Reading to the Kids

Today is Wednesday, and Wednesday mornings are for taking care of the homeschool kids while their moms are in the Bible study, and one of the best parts is reading to the little guys (5-6 years old).

Today was a very good day because, after a month of various illnesses, most of my littlest lambs were back. Also, we read 4 books, so they were very happy.

Our books for today:

Ol' Mama Squirrel by David Ezra Stein

When I Was Young in the Mountains by Cynthia Rylant, illustrated by Diane Goode

ish by Peter H. Reynolds

My Daddy is a Cowboy by Stephanie Seales, illustrated by C.G. Esperanza

The children were full of energy, questions, and comments this morning. There were a lot of requests to see something in the picture, to know who the person was, to know why someone did something, to know what was going to happen.... I finally asked, "Do you know how books work? I read, you listen, and then you'll find out!" But I wasn't actually feeling impatient with them; I was more amused at their chatter.

There were also judgements of the characters ("He's not being nice to his sister"), misunderstandings ("Why did he throw out her pictures?" "He didn't; he threw out his own pictures and she rescued them"), and random thoughts ("I'm going swimming today!").

The best was when we got to the last book, My Daddy is a Cowboy. They had so many questions and comments about the people and the horses and the people who weren't even in the story and the cake in the shop window. Every page elicited more questions and comments.

Then we got to the line where the little girl talks about her daddy telling her stories about his childhood and says, "I listen closely and only interrupt five times to ask questions." 

And my sweet lambs thought that five times was a lot and that she shouldn't interrupt. I just laughed at them and kept going.

Wednesday morning story time is one of my favourite times.

From the Kids

In Sunday School we were talking about the Christmas story, and I was getting the kids to tell me the whole thing in order. We got up to Joseph planning to leave Mary.

Me: And why was Joseph upset?

Student: Because he thought she had married someone else.

Other students agreed that this was the problem and I didn't correct them. I am actually quite happy that this as much as they know just yet. Not all 10 and 11 year olds are so innocent.

Another bit of conversation that made me happy came from a 13 (or maybe 14) year old. I spend Christmas with friends every year; I generally sleep over for at least 2 nights. The young man's mom and I were talking about how we can't wait and it's very soon.

His addition to the conversation: Yes! And Anatole!

The "Anatole" in question is the hero of a series of picture books written by Eve Titus in the 1950s-70s. They follow the adventures of a brave mouse and his family who live in a small village just outside Paris. I brought a couple of the over one visit a few years ago to read to the children and they hope for them every time I visit. In fact, last visit, when I started to read to his younger brother, the young man above ran into the room concerned that we were reading "Anatole" without him! (We weren't, but he stayed for story time anyway.)

I thought the boys would outgrow the Anatole books by now, but evidently not. I should have a new one for them by Christmas as a surprise; it's on the way from a used book shop in the states. I'm still missing a few (Anatole and the Robot; Anatole and the Poodle; and Anatole in Italy). They are difficult to find and generally quite expensive when I do find them; I was pleased to find Anatole and the Pied Piper for under $15.00.

I am very pleased that the boys still enjoy story time (the big kids often make their way to the room as well), and that they haven't outgrown picture books with good stories. In fact, this family is a book family and mom and dad reading to the kids (and to each other) has always been a part of their life. It's fun for all of us when I get to read to them as well!

A Story from a Sunday School Girl

It was very weird. It was very, very weird.

I was at the park with my mom and my sister. I was playing with my little sister but then I abandoned her.

(I did not abandon her; I asked politely.)

I was casually doing the monkey bars.

There was another girl. She came out of a tunnel. She just appeared.

She had the same name; she stole my name.

Her mom had the same name as my mom.

She was born the day before me.

She had the same hair as me and the same eyes as me.

Maybe it was my conscience.

The Many Problems of Rochel-Leah

Tuesday is tutoring day. I spend the afternoon working with three lovely children; they are 10, 8, and 6 years old. I do some reading and math (and talking and educational games and whatever comes up) with each child individually and then we do an activity together.

