A Life Skills Round Up
October 21, 2021 Comments Off on A Life Skills Round Up
On this blog, I have often stressed the importance of intentionality when it comes to sharing books with children. I’ve talked about the value of stocking our bookshelves with stories whose characters and settings and challenges reflect the greater world, not just the tiny slice taking place under our own roof. I’ve discussed the importance of reading stories that push against gender, racial, or religious stereotypes. I’ve hailed the way reading aloud can showcase the richness of language and the nuance of character, encouraging children to see the value of storytelling and expand their own reading choices. I’ve talked about how choosing a book we’ll enjoy reading goes a long way towards making read-aloud time special for our children and sustainable for us.
Children’s books can also be invaluable tools for imparting life skills to our children. The best of these do so by providing us with language for initiating important conversations. How often do we avoid talking to our children about uncomfortable topics because we’re afraid we’ll mess them up? Maybe we don’t realize we should be having these conversations in the first place. I continue to be grateful for the books that are by my side when parenting gets hard and messy.
Today, I discuss three fantastic new picture books that each tackle a different life skill, from taking accountability when we hurt someone, to setting boundaries around our bodies, to recognizing and calling out racism. There was a time when topics like these were relegated to the fringe of the publishing world, so it’s refreshing to see them taken up by innovative, even award-winning creators and supported by mainstream publishers. The result is books that are a joy to read: warm, cheerful, fun, and funny. They aren’t shaming or preachy or even a little bit boring.
I promise you: sharing books like these with our children makes our job as parents a little bit easier.
« Read the rest of this entry »Pointing the Finger (Who Me? Not Me.)
November 14, 2019 § 3 Comments
“You are a thief AND a liar!” Stomping. Bedroom door slamming. Welcome to life in our happy little home.
My son is convinced that he cannot find his tin of Hypercolor Twilight Thinking Putty because his sister snatched it for herself. As it turns out, this same flavor of putty is in a drawer in her room. And yet, she claims she bought this putty with her own money at a gift shop over a year ago. He says she bought a different flavor. Neither can understand why I don’t reserve a part of my brain for keeping track of their fidget purchases. (Never mind that they both have numerous tins in numerous flavors, and is Hypercolor Twilight really that much more satisfying than Emerald Sky?!)
It has been weeks—weeks!—and still the accusations fly from the mouth of my eldest. The interrogations. The investigations (which aren’t really investigations so much as relentless demanding that we agree with him). Here’s the thing: from where I’m standing (hands over my ears), it is entirely probable that this tiny tin of putty was left lying around the house (GASP!) and some adult picked it up and put it in my daughter’s room and no one was the wiser for months. You know what Mr. Finger Pointer doesn’t want to acknowledge in all this? The possibility that if he had taken better care of his putty, it would still be in his room.
Assuming personal responsibility—be it for our carelessness or mistakes or misunderstandings—is one of the toughest things our kids have to learn. Heck, many of us adults still struggle with this. (My hand’s certainly in the air.) Why turn towards our own regret, remorse, embarrassment, or shame when we can don the more tantalizing cloak of anger and go all Grizzly on someone else? Fortunately, in their new picture book, Who Wet My Pants? (Ages 4-8), Bob Shea and Zachariah Ohoro have given us a clever, quirky, and hysterically funny way to broach the subject of personal accountability with our kids. (This is not a potty book.)
My New Year’s Resolution
January 11, 2019 § 4 Comments
A few days after New Year’s, I asked each family member to come to the dinner table ready to share a New Year’s Resolution. My husband’s resolution was to find a new hobby; my daughter (never one to stop at just one) said she wanted to make new friends and get better at basketball; and my son said he wanted to read books faster, so he could “keep up” with all my recommendations (and the award for the person who stole my heart goes to…).
When it was my turn, I pulled out Cori Doerrfeld’s 2018 picture book, The Rabbit Listened (“I love that book!” my daughter exclaimed), and announced my intention to become a better listener. « Read the rest of this entry »
Weathering the Oopses
February 1, 2018 § 9 Comments
Compared to last week, this week’s book may a lighter pick, but it will do no less to make better parents out of us. In fact, it’s possible I needed this reality check more than my kids.
