Hello Book Bums families!
This week's newsletter is a treasure trove of spring ideas. Dr. Christy shares the secret to growing your own Easter grass as well as her favorite toys and gifts this spring for the kids in your life.
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Word of the Week
clemency (clem-en-see) noun/person, place, or thing - mercy, leniency
In an act of clemency, the professor agreed to accept several late assignments from her student.
Wordology Workshop
- The Latin root clement means mild.
- It appears in our Word of the Week, clemency, and also in weather-related words such as inclement.
Literacy Calendar
- March 21 is World Poetry Day.
- The holiday was created by UNESCO in 1999.
- The World Poetry Day website has some fabulous videos and articles about the impact of poetry, and leads with this bold statement, "Practiced throughout history - in every culture and on every continent - poetry speaks to our common humanity and our shared values, transforming the simplest of poems into a powerful catalyst for dialogue and peace."
- If you are a regular reader of our newsletter, you know that we enjoy sharing poems with you; and to date we've offered nearly 100 poems for you to read and ponder. Here's one more.
Pause for Poetry
Today
by Billy Collins
If ever there were a spring day so perfect,
so uplifted by a warm intermittent breeze
that it made you want to throw
open all the windows in the house
and unlatch the door to the canary's cage,
indeed, rip the little door from its jamb,
a day when the cool brick paths
and the garden bursting with peonies
seemed so etched in sunlight
that you felt like taking
a hammer to the glass paperweight
on the living room end table,
releasing the inhabitants
from their snow-covered cottage
so they could walk out,
holding hands and squinting
into this larger dome of blue and white,
well, today is just that kind of day.
From our Bookshelves
I kept hearing folks (mostly on BookTok, a subcommunity on TikTok) say that Lonesome Dove, by Larry McMurty, was in their top ten all-time favorite reads. I love experiencing books for which I have no expectations. A reviewer said this was a great one to listen to; so I purchased it on Audible, and I genuinely looked forward to every moment I could push play.
Lonesome Dove is an epic Western novel that was written way back in 1985. I hadn’t even realized it won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 1986, but I’m not surprised.
I suppose I thought Westerns were just shoot ‘em up, go nowhere books about spittin’, rustlin’ grub, and gettin’ the bad guys (You know. The ones with the black hats.). I certainly had not expected the emotions I experienced nor the tremendous crafting and perfectly precise vocabulary. Incredible.
This book conveys the life of some former Texas Rangers who decide to drive some cattle to Montana just as the days of the Wild West are waning.
The depth of these characters rivals any book I’ve read, and now I know that all those men who read Westerns are reading books just like those we love—but they’re taking place in a setting that quite remarkably enhances the story.
I thoroughly enjoyed experiencing the moral ambiguity in Lonesome Dove. For much of my life, I was accused of “living life in a bubble.” There’s truth in that. I didn’t have much room for nuance as I was raising my kids. Today, my kids are grown, and I more readily acknowledge ethical uncertainties. Lonesome Dove places its readers in a place where reserving the judgment of others feels right and good.
I cannot say I loved the ending—maybe I just didn’t want it to end, but I loved this book.
Tips for Families
Did you know that, instead of buying fake grass for baskets and/or spring décor, you can grow your own wheat grass to display dyed eggs and packaged treats instead?
First, you’ll need some containers to grow the wheat grass in. It only takes about a week or so to grow to maturity (as shown in the picture above), so while you’re gathering baskets, you have plenty of time to order some wheat grass seeds and soil.
When you have your wheat grass, soak your seeds (enough to thoroughly cover the base of each container) for 4-5 hours. After soaking the seeds, place soil in the containers to about an inch from the top. Moisten the soil with a spray bottle and then cover the soil with your moistened seeds. Add a bit more soil, loosely, on top of the soaked seeds and moisten that soil, too, with a spray bottle. Cover the soil and seeds with a piece of cardboard or something to keep everything dark and moist for a few days. When you begin seeing green shoots, remove the cover and watch the grass grow more quickly than you could have imagined. Your wheat grass will look gorgeous for about two weeks or so.
I love wheat grass for my porch pots and for center pieces on tables inside. Seeing the green after a long, cold winter just brings so much joy!
You can even use your harvested wheat grass cuttings in smoothies to add vitamins and minerals to your diet, to aid in detoxification, to boost energy, and to reduce inflammation. Just clip the grass with scissors, add the soil to your compost bin, and start to grow another round if you’d like!
Recommended Gifts for Kids (for Easter or just because)
In this newsletter, I’m sharing items I have purchased for some kids I adore or am purchasing for those kids this year. Note that when you use the provided links to purchase any of these items, you’re supporting what we do at Book Bums, and you’re choosing some proven winners that your kids are sure to enjoy.
