Shield.)

 

 

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Capturing Jasmina (Ages 12+)

Jasmina, a young girl in India, and her brother, Samir are sold by their father to a man promising them an education and good jobs. But, as Jasmina and Samir soon discover, the man is providing an education, not in a school, but as slaves in his sweatshop garment factory. While Samir quickly submits to his new life of misery, Jasmina never stops planning an escape. The story continues in Buying Samir and Seeking Mother.

 

Grab your hot chocolate, and curl up on the sofa for an evening of family fun! From all of us at BJU Press, have a Merry Christmas.

Filed Under: Successful Learning Tagged With: books, Christmas, family, JourneyForth, language arts, novels, reading

Education in the New World

November 17, 2015 by Ben

drawing of teacher with young students in a New England school room from the book America's Story for America's Children

I remember my parents being criticized by many family members for taking us out of the public schools. But just like thousands of other Christian families today, my parents didn’t want their kids influenced by the agenda of modern society. Today’s exodus of Christian families from the secular public schools is reminiscent of another pilgrimage.

When the Pilgrims came to America, they left Europe so that they could be the primary influence on their own children. It was a difficult first year, but the Lord provided. As they offered up thanksgiving, other deeply committed Christians who wanted the same opportunity for their children started pilgrimages to North America. Soon other communities popped up in the Massachusetts Bay Colony with the intent of establishing “a city on a hill.” These parents wanted to be governed by God’s law and to train their children to live the same way. It was their desire that future townships could be shining examples of communities committed to serving God.

Committed to Education

These Puritan parents and leaders were committed to godly learning. They believed that reading was critical to knowing God through His Word and to following the laws of their townships. So parents took the time to teach their children how to read in spite of the difficulties of frontier life.

However, the commitment to education began to diminish within twenty-five years. Parents were beginning to be negligent in teaching their children reading and Christian doctrine. So in 1642, the Puritan leaders in the Massachusetts Bay Colony gathered to establish a law requiring that parents teach their children to read and “that all masters of families do once a week (at the least) catechize their children . . . in the grounds & principles of Religion.”   [text of Massachusetts Act of 1642]

More Challenges

Five years later, the Puritan leaders gathered again and outlined a plan to provide assistance to parents for the education of their children. They believed that “one chief project of that old deluder, Satan, [was] to keep men from the knowledge of the Scriptures” by preventing children from learning to read. [text of Massachusetts 1647 “Old Deluder, Satan” Act]

So the Puritans provided a teacher for every township with fifty families to help them in teaching their children to read and write. If the township had a hundred families, they made provision for constructing a school building. Parents made a nominal contribution to pay the salaries of the teachers, but they were still responsible for their children’s education. All of this learning was motivated by a desire that children know the Lord through reading His Word.

Startling Changes

Imagine what the Puritans would think if they walked through the halls of today’s schools. How would they respond to the discovery that education has been ripped from its intended purpose—service to God? I think the Puritans would do what many Christian parents are doing today and take their children away from the evil influences. After all, they were willing to take their families into the wilderness of Massachusetts to give their children a thoroughly Christian education.

But even after that arduous journey, Puritan parents still faced challenges in providing education for their children. Yet they were willing to make the sacrifices they believed were necessary to ensure their children received that biblical education.

Providing our children with Bible-based education is vital, and BJU Press supports families like yours and mine in making this kind of commitment to Christian education by creating textbooks that present every academic subject and every aspect of life through the lens of what God has to say about it.

Are you ready to make the commitment?

Filed Under: Successful Learning Tagged With: Bible, education, family, language arts, Puritans, reading

Help for Moms with Struggling Young Readers

September 8, 2015 by Megan

alphabet flashcards spread out on a table

In July, I wrote a post about how to know when your child is ready to start kindergarten. But what if you’ve already started, and your child is having trouble? Let me tell you about my friend (whom I’ll refer to as Amanda) when her youngest son (Joel) was struggling with learning to read. Here’s how they found success.

Amanda had no worries about Joel starting kindergarten. He was four and a half, four months older than his older brother (William) had been when he had started. William had learned to read in K5 and had breezed through his early elementary years in a Christian school, exceeding both his parents’ and his teachers’ expectations. Although circumstances had changed and Amanda was now homeschooling, she didn’t expect Joel’s experience to be much different.