There are days when it feels like my children leave a trail of oopses in their wake. Days when my daughter—at seven, I tell you!—can’t seem to get a single forkful to her mouth without losing some of it down her shirt and onto the floor. When my son leaves his aircraft carrier outside his sister’s door and she steps on it with bare, now-bloodied feet. When just-poured glasses are knocked over by careless elbows; when Christmas ornaments become dislodged and shatter to pieces on the floor as running feet whiz by; when HOW ABOUT NO ONE MOVE BECAUSE THE HOUSE WAS JUST CLEANED AND I CAN’T TAKE IT ANYMORE! « Read the rest of this entry »
In Praise of One Exasperating Girl
November 16, 2017 Comments Off on In Praise of One Exasperating Girl
How often do we climb inside our children’s heads and look around? How often do we push past the in-our-face behaviors to understand the nuances of feelings behind them?
Because my Emily loves nothing more than a spirited, emotive, somewhat out-of-sorts heroine who reminds her of a hyperbolic version of herself, I always knew she was going to fall head over heels in love with Clementine. It’s why I waited until now to read the seven books in Sara Pennypacker’s laugh-out-loud but astutely heart-tugging chapter series set in Boston—first published ten years ago (Ages 6-9)—about a third grade girl with “spectacularful ideas” and difficulty paying attention in class. I wanted my Emily to be close enough to Clementine’s age to relate to her. And yet, I wanted her to be just young enough that the reading level was a liiiiiitle beyond her, so she’d perhaps pick up the books again on her own in another year. Which she will—I’m now sure of it. « Read the rest of this entry »
Re-Imagining Mistakes
May 18, 2017 § 6 Comments
It is often with trepidation that I watch my daughter prepare to work on a picture or a card. She sets out her paper, her drawing instrument of choice, and animatedly explains her Vision to anyone in the vicinity. “I’m going to draw a bird for my teacher,” she says, “because she loves birds.” I smile, but I try not to look too eager…or too stressed…or too anything. I try to look neutral. I attempt to recede into the kitchen—or, better yet, disappear into the basement to throw in a load of laundry—because I know from experience what likely lies ahead.
There are several minutes of happy humming, her preferred background music while she works. Followed by a sudden, guttural, downright masculine “UHHHHHGGGGGGHHHHHHH!” Followed by the sounds of said drawing instrument being thrown across the room. Followed by great, gasping sobs. “It doesn’t look like a bird at all! Its beak is terrible! It’s THE WORST BEAK IN THE WORLD! I hate this bird! I hate it!” Followed by the sound of paper crumpling, fists slamming, and stomping feet coming to find me. “Why did you tell me to make a bird? Don’t you know I am the WORST DRAWER OF BIRDS?!” (Ummm, I never said…)
My six and a half year old is rarely ruffled. She goes with the flow, handles curve balls with ease, and loves trying new things.
But she cannot handle mistakes. « Read the rest of this entry »
Making A Mess of the Alphabet
March 11, 2013 § 3 Comments
I was wrong. Occasionally, this happens. (My husband would probably debate the word “occasionally,” but this isn’t his blog and, besides, I am usually right when it comes to books.) Shortly after Kelly Bingham and Paul O. Zelinsky’s Z is for Moose (Ages 4-8) was published last year, I hastily thumbed through it at a bookstore and thought, “Another alphabet book…rudimentary drawings…simplistic-seeming text…a Bullwinkle-style moose…I’ll pass.”
Then, in January, right after the Caldecott winners were announced, the Internet was suddenly abuzz about this book: top children’s book critics were outraged that Zelinsky’s book got passed up for an award, and some went so far as to argue that it was the most revolutionary book published in 2012. “Huh?” I thought.
So ,when I happened to come across the book a second time (this time at our local library), I picked it up, brought it home, and read it to my kids. I’ll say it again: I was wrong. In my haste to judge a book by its cover, I completely blew past its cleverness, its hilarity, and its brilliant way of turning conventional alphabet books on their head.
What to Read to Your Kids 