Sarah (00:05):
Oh boy do we have a treat for you today? Our team here at Read Aloud Revival has been hard at work on a brand new book list for you. I’ve invited a couple of team members back to this side of the podcast. Kortney Garrison. Hello there. Want to tell us a little about you?
Kortney (00:23):
Sure. I am the community director here at RAR. I’ve got three kids. We homeschool in the Pacific Northwest. My kids are 16 and 13 and 10.
Sarah (00:35):
Every time I ask you this question on the podcast, I feel like they’re old… Well, they are older. That’s actually how-
Kortney (00:39):
That’s true.
Sarah (00:39):
Time works. It always takes me a minute. I’m like, “Really? How?” And then Kara, you’re here as well. Welcome, welcome.
Kara (00:48):
Thank you. Hey there. I’m Kara. I’m creative director for Read Aloud Revival and Waxwing books, and I have two kids and they’re both having birthday, Sarah, so are you ready?
Sarah (00:58):
I’m not.
Kara (01:00):
16, and 19.
Sarah (01:02):
Oh my goodness. Yeah. Yeah.
Kara (01:06):
One is studying at university and one is doing dual enrollment classes at our local college, and I live in Illinois with my husband and my youngest and lots of cats, and my son, whenever he comes back home to say hello.
Sarah (01:20):
Yeah, you just got a big promotion. That’s the way I see it. All that homeschooling, and now they’re successful in navigating college classes. That is nothing to sneeze at. That’s what I think.
Kara (01:32):
Yeah, it’s pretty awesome so far. Yeah, feel very, very excited and just maybe a little relieved too.
Sarah (01:41):
Yeah. Yeah. Fair. Well, for any new listeners, I’m Sarah McKenzie. I’m the host of this show and the founder here at Read Aloud Revival. My husband Andrew and I have six kids and we also live in the Pacific Northwest, so a little easterly of Kortney.
(01:58):
So let’s talk about this brand new book list and activity guide that we’ve got for listeners. Kort, this book list feels like your brainchild, so do you want to tell us a little about where it started?
Kortney (02:11):
Sure. So we’ve got a brand new nature study book list, and in the homeschooling world, nature study’s kind of a big deal. It can be intimidating. It carries lots of expectations around it. In my mind, if nature study was going to count, it was going to mean that we were traveling somewhere scenic and tramping around in the mud and painting with watercolors and, if your kids are like-
Sarah (02:34):
Outside. Sitting outside.
Kortney (02:37):
Oh yes. In the mud. Yes. Oh yes. And if your kids are like mine, getting the biggest sticks ever known and hardly being able to carry them, but it being absolutely essential that we have them all. So nature study was something that I wanted to do, but it often got pushed to the back burner because, I don’t always have it in me to go watercolor in the mud. Or ever, sometimes. Let’s just be-
Sarah (03:01):
Sometimes.
Kortney (03:01):
Yeah. So I was wondering how could we simplify nature study, because if it’s simpler, it’s more likely to happen. Could nature study be as simple as reading a book and doing an activity together? So this brand new book list came right out of those questions.
Sarah (03:18):
Yeah, we were going to make a book list and then you said, “I wonder if we could pair it with a very simple activity.” And this idea of simple but bookish. I mean this is 100% my love language. This is all the things that I want to do. So actually what we did is we selected 12 books for each season of the year, and each book is paired with a very simple activity. You want this book list. It’s free and you can download it by going to [email protected]/222, because this is episode 222, or just by texting the word nature to the number 33777. I really think this simplicity is where this book list and activity guide shines, because it makes it really obvious that we really can keep things super simple. Like you said, Kort, we don’t have to go watercoloring in the mud, exactly. I mean if that’s your jam, but you don’t have to, to make these meaningful memories and give our kids a rich educational experience.
(04:19):
It kind of reminds me of a very recent episode. The three of us recorded, 220 about essentialism for homeschoolers, really creating rich learning experiences for our kids without adding a lot to our plate. It feels like this book list is nature study essentialism in action.
