Sarah Mackenzie (00:05):
Hello. Hello, Sarah Mackenzie here. You’ve got episode 224 of the Read-Aloud Revival. This is the show that helps your kids fall in love with books and helps you fall in love with homeschooling. And today we’re going to talk about books and homeschooling. Specifically, I want to share a conversation I had with my friend and colleague Cindy West. Many of you know Cindy. She’s the teacher over at No Sweat Nature Study, that’s a homeschool nature study program that takes basically all of the guesswork and all of the work out of nature study. She teaches your kids directly, my own 11 year old, and nine year old twins love it. She also hosts the No Sweat Nature Study podcast, which is my kids’ favorite podcast. So if you haven’t heard it yet, search for it wherever you listen to the Read-Aloud Revival, I bet you’ll enjoy it.
(00:58):
Those are really short, fabulous to listen to start your homeschool day, maybe at breakfast or while you’re in the car on the way to the grocery store or co-op or wherever you are heading off to. Cindy and I recently had a conversation for her community all about how to use picture books to teach nature study. Nature study has a name for itself in the homeschooling world. If you’ve been homeschooling for long, you’ve heard the phrase nature study. We’ve built it up in our world as the supreme science activity, and I think it should be. I think it deserves that, getting out in nature, observing and learning about the world around us all wonderful. But sometimes we homeschool mamas make things a bit harder on ourselves than they need to be. At least I do. I’m raising by hand. Anyone else?
(01:45):
Sometimes we’re also in a season were going out and about to do nature study just isn’t in the cards for us. Maybe you have a new baby, maybe there’s an illness in the house, weather. Gosh, there are lots of reasons why you might need or want to do some of your nature study or a lot of your nature study for a season on a cozy couch or at the kitchen table. So today Cindy and I are going to talk about that very thing, how to do it. We’re going to recommend some books because that’s what we do here. Actually here at Read-Aloud Revival. We recently released a brand new book list that pairs 48 fabulous nature-based picture books with simple activities for your kids. You can actually get it for free by going to the show notes for today’s episode, readaloudrevival.com/224, since this is episode 224. Or you can text the word Nature to 33777. And I will send you that book list and activity guide. For now though, listen in as Cindy and I talk about teaching nature study through picture books.
Cindy West (02:57):
Hey everybody, it is Cindy West from ourjourneywestward.com, and No Sweat Nature Study Live, and I am so glad to be here with Ms. Sarah McKenzie today. We’re going to be talking about picture books and nature study. I know that’s no surprise if you know both of us, so I just thought that I would let Ms. Sarah tell a little bit about herself just in case you don’t know her. And then we’re going to talk about some really cool picture book and nature study connections. All right, Sarah, tell us about yourself.
Sarah Mackenzie (03:31):
Yes, thank you so much for having me, Cindy. I love, love, love chatting with you. So I’m Sarah Mackenzie and I run the Read-Aloud Revival, which is a podcast and an online community where we are super focused on helping kids fall in love with books and helping moms fall in love with homeschooling. And picture books are my love language. I just love so much the marriage of a beautiful text in really exquisite illustrations to tell a story and really enliven our imagination. So I’m excited to talk about this today with you. Also, I should mention the homeschooling bit that my husband, Andrew and I have been married for 21 years and we have six kids who we’ve homeschooled since they’ve been in school, since the beginning. And we’ve got two that are graduates, one that’s about to graduate and three still at home who are nine, nine and 10. So we’re still, we’ve been at it for a while, but we’re still really in it.
Cindy West (04:28):
You are still really in it, and I love being in it. So I guess maybe I’ll tell a little bit about myself in case there are some people who don’t know. I’ve been homeschooling for 21 years. I don’t know, I’ve lost count at this point.
Sarah Mackenzie (04:41):
Yeah.
Cindy West (04:41):
I’ve also graduated two of mine and then I have a 10th grader. And I tell you, I’m looking forward in some ways to having less on my plate, but I’m going to miss this like crazy. Homeschooling is not easy. It’s not always for the faint of heart, but it is so worth it. I can turn around on this end and I can say, oh, I almost wish that I had more to keep doing this because it’s been such an amazing experience. And so you and I have worked together plenty of times on projects that have to do with literature and nature study because they meld so beautifully together. But the whole main reason besides talking about some books in nature study that we’re here is for a little celebration of sorts too, because you guys, Sarah has a brand new book coming soon called A Little More Beautiful: The Secret of a Garden Did I get that?