Lately we've been learning about different countries. We find the country on the map, read a book about the country, and then they do a craft that is somehow related while I read stories that usually take place in the country.

Yesterday we learned a bit about Russia, and while they started on a simple nesting doll craft (pretty dolls for the girls and soldiers for the boy), I read them two stories from Russia. We first read The Turnip by Jan Brett. It's a fun story and the children enjoyed it. What really caught their attention, though, was The Many Problems of Rochel-Leah, written by Jane Yolen and illustrated by Felishia Henditirto.

Rochel-Leah's main problem is that she is a girl living in a small Jewish village in Russia in 1835 and she wants to learn how to read. Her mom and aunts can't help her because they don't know how to read and everyone else doesn't think she needs to learn to read; in fact, she is told that the rules are that only boys learn to read. Rochel-Leah is determined, and in the end some rules are bent a bit so she can learn to read.

The story is based on the author's family history and a story that was passed down though the ages. She says in the book that it's true-ish.

Usually when I read, the oldest child listens and does the craft at the same time; the middle child stops working regularly as he listens; and the youngest mostly does the craft with some interest in the story. This time, all three stopped working and focused entirely on the book. I don't know how much was the story and how much was the excellent illustrations, but this one held their attention like few other stories do when craft time is involve. 

My favourite part was when Rochel-Leah is learning to read. The youngest child was so excited because "Now she can teach her mom to read!"

My second-favourite part was after we were done, listening to her tell her mom the story with all the drama and excitement. I was asked to let them borrow the book so they can share the story with their mom; of course I said yes.

I am adding The Many Problems of Rochel-Leah to my list of books to read to the Wednesday morning kids next year.

From the Kids

A conversation with a 4-year-old last Sunday:

Me (showing him a picture): It's a heart. You have one inside you. (Pointing to his chest)

Him: No, I don't have heart. Daddy has one.

Me: Yes, you have a heart. It goes bum-bump; bum-bump. It makes your blood flow through your body.

Him: I don't want a heart!

I also had to roll up my sleeves and prove to him that I have elbows since I could see his but he couldn't see mine!

From the Kids

Wednesday morning I was reading to my little guys. They had been impressed by how many books I owned (based on how many I've read to them) until I told them that most of them came from the library. They they reminded me that I have to give them back!

Once I got on with the reading, this conversation occurred:

Small 5-year-old girl: How do you know what the story is?

Me (slightly perplexed): I can read. 
Me (pointing to the words): The story is right here.

Her: Those letters tell the story?

Me: Yes. The letters make words and they tell the story.

She can't read quite yet and was quite surprised to learn that letters can make words that can then make stories! She (and some of the others) were quite impressed that I can read all of the words!

I love 5-year-olds; they're so easily impressed.

Sunday School

Yesterday one of my younglings suggested that I could go teach another class and Pastor James could come in and preach for them. I confirmed that he was not suggesting a one time substitution; no, he was ready to replace me with Pastor James!

I considered being offended, but I was laughing at how calmly he suggested the change! Also, I was thankful that we have pastors who take time for the children rather than focusing only on adults as the important people. I have seen Pastor James (and sometimes the others) talking with the youngsters who have very important things to tell him and sometimes pictures that they have drawn for him. He's very patient with them and interested in all they have to say.

Side note, the rest of the class was willing to keep me around!

Anyway, I explained to my young student that Pastor James already preaches twice on Sunday and he would not be able to teach Sunday School as well. I did tell him that I would ask Pastor James if he would like to teach, or at least visit, one Sunday when he isn't preaching.

He seemed to be okay with the possibility of a visit from Pastor James and that he's stuck with me!

From a Student

Yesterday in history class we were, for reasons I don't remember, discussing talking to yourself. The conversation was about whether or not talking to yourself makes you crazy (it does not). 

One girl said that she always talks to herself because she's the funniest person she knows and she jokes and laughs at her conversation.. She likes it when she's home alone because she can wander around the house and talk to herself all the time.

