A Few Changes to our Morning Devotional and my New Books!

I went to a few classes at a homeschooling seminar yesterday.  One of the classes I attended was about teaching your kids through literature.  She gave me some great ideas like "come along reading" when a child reads to you while you get other things done.  I also liked the idea of putting poems and other things I want the kids to memorize up on the bathroom walls for them to look at (instead of the blank wall).  She gave us several book recommendations.  She talked about the importance of letting kids have their own books and not  just getting them from the library.  I loved this because I've always wanted a small home library filled with classic literature, but I sometimes felt unjustified buying books since I knew we could get them for free at the library.  I have found there are several books that we just need to own and I was glad to have her validate that for me.

Something she said that was indispensable to her was a graded reading set (like Childcraft or Bookshelf for Boys and Girls).  She specifically recommended "My Book House" as her favorite.   She recommended buying it on ebay or checking thrift stores.  So guess what I did during the lunch break?

The first thrift store I checked did not have the set, but I came away with about 20 other classic books and spent about 20 dollars.  I went to one more thrift store just to quickly check if they had any of the books in the My Book House series (I figure I could slowly gather the books as I came across them).  They had the ENTIRE set except for #10!  I got them all for 20 dollars!   You can imagine my excitement!

I've been looking through them this morning.  I love the content!  I've decided that I'm going to read from these stories during our "fiction" section of morning devotional (even though some of them are historical stories).  We had been reading from Andrew Lang's Blue Fairy Book, but we're about half way through it and I'm not loving it.  If anyone knows why the Andrew Lang books are supposed to be such great classics for children, please let me know.  They are a collection of many different fairy tales from a variety of authors, so I can see why they might be important, but a few (well, most) of the ones I've read are quite gruesome and really long.  I'm thinking I might skip all of the Andrew Lang books in our Good Books study plan. At least until we run out of other short stories and tales to read that I like better (like the ones in the My Book House series).  I have really been impressed with the other books on the Good Books list so we'll stick with it, but I'll just skip the Andrew Lang books for now.  Maybe I'll change my mind when I'm wiser :-)

Another great thing I bought was some coloring books.  I've mentioned how my kids like to color during devotionals.  I got some of the Dover educational coloring books and told the kids that they were very special books and in order to color in them, they had to do their best to color them accurately (like the real thing).  The books have small pictures of the real thing and you color a large picture of your own.  They're pretty cool.

One more thing that I decided to incorporate into our morning devotional is a poem recital.  We already memorize a hymn by singing it everyday until we have it down and a scripture (the Articles of Faith for now).  I like to read a poem everyday, but I think it would be good if we chose one to recite as well, until we have it memorized.  I've tried to explain to the kids that when we memorize something it's like putting great books inside our head that we can open whenever we need encouragement or advise.  I want to carefully select encouraging poems that they can think of when they need them.

Here is a great poem that I recently memorized (recommended by my very wise friend, Lara):

If by Rudyard Kipling

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn out tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on";

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run -
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man my son!

I love it.  It was so great to memorize it because I got so much more out of it.  Quiz me on it next time you see me!