Bring Reading Rainbow To All Kids!

Image: Wikipedia

Levar Burton loomed large in my childhood. I watched him as Kunte Kinte in Roots and adored him as Geordi in Star Trek: The Next Generation. But it was Reading Rainbow that really shaped my young life.

I loved Reading Rainbow and it really helped foster my love of reading. Though I do have to give my parents, especially my dad, some credit because my dad had a half a dozen bookshelves in our house and was always reading.

But I have fond memories of watching and learning from Reading Rainbow. I was always excited when a book I owned was featured on the show and sometimes I asked for my parents to get other books that I saw there.

I've been trying to instill a love of reading in Emily. We read books every night and generally several times during the day. She's starting to learn to read herself which is great.

I have heard of the Reading Rainbow app, but never got it because Emily was pretty small when I heard about it the first time. We have watched a few of the old Reading Rainbow episodes on Amazon Prime. We started at the beginning and they were fun but really dated.

Emily, like the rest of her generation, is very tech savvy. She is able to use my phone, tablet and video games better than I can sometimes. And she is a very early reader at this point. But she loves the story apps we do have right now. Right now we don't have the Reading Rainbow app because I just got a tablet in the last week.

When I saw the Kickstarter to bring Reading Rainbow to all kids, I had to back it. A lot of people felt the same way because it reached it's goal in less than 24 hours. I think it's a great cause to back because so many kids aren't exposed to books and reading like they should be. And the best part is giving Reading Rainbow to schools in need for free!

I'm sure everyone has heard about this Kickstarter by now. But it makes my heart happy to think about having Reading Rainbow back. It was a big part of my childhood and hopefully it will do the same for Emily.

Kindergarten Readiness Rally

Yesterday, Todd, Emily and I headed to Hendersonville for the Kindergarten Readiness Rally. We weren't really sure what to expect but we try to do the kid-friendly activities around town when we can.

From one end of the mall to another, there were tables of the local schools. At each table, there was some sort of activity. All things that Kindergarten aged kids should be able to do.

Emily had a blast! She did very good at everything. She can sort her colors, she can do some spelling / reading and she's excellent with counting and math.

One of the tables had her write her name down. The lady then wrote Emily's name in different colors and cut out each letter to make a puzzle. Emily easily put the puzzle together, told the lady the letters and the colors. The lady at that table was very impressed.

Emily's been in preschool for two years now and I think that's helped her a lot with learning and preparing for kindergarten. We also have been working on her letters and reading a lot at home lately.

At her school's table, she got to meet the teachers she'll have for next year. She also got to make a stick figure of herself. She got a lot of goodies too - pencils, a cup of dirt with a seed in it and even a new book.

Emily had a great time and it's nice to see that she is indeed ready for Kindergarten. We are keeping her at her preschool for one last year because she loves her school. Then she will head off to public school for 1st grade.

Her Majesty’s Explorer: a Steampunk Bedtime Story

Image: https://www.facebook.com/HerMajestysExplorer

Steampunk has always been fascinating to me. I love the idea of it as well as the beautiful clothes. But thus far, my daughter hasn’t had much exposure to anything steampunk. But now there is an adorable storybook, Her Majesty’s Explorer: a Steampunk Bedtime Story, that introduced the steampunk genre to her.

Her Majesty’s Explorer: a Steampunk Bedtime Story tells the story of an automaton, St.John Murphy Alexander. He is an explorer for the queen, but when he comes back to his unit after a long day of exploring, he has to get some rest. St. John has a bedtime routine that echos many toddler’s bedtime routines, but with a steampunk twist.

The last few pages are about Steamduck, the steam-powered bath toy. My daughter and I especially liked reading about Steamduck, because it was cute and funny. It was our favorite part of the book. Her Majesty’s Explorer: a Steampunk Bedtime Story was created via CreateSpace, a publisher and self-publishing platform.