I love her confidence.

From a Helper

Most of my homeschool and Sunday School stories come from the kids, but this one comes from one of the helpers! He is only 16 and many of my earlier stories were about him, so it's no surprise that he's still coming up in "things the kids say".

Anyway, I was with my older group of younger kids when this particular helper came from his room across the hall to talk with me. The conversation went something like this:

Him: I need to leave the room for a couple minutes.

Me: No you don't.

Him: I need to get some water.

Me: You're supposed to do that before we start.

Him: I know, but there's something wrong with my coffee. There's something strange in it.

Me (and the children): <guessing random things that may be in his coffee>

Him: No, there's something black in my coffee.

Me: Is it coffee?

Him: No, it's like black bits in the coffee.

Me: So coffee grounds?

Him: Oh...yeah....I didn't think of that!

Me: You were concerned because there was coffee in your coffee?

Him: I was wondering of the sugar could go bad or something.

He left and returned to his room while we laughed and then returned to our game.

A Story About Storytime

This morning I was back in with my Wednesday morning kids. We haven't had women's study since the end of November, so I was really happy to start up again. For trivia we did Birds of North America which turned out to be incredibly challenging. Then I read my little guys our weekly stack of picture books. 

We were reading Room for More by Michelle Kadarusman, illustrated by Maggie Zeng. The story takes place in Australia during a bushfire. Two wombats, Dig and Scratch, are happily hiding out in their nice, deep burrow when they hear footsteps overhead and start inviting animals to join them to escape the fire. First there's a wallaby and her joey, then a koala. Then along comes a tiger snake. One wombat is concerned because snakes have venom.

After I explained what venom is and that if a venomous snake bit you, you would get sick or maybe die, and that's why the wombat was worried, one small child piped up, "I bet that's what happens!"

Honestly, what type of children's story do the think I'm going to read to them? Happy, friendly animals until they rescue a tiger snake who bites them all?

I mean....there was the Babar incident. I had quite forgotten that his mother dies at the beginning of the story (shot by poachers while Babar was on her back) and that later the king turns green and dies. And the first one I read in the homeschool room many years ago was Charlotte's Web, so there is that. 

But these ones were just babies when I read those stories (in fact, Charlotte's Web was so long ago that these ones may not have been born). All they get are happier stories, but they still predict (or hope for) character death every now and then.

I should read them Where the Red Fern Grows. That would scar them for life!

Almost a book review by a student

One of my tutoring students has been reading Romeo and Juliet. She is not overly impressed by it; in fact, rather than view it as either a romance or a tragedy, she has declared it a comedy. She finds the entire story over-the-top absurd! I love talking with her about it because I view it as a cautionary tale: don't rush into a relationship and always listen to your parents. Between the two of us, we've really torn the entire story apart and it's been so much fun!

A couple quotes from her essay:

Romeo and Juliet is one of the most famous dramas in history, and yet it is quite silly.

It goes on and on. In the end they are both dead. There is quite a lot of drama in this drama.

Suffice to say, she is not a huge fan of Romeo and Juliet! It's quite nice to teach young ladies who don't think the whole thing is just sooooo romantic!

From the Children

I have a group of Sunday School girls over and the conversations are... interesting...

"You could cook a hotdog on his mustache."

"We're not a bunch of old ladies to sit around and gossip."

"I was ironing one of my siblings..."

A song: "Doritos... Doritos... where are the Doritos?"

"Oh, no... that was the other red yo-yo!"

"Do you like moose...or pizza?"

"If someone gave you a pet deer, what would you do with it?"

"She's my best friend, so I can be rude to her."

"I need a calmer craft than agonizing painting, like gluing with deadly glue guns."

"There's so much things you have to learn about growing up."

The Imagination of a Small Child

The family I met with yesterday has two girls of school age and a small boy (he's about 2 1/2). The small boy was very happy to see me, to tell me that he plays basketball, and to show me how he can drive a train by straddling his dad's guitar case and making all the train noises. He drove that train all the way to the Philippines. 

