Hello Book Bums families!
'This week in the newsletter we're exploring America. From historical fiction set in 19th century Maryland to a literary article from the Smithsonian to a spelling lesson in a National Park - there's something for everyone.
Dr. Christy also shares some simple questions you can use to check your child's reading skills this summer as well as her thoughts on exclamation points.
Read on and enjoy.
Bookbums.com is an Amazon Associate; We earn from qualifying purchases. This means that if you click on a link to Amazon.com and make a purchase, We may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. We do recommend the products. Feel free to find them by other means.
Word of the Week
raucous (raw-kus) adjective/describing word - boisterous and disorderly
The raucous behavior and noise at the party disturbed the neighborhood
Literary Calendar
• On June 26, 1819, Washington Irving released a book of stories that included "Rip Van Winkle."
• If you don't know about this story set in the Catskill Mountains, the main character, Rip Van Winkle, falls asleep for twenty years, missing some major events including the American Revolution.
• You can read more about the story and Washington Irving in this Smithsonian article.
Wordology Workshop
• The Latin root somn means sleep.
• You'll recognize it in words like insomnia, meaning sleeplessness and somnambulance, meaning sleepwalking.
From our Bookshelves
As I was copying the image of this book for the newsletter, I saw that I’d purchased Booth in December of 2023, and that means it’s been on the stack of my “books to be read” for some time now. What made me pick it up recently? I’m not sure, but I’m really glad I did. I’d been wanting to read another truly great book.
Karen Joy Fowler’s book, Booth, was published in 2022, but the story begins in 1822—exactly two hundred years earlier.
Fowler shared that she wanted to tell the story of the Booth family while trying to keep John (Wilkes) Booth a minor character so as not to give him undue attention. Interweaving facts from American history and adding the imagined scenarios of what might have happened make for a captivating story of which we all know the ending. That part of the story is minimal. The greater portion shares the life of a family just before the Civil War era. There is a man and his wife and their ten children. The father, actor Junius Booth, is living with his family on a farm in Maryland. Though Junius never owned slaves, he did rent enslaved people from other families, and one enslaved family was particularly impactful in the Booth family life.
Junius, was a curious man. He was a beloved American actor in his time, yet his career was riddled with raucous behaviors that made life extraordinarily challenging both at home and on stage. Despite their father’s struggles, all three of his sons became actors as well.
John Wilkes Booth was the youngest son in the Booth family, and though his family members were proponents of the Union, he grew up to become pro-slavery and a strong supporter of the confederacy. John vehemently opposed the political views of Lincoln—especially after the Emancipation Proclamation.
I’m no historian. I know the name John Brown, mostly from hearing it in one of my top three favorite movies, Remember the Titans where Coach Boone said, "You fumble the football, and I will break my foot off in your John Brown hind parts . . . and then you will run a mile."
With a little research, I learned that John Brown led the raid on the armory at Harper’s Ferry, a little town in Virginia (which later became West Virginia), with the aim of providing arms to slaves. I learned that Booth participated in capturing John Brown after his raid on Harper’s Ferry and was present when Brown was hung for treason, murder, and inciting a slave insurrection.
Though we know how the story ends, it was interesting to learn how things transpired and about how Booth’s family responded to learning that their beloved John had assassinated the American president.
It’s a big story with lots of interesting tidbits. It’s so memorable that, even though it’s almost 500 pages long, you’ll remember where you are even if you read another book or two at the same time.
NPR published a short interview with Fowler that you can explore here.
Tips for Families
It’s happened to me more times than I can count, but as I wrote the word vehemently above, I remembered the look on a family member’s face when I first said that word aloud.
I said the word like this: veh-he-ment-ly
It is actually pronounced like this: vee-uh-ment-ly
I mean, mine makes sense, but sure. Okay . . .
When we learn words as we’re reading, we’re bound to mispronounce them when we give them a go. Let’s honor efforts as others use words beyond their comfort zones, and let’s try to refrain from looking at beloved mispronouncers like they are aliens.