Sarah Mackenzie (05:44):
Story of a Garden.
Cindy West (05:44):
The Story of a Garden. And so I would love if you’ll just tell us a little bit about that story and then we will go right into our nature study conversation.
Sarah Mackenzie (05:53):
Yes. And you can see a little peak at some of the original artwork for the book behind me, illustrated by Breezy Brookshire who was homeschooled herself, which is very fun, a fun connection there. The picture book is about a woman named Lou Alice, who you might notice this little nod to Miss Rumphius, if you are familiar with the picture book, Miss Rumphius, who leaves each day more beautiful than she found it. And one day she is taken from her cottage to a new home, a nursing home, and nobody really notices that she’s gone, even though she’s done all of these invisible tasks making the world beautiful for everyone else during all of this time except for a little girl. And this little girl realizes that she’s going to take up the work of Lou Alice, but it’s not quite enough just to take up the work of those who’ve gone before her. She has to do something herself to make the world more beautiful.
(06:40):
And so it’s a story of gardens and friendship and carrying on beautiful traditions before us, while also figuring out what is the beautiful thing we were put here in the world to do. And one of the nature connections I love so much about the book is that Breezy did quite a bit of research to make sure that all of the flowers that she portrays in the book would be in bloom at the same time. She didn’t want to accidentally have two lips blooming at the same time as something that wasn’t bloom with two lips, which now my brain is not thinking of anything. She wants to make sure that she had all the different kind of flowers that were blooming, were actually what you could find in a garden. And then they’re also not just flowers, they’re real flowers. So that’s fun. So you can go through with the book and figure out which flowers are which and name them and find out which they are not, just that they’re like a pink random flower with-
Cindy West (07:36):
I love that. Oh, I love that. And so the way that, or the reason I guess I should say that I’m so excited about this book is because it makes such a perfect companion to nature study. I have a lot of books on my shelf that make those connections and it’s for a good reason. And I can’t wait until this one is ready and in my little hands because I’m going to keep it on my shelf forever. I’m so, so excited about this book. So let’s just talk about, you gave a great example of how you can take a picture book and it can be so enjoyable. It can also have other themes besides simply nature study. And we can use that book, we call it living literature in the Charlotte Mason inspired world, books that just draw you in. They’re so full of goodness and character, good character qualities first off, or evil ones I guess I could say. But that’s not exactly the point I was trying to make. Character development is where I was trying to go with that.
(08:41):
So you’ve got great character development, great plot development, great settings, and then you can have connections to all kinds of things. So we can have connections to math or science in other ways, the nature study, geography, things like that. And so your book is going to be an awesome one to be able to just read and get all of the wonderful benefits of it. And yet it can spark a nature walk into a garden or into a field of wildflowers that really helps your children to start thinking about flowers, noticing flowers, observing flowers, identifying flowers, like you said, identifying either in the book, the actual picture book or identifying outdoors.
(09:27):
And so lots and lots of great literature can do that. And there’s a difference you guys, between great literature like this book of Sarah’s and then what we call twaddle, which are books that are less inspiring, is a good way to put that. So before we jump into, I want to ask a read aloud question.
Sarah Mackenzie (09:51):
Yeah.
Cindy West (09:53):
We obviously could use any picture book to read before a nature study, during a nature study or even after a nature study. So we can use one to prompt some excitement about a topic, we could be outdoors knowing we’re going to look for flowers today and take this book in a blanket and sit and read the book amongst some flowers, or we could find flowers on a nature walk. And then we could go, Ooh, we know a book that makes some flower connections and we could read it after. But I want to talk about, from your perspective, children don’t have to read aloud books. What is a positivity for sitting around together as a family and reading aloud from picture books?