Later, when I was in his sister's room as she told me what she had been doing in school, there was a small voice coming down the hall, saying over and over, "Penguin, penguin, penguin..." When I turned to look, the small boy was standing on a blanket, holding the front part up in front of his legs with the rest trailing behind. He was shuffling along like a happy little penguin. When he got to us, he smiled and said, "I'm a penguin!"

He loves the story of David and Goliath and, using his sister's headband as a sling, pretended to throw a stone at me. I fell backwards on the couch and stayed very still. The small boy laughed and then said, "Wake up, giant!" so he could get me again.

From the Kids

A conversation with a 7-year-old boy:

Me: What do you want to do when you grow up?

Him: I'm going to have a job.

Me: What type of job?

Him: You know, a job, like dads do!

Me: Dads do different types of jobs. I don't know what job you mean.

Him: Yes you do! Like dads have jobs and they go to work.

Eventually we got to the idea that he wants to be in construction like his dad and build a skyscraper. Also, his dad now works in the office, which led to his final plans.

Him: When dad is old and I'm taller than him, I'll take over in the office.

A conversation with a 6-year-old girl whose mom is trying to get her to tell me that she finished a level in swimming:

Mom: What did you pass recently?

Her: I don't know.

Mom: When we were at swimming on Monday, you passed...

Her, thinking very hard: Um...a hula hoop!

Bits of Church Stuff

Today we started on the book of James in Sunday School. I was doing an introduction, and it wasn't long enough for the whole class, so we had time for some "Bible trivia". Basically, I ask them questions such as, "What is the 7th book in the Bible?" and "What is the fourth word in the eighteenth chapter of Isaiah?" and "What does Jesus talk about in Matthew 11?" It's all sorts of questions based on where I flip in the Bible, and the kids love it. Today we talked a bit about the valley of dry bones and how they came together and became people, and then about women eating their babies during a famine. The students were horrified and I realized that they don't all know these stories. I told them that next year maybe I should teach "gross stuff in the Bible".

Pastor James finished 1 Corinthians 14 today, talking about order in the church. It was a good sermon. I'm looking forward to the next few weeks because I love chapter 15.

I don't chew gum very often (almost never), but the past 2 weeks, the family I sit with has passed a piece of gum down to me during the sermon, so I've been chewing it. It's good gum; the mint is very strong and the flavour lasts a good while. The thing that I have trouble with is: what do you do with the gum when talking or singing? I sort of shove it to the side of my mouth, or stick it to one of my back teeth to get it out of the way, but I'm always aware of it. Do other people have that problem?

Two of the small boys were playing after the service, and one of the small girls was trying to keep up with them. She kept coming up to me to keep me updated on what was going on. I'm not sure what the game was, but it seems that one of them had been shot in the arm and leg (he seemed to be unbothered by it and didn't slow down one bit), and then she told me, "I can't find my boys and I've been shot in the leg!" before she ran off in pursuit of her boys. I'm still not sure what was going on!

So that was church today. It was good. Here's a song for you:

Sunday Notes

I'm pretty tired today, and there's not a lot to say. Church was good. The only problem is that Pastor James preached a "part 1" sermon, and now he's off for a couple weeks, so Pastor Mike is preaching. I like Mike and his preaching, but really...to leave us with a cliff hanger for a few weeks? That's just mean!

I can share my friend's son's joke with you. He send it to me for my birthday:

What do you do when you can't find any socks?
You run around with stinky feet all day!

He's six.

My birthday was nice. There was cake, and friends to share the cake with, so it was very good.

Here's a song for you....

A Story For You

It started with the joke of the week from work:

Question: How do you get a baby alien to sleep?
Answer: You rocket!

I texted it to a friend (just the question, not the answer). She said that her small son (who is not quite 6) thinks you give it a teddy bear. Also, he was considering (and seriously thinking) that I had a baby alien at home.

Where some people hear a riddle to solve, others hear a request for parenting advice.

What I like best is that he completely accepted that I might have a baby alien.