“I assumed that we would never have a problem,” Amanda told me. After all, Amanda was a former third-grade teacher. She was confident in her teaching ability. She was also confident in her curriculum choice—BJU Press—which “laid everything out for me. I knew exactly what to do.”

Joel completed K4 and K5.  He would often answer his brother’s third-grade math problems. But at the end of K5, Joel still wasn’t reading.

“I didn’t think that much about it,” Amanda admits. “BJU Press does not expect mastery of every concept at the kindergarten level, so I just thought that he would pick it up in first grade. I figured that he just needed more time.”

But they got into first grade, and Amanda found herself spending all morning with just the reading aspect of the curriculum. And Joel wasn’t getting it.

“I remember sitting at the dinner table one night. My husband asked Joel what he had learned in school that day. Joel didn’t remember. I said, ‘The letter T.’ My husband asked Joel what sound T made. Joel made several attempts at an answer, but none of them were right. We had spent all morning on this concept. And he still wasn’t getting it. I realized at that point that we were in trouble.”

“It was the most frustrating experience for both of us,” Amanda relates. “I was frustrated. Joel was frustrated. And I started thinking, ‘What do I do? Should I repeat him? Should I pull him back to kindergarten?’”

She sought the advice of a friend that taught K5 at a Christian school. Her friend advised her to just keep on going. She told Amanda that for a lot of boys, reading “clicks” the second half of first grade. Another friend of Amanda’s with a lot of teaching experience seconded that advice. “You’re homeschooling,” she reminded Amanda. “You can do whatever you want. Make accommodations. Think outside the box and try teaching it another way.”

Amanda went to the craft store and bought decorative letters, punched them out, and let Joel paint them. She went to the hardware store and bought sandpaper and had Joel trace letters on it. “We did a lot of hands-on,” Amanda tells me. “Nothing by itself seemed to be making a difference, but we kept doing it.”

They kept plugging away, and then in the spring, something happened. Joel started reading.

“It finally just all came together for him,” Amanda remembers with a smile. “He wasn’t a great reader by the end of first grade, but he was reading. And he’s done fine ever since.”

Joel is indeed doing well. He’s entering his senior year in high school and is looking toward the future. He wants to attend college next year to study criminal justice and history. Amanda is obviously proud of the young man he has become. “Those days that we struggled were horrible—I wouldn’t want to repeat them. But I’m glad we didn’t pull Joel back into kindergarten or have him repeat first grade,” she tells me. “Intensely focusing on phonics instruction was the right thing to do even though it took a lot of time and energy. Joel ended up succeeding. And since we were homeschooling, his success was my success too.”

Filed Under: Successful Learning Tagged With: early learning, kindergarten, language arts, reading

Summer Fun Meets Summer Reading

June 23, 2015 by Guest Writer

JourneyForth youth titles on a bookshelf

What’s the best way to keep your children learning during the summer? You guessed it─a nonstop parade of good books. With the strong pull of technology and outdoor fun, it may seem impossible for us to get our kids to sit still long enough to focus on a book. Regular library visits, a reward system, and some fun role-play after the summer reading session are just a few ways I recommend engaging your active brood in that most vital skill─reading.

Library Day

Scheduling a library day, either weekly or biweekly, sets aside a defined time for books and reading. If my kids have finished with their books, we return them on library day and get new ones. If a child is still enjoying a book, we renew it or bring it along to read while at the library. Make sure that the children know your family’s reading philosophy and guidelines; then set them free to wander among the shelves. They may come back with a random assortment of treasures─a pop-up book, a book about robots, a volume of fairy tales, and a historical novel─but if they’re excited about what they found, it’s a win-win.

Picture This!

Tiny preschoolers and early readers enjoy having plenty of pictures to go along with the story, like the beautiful illustrations in A King for Brass Cobweb. The images help their minds engage in the action, stimulating their imaginations. Eventually, the child’s imagination is mature enough to go off on its own, automatically creating the scenes and characters found in books without pictures. One way to help your little one’s imagination grow is to help him or her draw a new illustration for part of the story.