Kara (04:38):
It is. That’s a great way to put it. I love that. We were only going to select four books per season, but then we expanded it to 12, but this is important. Not because we think you need to do nature study every single week in your home, but just so you have options, because basically there are Read Aloud Revivalers everywhere, and so many of you use the library. And so we put 12 books for each season hoping that that gives you more options based on what’s available at your library, what your kids are interested in, books you already have on your shelves, all that good stuff.
Sarah (05:15):
Yes.
Kara (05:15):
But the key is that you can just flip to the winter section, for example, and pick any book from that winter section, read it and do the activity we’ve paired for it.
Kortney (05:25):
I really wanted to bring nature study close to home. Not we didn’t have to go on some excursion to find nature. It could be based on the foods that we eat, even. So seasonal foods like honey and blueberries and corn. We also wanted to make sure that the you, the listener could choose activities that aren’t necessarily tied to seasonal change because not everyone lives in a place that experiences traditional changes in season.
Sarah (05:53):
Not everybody’s buried in snow at the moment is what you’re saying.
Kortney (05:56):
It’s actually sunny here today, which is-
Sarah (05:59):
Oh, is it?
Kortney (06:00):
A big change and a big, I mean everyone is outside and I don’t expect them until it gets dark.
Sarah (06:06):
Except for you. You’re inside talking to us and we love you for it. Something we say in this guide is that when it comes to books, the most important thing is reading them, and when it comes to nature, the most important thing is to get out in it. And I think it’s very easy to sort of soup up something like nature study. It could be really simple, but then we just sort of tend to make it more complicated, not because we want to, but because we have very good intentions and we want to do it well. But I just want to take a second to encourage you to keep it simple, because reading and getting outside, that’s really the heart of it, no matter what age your kids are, which maybe we should talk a little bit about suggested ages.
Kara (06:47):
Oh yes, let’s do that. Because we purposefully created this book list and activity guide to be enjoyed by the whole family. There’s really no need to create separate nature-based activities for different ages. You can invite all your kids from toddlers to teens to learn about nature simply by reading good books, which we’ve curated for you in a list, and then observing the world around them.
Kortney (07:11):
Years ago, the tagline of this podcast was “Build your family culture around books.” And I mean that kind of can sound too abstract. How exactly do you do that? But really, that’s what we’re doing when we learn together. We’re building our family culture around books. So instead of worrying about grade levels, everyone receives what they’re ready for. Even you Mama. You get to be a part of this too. Your four-year-old will experience the book about owls differently than the 14-year-old. And that 14-year-old might even be ready to dig into research using back matter, or even working with the concepts that we talked about in episode 177 that was called Teach Your Kids to Think Like a Scientist. So things like scale and pattern and structure, they can start looking for things like that, even now.
Sarah (08:04):
I forgot about that episode. That’s a great episode to listen to after this one. Maybe we can link to it in the show notes. Yes.
Kortney (08:09):
Sure.
Sarah (08:11):
I love this idea of spreading a feast, especially if you have more than one child, because if you have more than one child, it means you are teaching kids with different temperaments and personalities and ages. And so what I love about this whole family learning in homeschooling is that we get to spread this feast and everyone just gets to take what they like. You don’t feel like you have to order everything on the menu when you go out to a restaurant. Same thing here. You just get to pick and choose, which is why I sort of want to emphasize what Kara, you had mentioned about just pick a couple from a season. You don’t need to order every single book in winter. And actually probably the Read Aloud Revival people in your community would be glad if you didn’t order every single book in the winter list during winter, for example. But then you can just sort of pick a couple and what sounds interesting to your kids.
(08:59):
That’s what I love about it. I love that idea of spreading this feast and everybody just takes what they’re fit for. So, with kids about age 12 and under, actually, I really think this book list could be your whole science curriculum.
Kortney (09:14):
Wait, that sounds huge.