I told her the answer. She and the older son were amused. The little guy didn't get it, so she tried to explain the rock it/rocket idea, but that was a mistake. He became fixated on the rocked and started asking her all about it. She said that conversation went on for too long.

I may have to send her all my jokes so she can try explaining them the her small son.

Bits of Stuff

Sunday School starts tomorrow. I think I'm ready. I'm not even teaching this year (except tomorrow, to cover for the teachers who are still on vacation) and I still feel overwhelmed by the amount of stuff I needed to do to get ready. It's probably best that I'm taking the year off of teaching! I'm actually using the year to train teachers, and to get more structure in the program. The best news is that we have substitute teachers now, so I won't even have to fill in that often.

The other day I was had a small student reading a sentence. It started "The rules..." which he read "The reptiles..."! I stopped him and had him actually look at the word, so he stared at it, and then tried decoding, and came up with "letters". How? How do you get from reptiles to letters anyway? He said that he forgot about the first r in the word.

I am loving the cooler weather. The temperature drops nicely at night, and hovers in the mid-teens during the day. Fall makes me happy.

Today I made soup and a rice-and-sausage casserole. I also made grape juice because the grapes weren't good for eating (they were sweet, but the peel was not nice, and I was not going to peel all my grapes). I need to let it sit over night and then strain it again, so I'm not sure how it turned out.

It is 25 days until vacation. I plan to stay home and relax and maybe get stuff done.

Life is nice right now.

It's Time to Start Again

Okay, let's try this blog thing again. I have a lot going on in my head, but there are some complications when it comes to blogging:

1. I don't want to share everything with the world (or the bit of the world that still reads this).

2. When I'm thinking about things that I could blog, it isn't always a convenient time to write.

3. I'm trying to stay off the computer in the evenings, there's not a lot of time to write in the mornings, and I'm usually at work during the day.

On the other hand, I like writing, and I do have thoughts that I can share. So here's the plan: I'm going to try updating the blog at least once a week. We'll see how that works for now.

And for those of you who have hung in there, waiting for words, I have 2 stories for you:

From work:

One of my students was trying to show off how smart he is, so I pointed out that I still know more math than he does. His response:
"That's because I'm only in grade 6, and you're in grade...adult!"

From Junior Church:

We were talking about Moses (who, despite what one small sweetheart thought, was never thrown into a pit by his brothers). We were talking about how God knew that Pharaoh would say No to Moses, and how God knows everything. We don't know everything: not us, or our parents, or the pastors, or anyone. Then this conversation happened:

Small girl, very thoughtfully: But I think Pastor James and Pastor Mike know a LOT about God and the Bible.

Me: Well, yes, or they'd have to or they wouldn't be very good pastors.

Smaller girl, with all the intensity of a Very Serious 4-year old: Pastor James and Pastor Mike are VERY good pastors because they teach us about God and Jesus.

There was general agreement, and I assured them that yes, I know that they are very good pastors. I was also trying not to laugh at how quickly they came to the pastors' (unnecessary) defense.

From the Children

I was doing a comprehension assessment with a grade 1 child yesterday. He read about children getting ready to go on a field trip and then I asked him some questions.

Question: Why would Mrs. Brown tell the children not to push one another?

His answer: Because if they were shoving they might accidentally hit the ejector button and the person would go in the air and float back down.

Official answer: So no one would get hurt. Accept other reasonable responses.

I accepted his answer as a reasonable response.


This morning we were talking about snakes in Junior Church during colouring time. One student insisted that all snakes are poisonous. I corrected that (and told them they should never pick up a snake anyway unless a grown up tells them it's okay). Another one told me that snakes stick out their tongues and lick you and then you turn into a snake. He insisted that it happened in a cartoon. I insisted that it never happens in the real world.

And...this morning I was called upon to unlock a room for the Junior/Senior High Sunday School class. I found my keys and went to the room to find the entire class standing around outside. I asked if anyone had tried the door and they told me that someone had. Then I tried the door. It was unlocked. Someone needs door-opening lessons.