Sarah Mackenzie (10:48):
There’s a couple things that come to mind right away for me, because I think there is a different experience with a book, whether you’re picking up a book as a child and reading it yourself, or as an adult and reading it yourself, or you’re sharing it with other family members. One of the first things that comes to mind from the academic perspective is just that every time we read aloud, we’re giving our kids these grammatically correct sophisticated language patterns that they don’t get anywhere else. So even when we are speaking with our kids around the dinner table, we’re not using proper grammar or sophisticated language patterns because nobody speaks that way. That’s just not how it works.
(11:23):
But even when our kids are reading on their own, especially if they’re good readers, they’re probably skipping things. This is why if I was to hand you Cindy a page from Little House in the Big Woods and you were to read it silently to yourself, you could read it a lot faster than if I read it to you. Because when we’re reading to ourselves silently, we’re skipping all those little connector words and articles and we’re just, that’s the way our brains work. And that’s good. But that means that the whole sentence structure isn’t really being stored in our kids’ brains unless they hear it through the ear. So there is a benefit to them hearing each word in order through their ear.
(12:03):
And then another thing that really jumps out at me is just the connection, because when we share a story, we are rooting it for the character. We’re holding our breath at the same moment. We’re worried about the whatever’s bad might happen, whatever obstacle they’re facing. And it really is a, there’s a connective power that while reading alone is a beautiful, wonderful experience, reading together is a whole nother kind of experience. And so if they both have benefits, but in our schools, especially in our homeschools, when we’re wanting to connect with our kids and also wanting them to get really good language skills, reading aloud has an edge, I think, it has a little bit of a superior edge there, gives a little extra oomph.
Cindy West (12:47):
For sure. And you know you guys, that translates into future writing as well.
Sarah Mackenzie (12:54):
Yes. Oh, yes.
Cindy West (12:56):
And one thing I don’t think you mentioned was just the articulation. The emotion that we are able as parents or whoever’s reading aloud to bring out as we read also translates into writing skills later.
Sarah Mackenzie (13:13):
Yes.
Cindy West (13:13):
In reading skills, when they’re reading alone, they begin to really hear the context of somebody’s emotions or how they’re speaking something. Are they asking a question? You’ve got that intonation that they might not have otherwise learned if they hadn’t heard someone else read aloud with all of that inflection. And audiobooks can really help with that too. So if you’re a parent who struggles with knowing how to do that, listen to some audiobooks, get yourself used to hearing that, and then you’ll naturally begin to read aloud a little more with intonation as well. And that keeps-
Sarah Mackenzie (13:51):
I had a funny story about that, Cindy, my 10 year old listens to audiobooks like nobody’s business over and over again too. There’s some that like the Ramona Quimby series, she could recite lots of long passages from there just because she’s-
Cindy West (14:03):
Love it.
Sarah Mackenzie (14:03):
… listened to it so many times. She is also pretty dyslexic and was a very late reader. But when she’s reading aloud now, she went from barely being able to sound out words to when she’s now able to read, she can read out loud with a lot of inflection and pacing and cadence. And I think it’s just all that oral language that she heard over years of listening to audiobooks and read alouds that then when she sees the words on a page, she knows how to deliver it because she’s heard it so many times before. It’s not brand new, it’s familiar territory.
Cindy West (14:37):
She probably doesn’t just know how to deliver it. That really probably helps with the dyslexia, honestly, being able to fill in gaps of, okay, that didn’t make sense when I read it.
Sarah Mackenzie (14:47):
Yes.
Cindy West (14:48):
But I have heard sentence structure so much that I know I need to go back and recheck that.
Sarah Mackenzie (14:55):
Yeah.
Cindy West (14:55):
So yeah, some awesome connections to all kinds of things for reading aloud. So thank you for that.
Sarah Mackenzie (15:01):
Yeah.
Cindy West (15:02):
All right, so let’s get right to it. Besides A Little More Beautiful, you and I have both brought just a few because we could have together probably stacks and stacks and stacks of books that would make fantastic connections to literature, fantastic connections to nature study that are also good literature. So that living literature versus the opposite, which I call twaddle. So I’ll go first with one, we’ll just go back and forth. And again, you guys, I literally, I don’t even know if I’ve picked my favorites because I just was at my shelf picking, but I know for sure that this one is probably one of my top, top, top favorites ever. Yes. So this is The Raft by Jim LaMarche, and it’s just a very simple story about a little boy who unwillingly visits his grandma. He thinks his summer’s going to be so, so boring because she lives out in the woods and it turns out to not be boring, let’s just put it that way.