Sarah (09:17):
Yeah, well really. I mean, read a book, do the activity, your kids are going to remember Snowflake Bentley and Catching Snowflakes, and they’re going to remember so much more about the history of when we first realized what a snowflake is and how they were first captured by reading the book then they are by working through a science textbook. So yeah, I think science could be this simple and really enjoyable, feels very freeing. It’s kind of goes back, I know we’ve said this on the show before, where there have been homeschooling moms who have used, let’s say I, Carol Joyce Side used to say you could homeschool with the Bible, a math book and a library card. And I think that’s true. And then I think Kara, you were mentioning a friend of yours that said she homeschooled with National Geographic subscription.
Kara (10:03):
Yes.
Sarah (10:04):
A creek and something else. I can’t remember what.
Kara (10:06):
Yes, A library card, a math curriculum, a National Geographic subscription and a creek.
Sarah (10:13):
Yeah. This really appeals to us, right? Because it’s very simple, but we also can sense a richness that we lose when we pile on a lot of things. So, yeah, I think this could be the heart or the whole, I should say.
Kara (10:27):
It’s true.
Sarah (10:27):
Of a science curriculum for younger kids, especially when we think about what we want our kids to know and do and love. So I think we should talk about that for a minute because, since we’re homeschoolers, we get to do things differently than traditional schools do with the “scope and sequence.” And we like to ask ourselves a few questions here at Read Aloud Revival.
(10:50):
One of the things I really like to ask myself is “What do I want my kids to know? What do I want them to be able to do? And what do I want them to love?” Because education is about growing in knowledge and skill and virtue. That’s what we need to know, learn new information, know things, knowledge. We need to grow in skills so we can do new things. And then we learn to love what is lovely and grow in wisdom and virtue. So if we can ask that know do love question, we can build an education for our kids that really enlivens their hearts and minds, gives them the skills they’ll need to be lifelong learners, and doesn’t need to be more complicated than this very simple guide sort of demonstrates.
Kara (11:33):
And I think that’s so powerful about this book list. Each book is already paired with an activity. So basically the know segment already paired with a do. And that sets the stage for our families to love nature, to love the world that God made, to love the world that God loves.
Kortney (11:53):
Exactly. Okay, so we know you want that book list now. So you can get your book list and activity guide by going to readaloudrevival.com/222 since this is episode 222. Or you can just text nature to the number 33777. Either way we’ll send you over this book list and activity guide right away. It’s so good. I was just, the way that you’ve paired activities with the books is just so wonderful. I can’t get over it.
Sarah (12:27):
Okay. I want to say just really quick though, one of the things that I think was so brilliant, Kortney, about this seed of an idea at the beginning, was I could tell because when you first passed over the idea to me, you already had a lot of books paired with activities, and one of the first things I noticed was that none of these activities needed special equipment. I didn’t have to go to the store and get cotton balls and I don’t know, rubbing alcohol, you know what I’m talking about. Everything was pretty much, I could just do it today because it was something that just sort of fits into the stream of life. Like go outside and identify some trees in your neighborhood or, I’m trying to think of another one off the top of my mind. Off the top of my head.
Kortney (13:09):
I don’t know. Kara was objecting to my addition of making jam as the paired activity for blueberries for Sal. She said that’s that’s not an easy, approachable activity. And I say if you want some jam lessons, you can come to my house because we’re making jam on the regular. It’s super simple and really, I mean you have to be like Sal’s mother on the end pages of blueberries for Sal and make some jam.
Sarah (13:37):
Okay. I think. Okay. That’s so fabulous because I saw that whole interchange between the two of you and I think I added a different simple activity like, “Okay, so you can make jam and also if you don’t want to make jam…” I think there’s something else in there I did.
Kortney (13:52):
She did the override of my jam.
Kara (13:54):
Okay, please make jam. I implore you, but if you’ve ever had the experience of, I don’t know, the house that you used to live in, still having strawberry jam explosion on the kitchen ceiling as you’re moving out, trying to figure out how to disguise this from the next homeowner. Yeah. Maybe it’s just me that jam’s not easy for. Oh, okay. I had to look. I had to grab my guide. So the activity is pick blueberries and make a pot of a jam and then in parentheses (or do a jam tasting.”