Tips for Raising Readers and Writers
Check in with your kids about a few foundational concepts. Do your kids know what the vowels are?
a, e, i, o, u
Do they know the short vowel sounds and the long vowel sounds?
Do they know that the letter y can act like a vowel and when it does, it sounds like an i or an e?
Can your kids tell the difference between us and use and cap and cape and rub and rube? Do they decode them correctly?
Do your kids know that s can represent two sounds? It can say /s/ and it can say /z/.
When your kids write, is there a vowel in each syllable? If they spelled the following words, do they include a vowel? Is it the correct one?
collar, mister, stir, world, blurt
Can your kids read the following words accurately?
staring
tapped
mopped
starring
hoping
hopping
moped
taped
Do your kids guess what the words say with just a quick glance and say things like house for horse, who for how, the for and, etc.?
If so, you may want to schedule a free assessment with Dr. Christy. We can do a quick and painless assessment to determine which foundational skills your kids need to firm up so they can make excellent progress this next school year. It’s not too early! You can jump start your kids’ skills for a strong start to a new school year.
Click the link to schedule a free assessment today! https://bookbums.com/assessment/
Practical Grammar
As we were traveling home from the Smoky Mountains, I asked my husband, “How do you spell smoky?” He promptly replied, “s-m-o-k-e-y.” Truthfully, that’s what I’d have said. The word smoky looks really strange to me.
• The Greek root amphi means around, about, both.
• You can find it in the word amphitheater which is a round space where people can sit and hear from all sides.
• Amphi is also in the word amphibian which identifies animals that can live both the in water and on land.
When I say that we have gone to the Smoky Mountains almost every year for the whole of our 41 married years, I’m not exaggerating. My in laws have rented the largest chalets they could find for all three of their kids, and then their kids’ kids, and now even their kids’ kids’ kids who all gather for a long weekend. And yet I still feel Smoky looks odd.
I mean, it makes sense.
Here’s how it works:
If the noun ends in a consonant and then an e, drop the e and add a y. (babe, baby)
If the noun is a consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) word, double the final consonant and add a y. (nut, nutty)
If the noun does not end in an e and is not a CVC word, just add the y. (showy)
Smokey is generally reserved for names like . . . Smokey the Bear and Smokey Robinson.
Can you find all the errors?
News from Book Bums
When you read this message, we will have completed our first Summer School program at VanGorden Elementary School! It was a lot of work, but we had a great time; and we believe the kids learned a whole lot. We’ll begin session 2 the week of July 7th. We’d love to have you join us as a volunteer!
Email Judy at judy@bookbums.com for more information.
We’re great for students who need community service hours too.
Tips for Teachers
Many teachers will find the following information difficult to believe, but plentiful research indicates that whole group instruction is a more effective approach to classroom instruction than the utilization of working with small groups—especially with reading instruction (including phonics).
Even if the data show slight gains for those within the small group, after accounting for the loss of learning when students are not in the group at the table, there is little to no evidence indicating that breaking kids into groups for reading instruction is advisable.
Though it can be a call to consider a new way of teaching, this is good news for educators. No longer will they need to plan for multiple groups throughout their reading blocks.
Just for Fun
I shared with a friend the name of a good Bible study, but I warned her that the author uses a great number of exclamation points, and that I had found it a bit irritating. My friend said, “Oh, I love exclamation points! My daughter continually hounds me saying, ‘Mom, that is not exciting! Why the exclamation point?!’”
I have another friend who simply cannot, it seems, write a single post on social media without adorning it with LOTS of exclamation points. There’s absolutely nothing boring happening in her neck of the woods.
In truth, I have seen this tendency in my own writing. I’m learning to parse my sentences to determine whether I’m using the desired end marks.
They say that acknowledging the problem is half the battle!
(Ha.)
If you know someone who would benefit from our newsletter or tutoring at Book Bums, please share this email with them! Thank you.
Copyright © 2024 Book Bums, All rights reserved
Our mailing address is:
7967 Cincinnati-Dayton Road Suite L
West Chester, OH 45069