(16:08):
And so the connections you can make from this book are connections to kiddos who don’t necessarily love the idea of nature study, and yet they can watch this little boy discover that nature is pretty awesome. You can make connections to creeks, to any animal that lives in a woodland area, particularly near water, not just creeks, ponds would work too, maybe even, I think probably rivers as well. You could even make some connections to nature study safety because this little boy is allowed to go out and do a lot of things alone at a creek. I wouldn’t have allowed my children to do that.
Sarah Mackenzie (16:44):
For sure. No.
Cindy West (16:45):
So we definitely had some conversations about nature study safety. So it’s a fantastic book. Like I’ve mentioned, you can read these before, during, or after nature walks for inspiration or connection points or whatever. And PS, you don’t even have to go on nature walks. So let’s mention that really quickly.
Sarah Mackenzie (17:05):
Yeah.
Cindy West (17:05):
Nature study doesn’t have to be outdoors. I know a lot of people would probably want to shoot me down for saying that, but there are a greater number of us who are like, wait, really? Tell me more. It’s true. Yeah. Yeah, because I know people either have time constraints or allergies or they really can’t stand the thought of being out when it’s too hot or when it’s too cold, or they literally live in the middle of a concrete jungle and they’re like, oh, visiting a creek. Well, wouldn’t that be nice?
Sarah Mackenzie (17:39):
Yeah.
Cindy West (17:40):
So you can do a kitchen table nature study or cozy couch nature study, of course over at ourjourneywestward.com. There’s tons of curriculum for you to choose from. I can even teach your kids nature study and you can have nothing to do with it if you don’t want through No Sweat Nature Study Live video classes. But that’s not what we’re here to talk about. I just wanted to encourage you that this same book could be read to prompt a discussion about nature or to further study, let’s say a blue heron through field guides or YouTube videos or something like that. Okay.
Sarah Mackenzie (18:18):
Well what I was thinking of as you were holding up the raft is, because my kids do your No Sweat Nature study, and we love it. And one of the things I love about what you do there is you have a reference picture that they can use. You call it a specimen that they can use to look at. And so when I was first trying to do nature study with my older kids when they were younger, in my mind I was like, we’re going to do nature study about, we’re going to go see the ducks down at the river, let’s say. And then I’m like, we’re going to bring our sketchbooks and we’re going to sit outside, but we live in the northwest and it’s always wet. And so sitting down outside with our nature study notebooks that are now getting damp and crinkled and then the ducks never sit still. So the kids would say, how am I supposed to draw it if it won’t sit still? And I’m thinking the exact same thing.
(19:02):
So this idea of being able to, yes, we’ll go down and see the ducks and we’ll talk about them, but being able to do our actual nature journaling at the table with a book, The Raft sitting in front of you where you’re looking at different pictures of the heron and you get to choose which one you want to try and copy, which is also, there’s so many good things they’re learning there and it really brings things down to a manageable place. Especially if, like you said, going out in nature is either difficult because your location or your season. When I had new babies, the last thing I wanted do was cart everybody up and try and go to a nature walk when I really needed just a nap.
Cindy West (19:39):
Yeah. And one other thing at the table, you actually can promote a little bit better nature journaling artistic skill.
Sarah Mackenzie (19:51):
Ah, yeah-
Cindy West (19:52):
Because when you’re on the go, even though I really do promote getting outdoors and nature journaling when you can, you can actually focus a little bit more on the skill level of your nature journal page when you’re at a table.
Sarah Mackenzie (20:04):
Yeah.
Cindy West (20:04):
Anyway, okay, your turn.