Sarah (14:35):
Oh, that would be lovely.
Kara (14:36):
If you keep this extra simple.
Kortney (14:37):
I was just going to say eat a blueberry.
Sarah (14:39):
Yes, exactly. Exactly.
Kortney (14:40):
That’s my speed.
Sarah (14:43):
I love it. Okay, so let’s talk about some of our favorites on this list. Kara, you want to start?
Kara (14:50):
I do. I love this book. Celia Planted a Garden by Phyllis Root.
Sarah (14:55):
Yes.
Kara (14:56):
And Gary D. Schmidt and Illustrated by Melissa Sweet. So total powerhouse group in there.
Sarah (15:04):
I know you see those names on a book cover and you’re like, “Yeah, okay, I’ll buy that before I even look at it.”
Kara (15:10):
Yeah. Who do you want to have dinner with? Dinner party guests? So I just want to read, and Kortney, you pointed this out too, I want to read the first paragraph because it feels so classic Gary Schmidt. That it’s really kind of hard to miss.
Sarah (15:27):
Now I’m intrigued ’cause I don’t know, I know the book of course, but I don’t know what the first line is. First paragraph.
Kara (15:33):
Okay. “When Celia Layton was very young, she lived on White Island, where the rocks were gray and white and the waves that broke on the rocks were gray and white, and the seagulls that rode the sea were gray and white.”
Sarah (15:49):
Oh.
Kara (15:51):
I just love it. I love it. And of course Melissa Sweet brings collage that is so engaging. She adds typography that just makes you want to just go back, and I mean the minute I read it, I wanted to read it again. I wanted to look through it again. I kind of couldn’t put it down. It has great back matter. It’s the perfect example of a book that’s science and nature study. Yes, but also includes other topics. History, poetry, art, and it’s all about finding color, and our activity guide gives you a chance to do that, and it just feels like the perfect bright and springy activity and book pairing to do together. Now I picked this one to highlight because I loved it when I first saw it and I was excited that it made the list, but then a few days later we decided it’s going to be an RAR premium book club pick for this year. So if you want to know more about that, be sure to check out premium at rarpremium.com.
Sarah (16:52):
Yeah, I mean I think you can’t take the illustrations by Melissa Sweet and not just think of so many different layers to peel back and learn more, and her illustrations just make you want to look longer. So I have some ideas for that family book club guide already. I’m very excited.
Kara (17:08):
Love it.
Sarah (17:08):
Yeah.
Kara (17:08):
So good.
Kortney (17:09):
Yeah, I love her colors. I don’t know, they just sing spring to me. They’re just yummy. And color plays a really big part in the book that I chose to, it’s one of my favorites from the list, a brand new book that was published in 2022 called The Tide Pool Waits. It’s written by Candace Fleming and illustrated by Amy Hevron.
Kara (17:31):
This book, Candace Fleming is one of my favorite authors.
Kortney (17:35):
I know. I know. And what about Amy Hevron? Do you know her word?
Kara (17:36):
I’m not as familiar with her but, since you put this book on my radar. I’ve got and seen a few different books. What? I’m trying to think of another one that she’s done.
Sarah (17:44):
She did the book about herons.
Kara (17:47):
Oh yes.
Sarah (17:48):
Which is just-
Kara (17:49):
The Longest Journey.
Sarah (17:49):
And they’re migration.
Kortney (17:50):
Yes.
Kara (17:51):
Yes, yes.
Sarah (17:52):
It is just absolutely wonderful.
Kortney (17:52):
Is it Arctic Turns?
Kara (17:56):
It is. No, you’re right, it is Arctic Turns. I’m sorry.
Kortney (17:59):
Okay.
Kara (17:59):
Yes, it’s Arctic Turns.
Kortney (17:59):
Yeah.
