Today is Monday. Mondays are usually not a great day to just sit around and pour over books. Usually there is washing to be done, chores to be caught up on, music lessons to run to and normally I'm delivering my Avon orders. But today, it's snowy, my husband is home not feeling well. I'm not feeling well. We have a sick chicken, yes chicken, and well I simply thought I'd take a look at whats on my shelf and sit and read awhile.
It's been several hours and I am now surrounded by Abeka 10th grade geography, Bob Jones geography, British literature, American Literature, 5th grade spelling, Vocab and Spelling, Writing and Grammar and well a host of other things. Yes, all from just thinking I might take a peek on my shelf and grab a book to read.
I have this love hate relationship with living books vs boxed curriculum. I love a good book. I love the conciseness and non parental involvement of boxed curriculum. I hate trying to fit my living books into a perfectly organized curriculum by subject, date and relevance and I hate not having the full story in a textbook. Every year I go through the same problems. Geography is a great example of using a text book. It's organized and I know they are going to learn just enough. Literature is a poor example of a text book. While it's good for organized learning, reading half-stories is boring and I think does not feed a desire to read good literature. It takes the best parts of a book and leaves it at just that. You kind of miss the connection you get with the author and the characters when you don't read a book cover to cover . Don't get me wrong, textbooks are a good tool. I just don't feel like it's going to be what we want. Yet I believe I own every literature text book every made.
So, I've gotten way off my topic of what I wanted to talk about, but since this is a blog you get to read along with my spastic thought pattern.
Amongst my looking at books today I came across a little gem that I bought at the used curriculum fair last year. Marilyn Boyer's For You They Signed, The Spiritual Heritage of Those Who Shaped Our Nation. I picked it up last year because I had remembered hearing great things about the book and well, if a book has made any impression on me that I remember it while in the throws of the pure joy of a book sale I must purchase it. I hugged my book, loved it a little held it close and when we got home gazed at it longingly as I put it on my shelf to be rediscovered today. Yes, a year later I pulled it out to peak inside the cover. I was even so excited I handed it off to my husband only to be greeted with "Oh yea, I read that last year when you bought it" (LET DOWN)
Before you faint, let me just remind you that I had already picked out what my kids were going to be doing for this year before I bought the book.
I curled up on the couch, surrounded by these loads of textbooks and started reading. It was the first time ever.....(I can not believe I'm admitting this) that I have read the Declaration of Independence. My immediate thought after the first few paragraphs was I have got to post this on Facebook. People need to read this. I popped over to facebook on my phone, yes I was still in the middle of reading, and started to post only to stop myself and shy away from telling everyone in the world that I had never read this founding document that our entire country rests upon. Um, yeah, no. Instead I'm sitting here telling you and I'm going to go post this on Facebooks so......yeah, throws a big knot into my thought process. Seriously if you have not read this document you really need to get your eyes on a copy now. Especially today!
I spent the next two hours devouring this book. I have to say it has been a sincere pleasure to read the stories of our founding fathers. Marilyn has outdone herself with the history and research that reside in-between the covers of this book. This is not a TEXTBOOK, it is a beautiful story interwoven with the lives of those who took a stand for our freedom when it was not the popular thing to do
I know I will not do it justice to explain how this book is laid out. I will however give you the link to their site. They have a sample chapter you can download and of course they have spent way more time concisely telling you about this book. No rabbit trails like my blog. :)
For You They Signed - Marilyn Boyer
Needless to say, my children will be reading this next year. It really is quite an amazing book. I consider it a must absolutely own book.
No comments:
Post a Comment