Sarah Mackenzie (20:06):
Okay, so I’m excited to show you this one. This one is brand new. It’s less than a year old, let’s say. It’s called Of Walden Pond: Henry David Thoreau, Frederick Tudor, and the Pond Between, and it’s a picture book biography that tells two stories. One of Henry David Thoreau, one of Frederick Tudor, both their interaction over Walden and Pond. And my family just took a trip to the Boston area last year and we got to visit Walden Pond. So I was very excited to show my kids this book, because I’m like, remember when we went here? Which does not feel like a pond, by the way. It’s a lake. I don’t know why we call it a pond. It is definitely not pond. That’s not what we call ponds where I come from. Let me just say that way. You swim in the lake easily and [inaudible 00:20:50].
Cindy West (20:50):
Yeah.
Sarah Mackenzie (20:51):
But basically the story juxtaposes the way this very prominent businessman and also this nature lover interact with the pond and you learn all kinds of things about ice and the history of, there was a time when we didn’t have ice to put in ice cubes in a drink or whatever. At the very end of the book, you’ll see they sent it to, now I’m trying to remember where it was exactly that it ended up, that was some of the first ice they’ve ever had in Calcutta that came from Walden Pond.Anyway, it’s got lots of… One thing I love about picture book biographies is that they’re the epitome of a book that you can read with all ages because your four-year-old is riveted by a wonderful picture book that has great illustrations, but the back matter is just full of really good research rabbit trail launching points for your older kids and teen.
Cindy West (21:50):
Yes.
Sarah Mackenzie (21:51):
So I feel like I come away learning so much. So this is a great one that combines history, like what you were saying before, it’s never just about one theme, a picture book’s never just about nature’s study. You’ve also got storytelling and story structure in there. In this case you have history and geography in there, which is really how all of our lives are. This is the beauty of homeschooling, is that we get to-
Cindy West (22:14):
A 100%. Yeah. And honestly, I think that books and nature study are two of the easiest things to make all of those many connections.
Sarah Mackenzie (22:20):
Yes. Yes.
Cindy West (22:21):
Your experience over all these years, those two things are almost seamless with just, yeah, we tie it into geography or we tie it into math and doesn’t have any problem at all making that connection.
Sarah Mackenzie (22:33):
Yeah. Yeah.
Cindy West (22:34):
So I love what you said about biographies. Well, PS, we did a class on Henry David Thoreau and Walden Pond, and I never knew that book existed. So now I have to go back and update the book list on that-
Sarah Mackenzie (22:48):
It might not have been out when you did your class because it’s fairly new. Yeah.
Cindy West (22:52):
It may not have been. Okay. So speaking of biographies, this one is a little less biography like as compared to what it sounds like in that book. Just trying to think if it’s got anything in the end. Oh-
Sarah Mackenzie (23:06):
… remember.
Cindy West (23:08):
… sure does. Look at that. Look at that. We have some wildflower identification in there. So this is a biography on Lady Bird Johnson and her push to get wildflowers along the interstates to beautify all these new roads that were being built at the time. So this is a fabulous book that clearly makes a very easy transition into studying wildflowers or any kind of flower. You don’t necessarily have to find wild ones. You can find some that might be growing in a pot on your porch. But it helps you really get excited about the idea of looking at a flower closely, how is it colored? What’s going on with its petals, who is pollinating? So there are all kinds of jumping off points for a book like this. And again, I love the biographies because what we just found in here is the same as in what your book that you shared, there are extra ideas for you to use. Okay. So this one was called Miss Lady Bird’s Flowers by Kathy Apelt. Okay, your turn.
Sarah Mackenzie (24:13):
Okay, I’ve got one more picture book biography.
Cindy West (24:16):
Great.
Sarah Mackenzie (24:16):
Because the connections here are so rich. This one is also fairly new. It’s called Antsy Ansel: Ansel Adams, a Life in Nature, which is about the photographer Ansel Adams. And the thing I really love about this picture book biography in particular is that I think it will inspire your kids to try their hand at nature photography. Yes, there’s this particular spread. I think one of the thing that I love so much about a well told biography is it doesn’t just give our kids history. It also inspires them to see themselves as a part of history. And I think because picture book biographies often focus on the childhood of, not always, in the case of Walden Pond, it’s not focusing on the child of Henry David Thoreau or Frederick Tudor at all. But in this case, it really focuses on where Ansel Adams’ love of photography came from. And then your kids will get inspired to do some photography themselves.