Kara (18:00):
And that is an example of a perfect picture book for older kids when you kind of think, “Oh, are we still at a picture book stage?” You definitely are with that book. I mean, like I said, “My kids are 16 and 19. It’s so good.
Sarah (18:15):
Yeah, so good. You heard it here folks on the Read Aloud Revival. They’re 16 and they’re still, it is. They are absolutely picture book aged.
Kara (18:23):
Yes.
Sarah (18:23):
We will stand by that till we lose our breath, won’t we ladies?
Kara (18:27):
Until we lose our breath.
Sarah (18:31):
Not to be dramatic or anything.
Kortney (18:32):
Just a little dramatic.
Sarah (18:36):
Okay, so tell me about this book.
Kortney (18:37):
Well, wait, I want to tell you about older kids and picture books because I think that actually is the test. I mean, we as mamas, we’ve got our own opinions about the books and what we like and what draws our eye, but when I bring a stack of books home because I’m doing research for a book list and they sort of get distributed around the house, I can tell the books that are actually going to make it onto the list, because those are the ones that I have to go get out of the bunk beds and find them, because those are the ones that the kids are actually reading. So I mean kid approved books, that’s a real thing.
Kara (19:11):
Yeah, it is. It’s like we have our own little focus groups.
Sarah (19:15):
We talk about that every award season when we do our annual podcast, we talk about our kids being our little focus groups and what books we think should have won awards and they think should have won awards. It’s a lot of fun.
Kortney (19:28):
That’s coming up. So let me tell you about the Tide Pool Waits. It’s a book obviously about ocean tides and the creatures that live in the tidal zone. It is an excellent read aloud. The imagery is rich, there’s repetition alliteration, and the illustrations. They’re done in acrylics, and they are stunning. They’re the kind of thing that I think is going to inspire kids to want to try their hand at. But most of us don’t live, don’t have direct access to the ocean. So if you can go to the coast or to an aquarium, that is a wonderful bonus, but if you can’t, the back matter and the in papers of The Tide Pool Waits are full of specimen images, and those are great for drawing and adding to your nature journal. When I see a book like this, I think “This is what a picture book should be.” It is the perfect combination of poetic writing and engaging artwork and there are plenty of rabbit trails to keep on learning.
Kara (20:30):
You are also pointing out something key, I think, Kortney, not just if you don’t have a coast close by or an aquarium that you can go to, but also kind of going back to what we were talking about at the beginning of the episode, sometimes we overcomplicate because we think nature study means we have to go get in it. And that’s great. I mean that is the most wonderful part about getting outside is getting outside. But let’s say you’re in a season where you just can’t. Maybe you have a new baby, maybe there’s just a lot of different things that could happen that would make that difficult. You don’t have to say, “Well, we’re not doing any nature study. With The Tide Pool Waits, the activity we’ve paired in the back or we’ve paired with the book is that you can visit a tide pool if you have tide pool access to you, but if you don’t choose a creature from the back from book to sketch into your nature journal.
(21:18):
You can learn more about it in the back of the book. You can just look really close at the picture and sketch it. So your nature study can happen right at your kitchen table. And so don’t let that sort of keep you back from, if now’s not a good time for you to go on adventures, there’s a lot of times in my parenting life where it has not been a good time to go on adventures. So the freedom to know you can do good nature study with your book as your main thing is really freeing, I think.
Kortney (21:44):
I mean I think we can underestimate the goodness of that sort of prolonged looking and that looking, again, like you were saying with Melissa Sweet’s illustrations, that contemplative reading, where we’re not just rushing to the end but we’re lingering. That sort of attention is going to pay dividends richer than any trip to the beach could.
Kara (22:05):
Yeah, that’s true. That’s true.
Sarah (22:06):
I just thought as you were saying that too, that we have an episode with Greta Eskridge where she talks about exploring, inspiring a love of nature through books.
Kara (22:18):
Yes, that’s right.