Chapter by Chapter

Once children pass the picture book phase, chapter books like Mice of the Herring Bone transition them to stories that last beyond a single reading session. They have a sense of accomplishment as each chapter ends, blended with anticipation for the next phase of the story. Read to them, and encourage them to read to you as well. Some parents of reluctant readers like to reward completion of chapters or whole books with a sticker, a treat, a trip to the playground, or a little time with the tablet or TV.

Girl Time

For moms of girls, starting a mother-daughter book club or girls’ reading time yields a closer bond and plenty of precious memories. My sister and I vividly recall curling up in our bunk bed each night, listening to my mother read Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. When I was older, I read the The Journeyman by Elizabeth Yates aloud to my mom while she cooked dinner every evening. To pique your daughter’s interest, find books that address current issues, such as Capturing Jasmina, with its thoughtful yet dramatic depiction of child labor and trafficking. Or look to the past and imagine what life must have been like in Old Testament times with the book Where I Belong.

For the Guys

Boys typically love action-packed stories. They also appreciate strategy, cleverness, and a fight for survival. Wartime struggles or wild westerns are perfect for teenage boys. If elementary-aged boys have trouble settling down to read, promise to act out the story with them after they read a chapter or two. For example, after reading part of Brave the Wild Trail, you might set up a cowboy camp in the backyard. Following a chapter of Jericho Ride, a father and son could create an obstacle course and make horses from branches or sturdy cardboard.

With boys and girls alike, associating imaginative play and outdoor fun with a great book brings them that much closer to a lifelong love of reading.

• • • • •

Rebecca is a work-at-home freelance writer, novelist, wife, and the mom of two bright-eyed little ones. She credits her success in writing and her love of books to her own mom, who homeschooled three kids from pre-K through high school.

Filed Under: Successful Learning Tagged With: book club, chapter books, family, homeschool, language arts, reading, reluctant readers, summer reading

Benefits of Reading Aloud to Your Children

June 4, 2015 by BJU Press Writer

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As I look back over my childhood, I’m thankful that many children’s books play an important role in my memories.

I can get quite nostalgic thinking about curling up next to Mom on the couch—back when my feet couldn’t reach the floor—and hearing her read aloud. She was (and still is) a great actress, and the books came alive in my mind over and over again.

Some of my favorite books are still easily available: Blueberries for Sal, The Snowy Day, The Story about Ping, Caps for Sale, Harry the Dirty Dog, Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel . . . and the list could go on.

What made those books so special? I think their beauty lies in their simplicity. And attaining simplicity is more difficult than it might seem!

What do I mean by this? I mean that a book for children must intrigue the child by hooking him into a situation to which he can relate. It may or may not be something he has actually experienced, but it should be something he can imagine happening to him.

What if my mom and I were picking blueberries and I saw a bear?

What if I woke up one morning and saw that the street outside was covered with beautiful, clean snow?

What if I were a little duck that got distracted and wandered away from the group . . . and then the boat left me?

Or it may be something completely outside his experience—but if he can enjoy the humor or sense the suspense, he will love it and want to hear it over and over.

Where did all those caps go while that man was sleeping?

What if the family doesn’t figure out that the dirty dog at their doorstep is actually their Harry?

What if Mike and Mary Anne can’t dig that basement in just one day?

Learning to love those read-alouds as a youngster contributed to my ongoing love of reading throughout life. As I grew older, I developed a similar love for The Borrowers, for My Friend Flicka, for Misty of Chincoteague. . . . Again, the list could go on and on!

I encourage you to take some time out of your busy homeschooling schedule to read aloud to your children. Books that tell intriguing stories but also promote character traits that you’d like to encourage can have lifelong effects. And they don’t have to be just the “old” classics either! Include some new(er) classics in your repertoire—such as these titles:

  • The Far Journey
  • Mumsi Meets a Lion
  • Shield
  • Sticky Flies, Whirling Squirrels, and Plucky Ducks
  • The Window in the Wall

My kids have all grown past the age where they’re interested in those early read-aloud stories. But that’s OK. One of these days when the grandkids come along, they’ll be hearing about Harry and Ping and Mike and Mary Anne . . . and cap-stealing monkeys!

• • • • •

Steve serves as director of content development for BJU Press. He and his wife are the parents of five adult children. They homeschooled for over ten years.

Filed Under: Successful Learning Tagged With: books, children's books, classics, family, homeschool, language arts, read-aloud, reading, summer reading

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