(25:18):
And I’m going to look and see what’s in the back of this one, because I can’t remember. Yep. There are some real photographs by Ansel Adams and of him and then more resources for your older kids and students. So this could be a launching point for all kinds of great close looking, which is what we do with nature study. We learn to look closely.
Cindy West (25:37):
So our conversation has a problem as far as my husband is concerned, because now I’m putting at least two new books in my Amazon carts. One that is not necessarily a biography but kind of sort of is a story about someone that could easily be a biography of an actual person is Rocks in His Head by Carol Otis Hurst.
Sarah Mackenzie (25:59):
I’ve never seen this.
Cindy West (26:00):
Well, it’s so cute. It’s just a story of a man who has always loved to collect rocks and he actually went into an occupation that allowed him to do some of that as well. I’ve found that this book is so loved by kids who already like to collect rocks, they like to identify rocks. It’s a great little book for them, but it’s also a good book if you want kiddos to get excited about the idea of boring old rocks and to notice that they are cool and different. It’s also for those kiddos who love just nature collections in general, this will really build them up that it’s okay to do that and to make some collections that are treasured for them, that it’s meaningful that they love to collect things. So another good one. Do you have another book to share?
Sarah Mackenzie (26:54):
I don’t… Oh yes, I have one more to share. I was going to say-
Cindy West (26:55):
One more. Okay.
Sarah Mackenzie (26:56):
… I don’t have that one. I’ve never seen it, but I just jotted it down so I can have it after we’re done. I have one more to share. This one I wanted to share and some you might recognize this one, Roxaboxen by Alice Mcllerran illustrated by my favorite, all the time favorite Barbara Cooney. And you might recognize it because it’s an older book, but there are lots of nature connections it’s set in, I think it’s either New Mexico or Arizona. It’s set in a desert where you might actually feel like there isn’t as much nature as we might think of when we’re thinking of the lush greenery of some of these other places like Boston and these other places that you think of, oh, trees and all the growing things. And in a desert we might not think that as much, but it’s really not about nature at all, it just makes you want to get out in it.
Cindy West (27:49):
Yeah.
Sarah Mackenzie (27:50):
So when you read this book, it’s just a story about kids who have this whole make believe store and world using rocks and twigs and your kids will not be able to help themselves after you… If you just read this book and never give them the idea at all, you may find them outside creating their own outside make believe world and really getting close to nature. And I love that because my kids have not always been the kind of kids who are super… I know I’ve heard of people who are like, I just have a hard time getting my kids to come back in from outside. And that’s not always been my experience. Sometimes I have to convince mine to stay outside for longer. And so books like this can help with that, if you’ve got kids who you need to be like, get outdoors, go-
Cindy West (28:31):
Get outdoors. Well, and that brings another important point that you guys nature study can be play. They are learning so much about nature when they just get outside and play with a rock or play with a stick and that, I think I wrote a post many moons ago because I had very, very active boys and I always got the question, how do we do this with kiddos who are active and they would rather climb a tree or jump off a tall boulder or something. And I’m like, let them do that because there is so much that you’re learning about the strength of a tree and the texture of a tree and what’s tree bark? Why is this one slick and I can’t climb up it as easily as I can with this one that’s not slick, for instance? So just the tactile experience teaches a lot, call it experiential learning. Okay, so I have just two more along. I’m going to just hold them both up at once.
Sarah Mackenzie (29:30):
Okay.
Cindy West (29:30):
Because neither one of these, by the way, oh Miss Sarah and I did a class together about this book. It’s called The Hundred-Year Barn by Patricia MacLachlan. It’s a newer book, it’s not necessarily about nature study, nor is Higgins Bend Song and Dance by Jacqueline Martin. They’re just fun books. This one about a farm, as you can imagine, actually about a barn over a hundred years time. But it’s got such inspiration points if you were going to take a, maybe a nature walk at someone’s farm, this is a great jumping off point for that. This one is just a funny story about a man who tries to catch fish with his stinky socks. Has nothing to do with nature study, and yet it’s such a fun, fun way to introduce the idea of we’re going to learn about fish together. And PS, we also did a class together about fish. Do you remember that class about salmon that we did?