Sarah (22:19):
I’m trying to find which number that was for us. Looks like number 62, and she talks right about tide pools right in there, but also ways to make nature journaling less stressful for everyone, and how books can transport us to nature when we can’t actually be out in nature, which is like you said, a very real thing sometimes for us.
Kara (22:44):
Yeah.
Sarah (22:46):
Okay, so one of my favorite books that’s on this list is brand new in the last year and you introduced me to it, Kortney, that just seems like a running theme for this episode. It’s all the things that Kortney introduced. It’s called Of Walden Pond, Henry David Thoreau, Frederick Tudor, And The Pond Between this one is written by the absolutely lovely Lesa Cline-Ransome and it’s illustrated by Ashley Benham Yazdani and, I met, okay, so first of all, we’ve had Lesa here on the show. We’ve had her in RAR Premium to teach kids in a wow workshop. We love her and her husband James as well. And then I met Ashley at a conference several years ago, bookish conference for her first book that had just come out. And then so those two names sort of caught my attention. And then also my family took a trip to Boston last summer and we spent a whole afternoon at Walden Pond. We had never been.
(23:45):
The kids were swimming in the pond, which is not really a pond, you guys, it’s a lake. I mean, I don’t know, we don’t call that a pond where I come from. It was definitely a lake. We were all kind of staring at it and the kids are like, “So is that the pond?” I’m like, “I mean, yeah. I’m not really sure why it’s called a pond.” There’s trails to walk, and then you can actually go see where Thoreau’s cabin really stood. It’s not still standing there, but there’s like these rocks, people put rocks there to, yeah, it’s so sweet. And so I’ve got some pictures. I’ll put them in the show notes. I’ve got pictures of my family putting rocks there, and then at a different part of Walden Pond, they have a replica of what Thoreau’s cabin would’ve looked like. So anyway, so I have all this background knowledge and I see this book and I’m like, “Oh, you’ve got to be kidding.” So I tell my kids, “Come here, let’s read this book together.”
(24:35):
And it was so lovely. And then at the end, Clara, who’s, she’s my 10-year-old and she’s always the one who for as long as I can remember, has been like, “Did this one really happen?” And it’s so fun when I can say, “Yes. This one really happened and let’s like look through some of the back matter to see.” It basically tells a story of Thoreau and his time at Walden, which paralleled Frederick Tudor’s quest to harvest ice from Walden Pond. Everybody thought he was crazy for doing it. He was failing as a businessman. Anyway, there’s lots to look at in the illustrations. Lesa’s writing is just perfect. And then the very simple activity you compare with that is just to go on a walk and look for ice on tree branches or for frost on windows, and take closeup photographs. And if you don’t have ice on your tree branches or frost on your windows, I’m jealous because we have a lot of ice right now.
(25:26):
But you could also just take up close photographs of ice and you’ll probably be a little surprised at what you see. Just the act of taking an up close photograph helps your eyes to see things it doesn’t see otherwise, so.
Kortney (25:41):
Oh, I love it. I’m jealous of your trip. That sounds wonderful. I’m actually jealous of the book because I haven’t actually seen this book.
Sarah (25:49):
Oh, you haven’t?
Kortney (25:50):
Okay. Our library doesn’t have it and so I’ve heard of it, but I have not seen it yet, so it is on my list.
Sarah (25:57):
You just passed it over and said, “Hey, have you seen this yet?”
Kortney (25:59):
Yeah.
Sarah (26:00):
And I think I got it the same day. I walked down to the bookstore. This is not too far away, and I got myself a coffee. I was like, “They have one. I better go but get it.”
Kortney (26:07):
Yeah.
Sarah (26:09):
I also wanted to mention a book that we put at the front of the guide, which is called Sing a Song of Seasons, nature poems for every day of the year. I love this book. Have you both seen this book?
Kortney (26:18):
Yeah.
Kara (26:18):
Yes.
Kortney (26:20):
Yeah.
Sarah (26:20):
I keep ours out all the time. We don’t read it every day. I don’t do anything 365 days a year except maybe brush my teeth. I shouldn’t say maybe. Now everybody’s wondering> except I do you brush my teeth?