This is a beautiful book that shows how to be a treasured friend to others who are experiencing hard times.
These eggs (with shapes inside) have been very well loved by our grandkids!
Our Little Letter Learners love matching the letters inside these eggs! (They’re great to press into kinetic sand, too!)
Our toddler grandkids love placing toys inside containers. They’re learning their colors and animal names and sounds, so I think this alternative for plastic eggs will be a hit!
Who doesn’t like using locks and keys? Our grandkids will love these! We’ll be sharing numerals, number words, and counting to promote both math and literacy skills as well as fine motor skills.
I shared in a past newsletter that I’m teaching one of my grandkids to tell time on an analog clock. This will be a great gift for them!
This was such a fun gift for my grandson who needed some support with fine motor skills, I’m ordering one for another grandson who’ll grow into it—and I don’t want to risk it not being available in the future! Kids use a number code to place foam tiles to create beautiful mosaics that they’re so proud to display!
If you have kids in your life who prefer mermaids to robots, this one might be a better option. I know it’s a bit pricey, but these offered hours of fun, and they promoted fine motor skills, following directions, and a fine introduction to mosaics. I also recommend you visit the Cincinnati Museum Center to observe the gorgeous mosaics adorning the walls there.
If you decided to take advantage of the springtime to teach your kids about American robins (as suggested in last week’s newsletter), your kids might just adore this stuffed tree stump that contains birds and a blue egg!
These beads stand the test of time. We never tire of playing with them and creating jewelry or simply making patterns for others to try to match.
Tips for Raising Readers and Writers
I love the idea of equipping kids to joyfully use a journal by providing a resource like this one for kids ages 6-9. The questions are engaging, and the writing demands are not overwhelming. You’ll have an opportunity to teach kids to write the date, equip them to write complete sentences (using the question in the answer), and you can observe your child’s spelling to learn what they already know and what they still need to learn. I wouldn’t suggest being overly “teachy” with this journal. Instead, simply note what you’re seeing and use another time to say something like, “Hey. Did you know that i-g-h says /eye/ in the word night? Here are some other words where /eye/ is spelled the same way (right, fight, tight, etc.).
If you decide to try this, I highly suggest you also use the Dynamic Dictionary shared about in this episode and this episode from the On Your Way podcast.
Practical Grammar
Not long ago, I saw a post asking, “What word spelling is simply unacceptable to you?”
Colonel, /kernal/, is a top contender for sure.
The one that really gets my goat is judgment.
Judge needs an e to make the g make its “soft sound” /j/. Someone—who clearly was not well-versed in phonics knowledge—decided to omit that very important e. Now it says /jug-ment/. What in the world?!
Of course there are others like aisle, queue, vacuum, and . . .
What spellings get your goat?
News from Book Bums
We finally received the keys to our Monroe space! It’s been a l-o-n-g wait, but we’re trusting it’s God’s perfect timing. We’ll be documenting and sharing the process of opening our newest tutoring center, so we’ll be better equipped to help others open their own centers—even beyond the greater Cincinnati area. Who knows? We may just equip and inspire other teachers and/or business owners to positively impact their communities, using our curriculum, beyond the regular classroom setting.
I hope you don’t get sick of me when I share things on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and LinkedIn.
Tips for Teachers
When I share with parents about the tutoring we offer at Book Bums, I explain that we hire devoted educators (not high school students, college kids, or even those who have a bachelors in an unrelated field), because we believe teachers are among the few who can expertly balance both the Patience and the Push required to move struggling readers forward.
Tutoring with us isn’t cheap ($83 per hour for a Foundations for Literacy-trained teacher). In the long run, it’s a small price to pay to eliminate the heart-wrenching worries over a child who’s struggling in school. We gladly make the sacrifices needed to help our kids become confident, skilled readers so they can competently navigate academic expectations, don’t we? There’s not much we parents won’t sacrifice to help ensure our kids enjoy a successful adulthood.
I feel a keen sense of urgency and strive to ensure we pack a big punch in every hour-long session at Book Bums.
But kids can be tricky. They test to see if we really care (often because they’ve had other teachers who didn’t). They test to see just how much they can get away with (because they want a line, and they’re looking for—begging to learn our boundaries). They test to see if they can get us off topic (because doing something they’re not good at yet costs them, and they’d prefer to avoid revealing their insecurities). They test to see if they’ll get more attention for negative behavior or positive behavior (and either will do. Many kids simply crave energy from others. They don’t mind, much, how they get it).
I once had a potential partner ask, “You’ve made this so easy for the tutors. Anyone could do it. Why hire teachers and pay them so much?”
Here’s why: It’s not easy balancing Patience and Push, and we only trust seasoned educators to work with our students.
Just for Fun
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