Sarah Mackenzie (30:27):
Yes.
Cindy West (30:27):
Yeah.
Sarah Mackenzie (30:27):
Yes we did. Yes. And it was tied into the year of Ms. Agnes.
Cindy West (30:33):
Yes it was. Which is another fantastic book, chapter book that could make a connection into nature study. Don’t forget chapter books. Okay. So you can find those classes, by the way, in either one of our memberships, so the Read-Aloud Revival Premium or the No Sweat Nature Study Live, both of those memberships have all these recordings that we keep talking about that your family can watch. Let me mention one more thing before we shut this down for the day.
Sarah Mackenzie (31:01):
Yeah.
Cindy West (31:02):
We’ve been talking a lot about living picture books, the things that really grab attention, they’re more story-like. Well you can actually find some that are non-fiction. The biographies tend toward that, but I feel like the biographies that we’ve mentioned so far are still very story like. Ducks Don’t Get Wet by Augusta Goldin. This is an old book, I think it’s still in print. And then Seashells: More Than a Home by Melissa-
Sarah Mackenzie (31:33):
… see that one.
Cindy West (31:34):
… Stewart. Oh, it’s so precious. These, they have a storyline to them, but they’re way more nonfictiony than say your Usborne or DK kind of books. I have an example of one of those, this is a National Geographic book, you know the ones I’m talking about, that are way more just strictly informational.
Sarah Mackenzie (31:57):
Yeah.
Cindy West (31:57):
So Seashells: More Than a Home and Ducks Don’t Get Wet. Those are books that are still in somewhat of a story form, but they’re very much less of a story and more about the facts. Those also make great connections. So don’t leave those kinds of books out. But Sarah and I really wanted to focus in on living literature like her brand new book that I know all of you guys are going to go get, A Little More Beautiful, when it comes out. So let’s finish with that, Sarah. Can you tell us a little bit more about when, where and how we can get our hands on that book soon?
Sarah Mackenzie (32:37):
Yes, absolutely. It can be pre-ordered now at waxwingbooks.com. It’s shipping this spring. Very excited about it. We actually, Waxwing Books is our new publishing imprint at Read-Aloud Revival. So this is the first of many we have, four or five at this point that are in different parts of the funnel. I cannot wait to show you all illustrations from our second book that’s very close to being ready too. And that one has a lot of nature connections too with moonflowers. So Flowers-
Cindy West (33:03):
Well then we will be back together, won’t we?
Sarah Mackenzie (33:05):
Yeah, we’ll have to. We’ll have to.
Cindy West (33:10):
We’re actually-
Sarah Mackenzie (33:10):
All the information about those books that’s there coming and where you can pre-order them is at waxwingbooks.com.
Cindy West (33:15):
Waxwing books.com. And I was so excited, I forgot to even mention the fact that you now own a publishing house. So how exciting is that? I cannot wait to see what comes out. We have a class, I don’t know, this coming fall on night-blooming flowers. So I need you to get your moonflower book done quickly. Okay.
Sarah Mackenzie (33:40):
Okay.
Cindy West (33:43):
All right. Well it’s been so much fun chatting with you. Thanks for doing this. I think it’s going to be a benefit to every one of us who love books and love nature study or don’t and want to find easy ways to make that more enjoyable. So Ms. Sarah McKenzie, thank you for being here. I am Cindy West and we will be back together doing things together soon. So join us in either one of our memberships, Read-Aloud Revival Premium or No Sweat Nature Study Live. And we both actually hope to see you guys a lot soon. Ah, I hope you’re inspired. Now let’s hear from the kids about what they’re reading and loving lately.
Speaker 3 (34:26):
My name is Holly. I am eight years old and I live in Richmond, Texas and I like Meg McIntosh because she solves mysteries.
Speaker 4 (34:37):
Hi, my name is [inaudible 00:34:39], I live in Richmond, Texas. My favorite book is Llama Llama Red Pajama because he shout out to mama.
Speaker 5 (34:46):
My name is Josiah. I live in Lee’s Summit, Missouri and I am 10. My favorite book is The Wingfeather Saga. My favorite part is when Kalmar and Janner go into Anklejelly Manor.
