-The Best Thing I Learned From My Time in the Homeschooling World-
Our family has decided it’s time to make the transition to traditional brick-and-mortar school for all of our school-age kids next year. As I look back on our homeschooling experience, much of which has been positive, I’ve been thinking about the impact it has had on our family. Aside from the obvious benefit of the extra time we’ve been able to spend together, plus the flexibility it afforded us to travel (so helpful for a military family), one thing stands out to me as the biggest thing we’ve gained from our time in the homeschooling world: a commitment to providing our kids with quality literature.
I had never planned to homeschool or been involved in that world at all, so when the idea began to float through my mind a couple years after our oldest was born, I did a lot of research. I hadn’t even begun homeschooling yet, but after a few months of immersing myself in that world through books and blogs, I had begun to grow excited about opening the world to our kids through truly good books. I knew I was going to carry this inspiration and commitment with me, whether we ended up homeschooling or not.
As I visited the local library with my children regularly, I began to discover that it actually took a little digging to find good children’s books. The quality of the books on the shelves varied widely, and my kids seemed to have a knack for finding some duds. Whenever I’d let them loose to pick out the books they wanted, they’d pull off the shelves whichever ones they could reach or gravitate toward the most appealing covers (which could mean a carton of french fries with a face or whichever one was the most pink-a-tastic). We’d get home and I’d find myself rolling my eyes at some of the content or wanting to hide the books when I realized how junky they were. There were characters with terrible attitudes, books that glorified physical appearance, disgusting jokes, commercialized characters, and all kinds of what Charlotte Mason called “twaddle”- basically the literary equivalent of junk food.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for having some silly books mixed into our reading rotation, and if a kid really enjoys something with minimal educational value (I’m looking at you, Peppa Pig), I’m not going to ban it, especially if it gets a reluctant reader excited about reading. I’ll even tolerate some books that don’t align with our values or rules. For example, our kids love George & Martha, which happens to includes some lying, giving friends ultimatums, and an incident involving peeking in on someone in the bathtub. Some discussions were required. And one of our kids couldn’t get enough of Curious George, who regularly plays at construction sites, hops on random busses, and runs away every time he gets in trouble, things we had to make sure he knew weren’t okay.
We don’t draw a hard line of censorship in our house because material like this provides a springboard for discussing those issues with our kids, and because we want to allow them to develop critical thinking and discernment rather than labeling everything for them in black-and-white terms. So when our four-year-old pre-reader found a Princess and the Frog book at the thrift store and begged to buy it with her own money, I couldn’t say no. I just had to explain to her that we don’t kiss strangers just because they promise to buy us a restaurant.
On the whole, though, you won’t find too many sub-par books on our shelves. Again, our goal is not censorship but to provide our kids with a rich literary experience that will engage their minds with captivating stories, noble characters, quality writing, and all that we want to nurture within them. We don’t want our children snacking on potato chips for every meal. We want them to feast on rich fare and be nourished, painting in their imaginations stories and characters worth admiring and aspiring to. I can promise you that our homeschooling days don’t look pretty and polished by any means (just ask my husband or kids!), but because of this one thing we do- choose great books- our kids are flourishing in mind and heart.
So how do you find these great books? I wasn’t quite sure, either, apart from pre-screening every book myself, which I wasn’t keen to do. So I did something I had previously thought was silly. I bought a book about books. Once I got over the humor of it, I relished books like Read for the Heart by Sarah Clarkson and Honey for a Child’s Heart by Gladys Hunt for the invaluable resources they are. The digging and vetting has already been done for you. You can simply look up recommendations by age and interest, read the short reviews, and decide which ones you and your kids might love.
I began keeping a list on my phone of titles and authors to check out, so that when we found ourselves at the library, I knew what to look for. Now I’ll usually just request a handful of titles in advance through the library’s website. It’s so much easier to juggle a bunch of kids at the library when a bag full of literary gold is already stacked up and waiting for us. I let my kids throw in a few of their choosing, too, because that’s part of the fun of library visits, but they know that I’ll probably limit how many they can select and that we’ll already have almost more than we can carry with what we’ve reserved in advance. They don’t mind. Once we get home, the excitement of a new story and the allure of some special time cuddled up with Mom or Dad is incentive enough to make them want to open these books we’ve selected for them. They have come to expect that we’ll pick good ones (even if the covers aren’t always impressive), and they’ve begun to be drawn to the good stuff themselves, now putting in their own requests.
So, what do we read? I’m so glad you asked! And so are my kids, who were eager to chime in with their recommendations (and make sure I wasn’t giving away those books I was pulling off the shelf for this post)!
Here are a few of the most loved picture books at our house:
All the Places to Love by Patricia MacLachlan
This is one of the first books I bought after making the commitment to finding quality children’s books. A young boy describes for us the favorite places loved by each member of his family, and he eagerly awaits showing them all to his new baby sister.
One Morning in Maine by Robert McCloskey
Little Sal from Blueberries for Sal is a big kid now, and she can’t wait for a special trip into town with her dad and her little sister, but a loose tooth threatens to throw a wrench in her plans.
Our Animal Friends at Maple Hill Farm by Alice & Martin Provensen
Maple Hill Farm is home to animals of all kinds- farm animals, wild animals, and beloved pets- many with quirky personalities. A lovely and funny book our kids love coming back to, along with its sequel, A Year at Maple Hill Farm.
Roxaboxen by Barbara Cooney
Every child who reads this book will be captivated by the imaginary town a band of neighbor kids dreams up together- a world of their own that becomes synonymous with childhood. When those kids grow to adulthood, not one of them ever forgets their time in Roxaboxen.
The Snail and the Whale by Julia Donaldson & Axel Scheffler
A poetic, almost musical story about a snail who longs to visit far-away places. He may be misunderstood by his friends at first, but when he returns from his trip around the world, it inspires everyone to go out and explore, too. A great book for military kids moving overseas.
Me on the Map by Joan Sweeney
Even our toddler asks for this book, which helps kids understand that maps depict real places- streets, cities, states, countries, continents, and even your very own bedroom.
Ruby in Her Own Time by Jonathan Emmett
Perfect for a child who is developing at a different rate than peers or siblings, this book reassures them that no matter how quickly or slowly they grow, they’re going to soar.
The Bee Tree by Patricia Polacco
Mary Ellen’s grandfather takes her, and half the village, on a sweet adventure that ends up instilling in her a love of reading.
I can’t fit all our favorites in one post, but if you’d like more recommendations, sing up below to get my list of 60 Wonderful Books for Children, with topics including mental health, body awareness, science, faith, art, and lots more sweet and enriching stories like the ones listed above. You can print the list and take it with you to the library or bookstore, making it quick and easy to find some great new books for those little minds and hearts to be nurtured by.
Happy reading!
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