Kara (26:31):
She does.
Sarah (26:32):
Okay. But I don’t read the poem every day of the year, but we keep it out and then we’ll read some nature poems around whatever time of year, and some of them are funny, some of them are quiet. I adore the illustrations. I cannot remember who the illustrator is off the top of my head.
Kortney (26:49):
I do know them.
Sarah (26:51):
But I just love them. This is this big, gorgeous, beautiful hardback book with a pretty ribbon. It’s like an art book really that you could keep out. But anyway, it’s one that’s worth adding to your home collection if you can, because then, no matter what time of year it is, you always have some good poetry that goes with that season.
Kortney (27:08):
And that, I mean, it’s sort of what Kara was mentioning, that it’s great to have nature study science books, but that they’re so connected to history and art and poems as well. That just enriches everything.
Sarah (27:22):
I love the suggestion in the guide to leave it open as part of a nature display so that kids can kind of come across it and look through it when they’re exploring.
Kara (27:36):
When they’re adding their very big sticks to the collection.
Sarah (27:38):
Yes. My kids, they can’t help themselves. Acorn caps, it’s like they have a magnet inside of their body that draws them to acorn caps, so we always have acorn caps, floating around our house and pine cones, and then probably random bugs that came in on the acorn caps and-
Kara (27:55):
Have I ever told you about we brought home acorns and then one day there were holes in the acorns and we had little friends crawling all over from the holes in the acorns, and-
Sarah (28:08):
This is not the kind of nature study I want to do, but that sounds like some up close nature study.
Kara (28:13):
It was. It was actually kind of wonderful because we were like, “How did that happen? How does that happen?” It’s so sort of like when you raise butterflies in your house or something like that. You want to know more about it, but there was also a moment of why are there holes and what made the holes and where are the things that made the holes?
Sarah (28:32):
And can we escort them back out where they belong?
Kara (28:35):
Then once we figured all that out, then it was actually really cool.
Sarah (28:38):
Yeah. Yeah. That is really cool. Okay, well I think we’ve been talking for long enough. Make sure you grab that book list and activity guide. Readaloudrevival.com/222 or by texting nature to 33777. Let’s hear what the kids are enjoying these days, shall we?
Bonnie (29:00):
Hi, my name is Bonnie. I’m 10 and a half. I live in Tennessee and one of my favorite books is The Long West Home by Mary Rosewood. I like it because Penelope finds her parents.
Piper (29:10):
Hi Sarah. My name’s Piper Christie. I live in Acton, Massachusetts. I’m 11 years old. I was wondering if you could do an author access with Sharon Preach. I fell in love with her writing after I read one of her books. Walk Two Minutes.
Herbert (29:24):
My name is Herbert and I’m in Tennessee and my favorite book is [inaudible 00:29:32] and a book.
Speaker 7 (29:32):
What series is that from?
Herbert (29:32):
Alfred and Picky.
Speaker 7 (29:33):
And why do you like that book?
Herbert (29:40):
Because it’s so funny.
Emma (29:41):
My name’s Emma, and I’m four years old. I live in New York and my favorite book Kay In The Bedroom and why I like it is because she never gets tired.
Finlay (30:02):
Hi Sarah. My name is Finlay Christie and I’m eight years old and I live in Acton Mass. And I want to do a book club with Leroy Minker.
Sarah (30:16):
Thank you kids. That’s it for us today. Grab your Nature study book list and activity guide for [email protected]/222 or by texting nature to 33777. We’ll be back in two weeks. We’ve got to talk about those ALA awards, the books that won, and a few that should have. We’re talking all things Caldecott and Newbury and Coretta Scott King and Seabert, and it’s all coming up here at Read Aloud Revival. Make sure you are subscribed to the podcast so you don’t miss it. Until next time, go make meaningful and lasting connections with your kids through books.
(30:58):
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. This podcast has been downloaded over 8 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 kind of overwhelming, right? 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.
(32:26):
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. 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.