Speaker 6 (35:02):
My name is Elsa, I live in Maryland. And friends, Romans, countrymen lend me your ears. I love Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare. One of the reasons why I love it so much is because I had a great English teacher who helped me to understand it and also made it a lot of fun.
Speaker 7 (35:22):
I recommend the Henry Huggins series to anybody who likes Beverly Cleary. I live in Maryland and my name is Henry.
Speaker 8 (35:33):
My favorite book is Curious George when he Takes a Job. My favorite part of it is when the sleeping gas part of it, when the doctor said, don’t touch anything. When he touched, he breathed into the sleeping gas. That’s my favorite part. My name is Polly Anna Mitchell and where I live is Maryland.
Speaker 9 (36:09):
Hi, my name is [inaudible 00:36:08]. I live in Missouri.
Sarah Mackenzie (36:10):
Live in Missouri.
Speaker 9 (36:11):
And I’m six. And I like Chronicles of Narnia.
Sarah Mackenzie (36:11):
Chronicles of Narnia.
Speaker 9 (36:11):
And Snow Horses.
Sarah Mackenzie (36:16):
And Snow Horses. Why do you like Chronicles of Narnia? Why do you like listening?
Speaker 9 (36:21):
Because they’re nice and I’m watching them and-
Sarah Mackenzie (36:27):
Because there’s movie to do with it too.
Speaker 9 (36:28):
And there are some people what are alive and some people are dead. You don’t know when you have to read next book.
Sarah Mackenzie (36:37):
Why do you like Snow Horses?
Speaker 9 (36:38):
Because there’s snow and I like winter and winter is my favorite thing. Thank you.
Sarah Mackenzie (36:48):
Thank you. Thank you kids. And thank you for listening through to the end. Remember, you can grab your Nature Study and activity book list. It might be one of the best book lists we’ve made around here. And that’s saying something right, because book lists are our thing. You can grab that book list in the show notes, readaloudrevival.com/224, or by texting the word Nature to the number 33777. That book list can serve as your science curriculum for kids under 12. And then there are fabulous recommendations and they’re all the way up for kids through 18. So really grab it truly. No matter how old your kids are, how many you’ve got, grab that book list, don’t miss it.
(37:34):
And if you want to hear more on how we built that book list and how to use it, go back and listen to episode 222. Just a couple of episodes back, 222. Kara and Courtney from the Read-Aloud Revival team joined me on the show to talk about making the book list, how we picked the books, which books we love, a couple we were most excited about, and how to use it as your science curriculum or as a way to enhance your children’s love of nature in their observations about the world. Okay, well you know the drill, we’ll be back here in two weeks here on the show. In the meantime, go make meaningful and lasting connections with your kids through books.
(38:18):
So many of us feel overwhelmed in our homeschool. There’s a lot to do and it feels like every child needs something a little different. The good news is you are the best person on the planet to help your kids learn and grow. And home is the best place to fall in love with books. I’m Sarah Mackenzie. I’m a homeschooling mother of six, the author of Teaching from Rest and the Read-Aloud family. And I’m the host here on the Read-Aloud Revival podcast.
(38:56):
This podcast has been downloaded over eight million times. And I think it’s because so many of us want the same things. We want our kids to be readers, to love reading. We want our homes to be warm and happy havens of learning and connection. We know that raising our kids is the most important work of our lives. That’s overwhelming. You are not alone. In Read-Aloud Revival Premium, we offer family book clubs, a vibrant community and Circle with Sarah, coaching for you, the homeschooling mom. So you can teach from rest, homeschool with confidence and raise kids who love to read. Our family book clubs are a game changer for your kids’ relationship with books. We provide you with a family book club guide and an opportunity for your kids to meet the author or illustrator live on screen. So all you have to do is get the book, read it with your kids, and make those meaningful and lasting connections. They work for all ages, from your youngest kids to your teens.
(40:14):
Every month our community also gathers online for a Circle with Sarah to get ideas and encouragement around creating the homeschooling life you crave. They’re the most effective way I know to teach from rest and build a homeschool life you love. We want to help your kids fall in love with books, and we want to help you fall in love with homeschooling. Join us today at rarpremium.com.