If you are a fan of steampunk, I would highly recommend this cute, steampunk bedtime story to read to your kids. Her Majesty’s Explorer: a Steampunk Bedtime Story is currently available in paperback and for Kindle.

Note: I received a copy of this book for review purposes.

All About Grandmas – A Children’s Book

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My daughter is five years old and like many kids, she has two grandmas. Both of her grandmas are very different, but they are both the same in the fact that love their grandchildren. In the new children’s book,All About Grandmas by Roni Schotter, all kinds of grandmas are shown doing all kinds of different things.

As a parent, I really liked this book because it not only showed that a grandma can have different jobs and different hobbies, but that grandmas aren’t perfect either. It’s written in a way, with great illustrations by Janice Nadeau, that small children can get the message. It’s great to see see a book that shows more than the stereotypical grandma that is shown in popular culture.

All About Grandmas is recommended for ages three to five. I would recommend this book for any kid who has a grandma, especially if their grandma doesn’t fit in the stereotypical grandma mold.

Note: I received a copy of this book for review purposes.

Personalized Children’s Books

Image: http://www.chroniclebooks.com

When I was a kid, one of my favorite books was a personalized book. I don’t remember a lot of details about the story but I loved that it was a book about me. I do remember that the name of the dog in the book was Snoopy because we didn’t have any pets at the time and that was the name of my dad’s favorite fictional dog. I wish I still had the book because it was just so cool.

So I jumped at the chance to be able to do the same for my daughter. There are a couple of types of personalized books that My Chronicle books offers. One tells the story of a day in a life of a race car driver and another is the day in the life of a princess. There are other options as well like a fairy book and a pirate book. My daughter is very into princesses now, so I picked the princess book for her.

My daughter enjoyed the book a lot because it was about her. Because she is only five she didn’t pick up on some of the details in the story like how the book mentioned that her birthstone is the opal or how the name of her kingdom is the town that we live in. She did like that the princess was named after her and had purple hair, which is her favorite color. I think she’ll appreciate her story more when she is a little older and can read it herself.

You can learn more about these wonderful personalized books at My Chronicle Books’ website.

Note: I received a copy of this book  for review purposes.

Being Different Is A Good Thing – A Children’s Book

Image: http://furry-feline.com/

As a geek, I have always known that I’m a little different from many folks out there. My daughter, who is five, has already expressed interest in geeky things at a young age. So the children’s book, Being Different Is A Good Thing, which features Furry Feline characters, has been great in helping her know there is nothing wrong with being different.

The Furry Feline characters are a line of plush animals, but this new children’s book brings these characters to life. Being Different Is A Good Thing tells the story of Chef Tako, who is an octopus. He becomes concerned because all of his friends have tails and he doesn’t. He does finally realize that being different is a good thing, by embracing the things that are good about him and not worrying that he doesn’t have a tail.

This was a really sweet story with cute characters. My daughter really enjoyed it. I’d recommend Being Different Is A Good Thing to any parent of young kids to help bring the point across that being different is just fine.

Note: I received a copy of this book for review purposes.

Banned Book Week: Harry Potter and The Banned Book

I didn’t get into the Harry Potter books right away. I think I had heard about them but I didn’t get around to reading them until the next town over from my hometown banned them.

The fact that Zeeland, MI school system banned the Harry Potter books was big local news so my dad (who is a geek as well) picked up a copy of the first Harry Potter and got hooked.

We went on a family vacation to Arizona around that time and my dad brought Harry Potter with him. I started reading it then, and I became a Harry Potter fan at that point. My mom read them as well, and even my sister did, even though she didn’t like anything else remotely geeky.

I’m sure my family would have gotten into the Harry Potter series at some point, but I do think it’s funny that the reason we got into the series was because it was banned.

The Harry Potter series isn’t one of the top banned books, but it was the one that directly affected me. I thought it was silly that it was banned, but I’m glad I was able to get into the series at that point in time.

Trying Out ABCmouse.com

Emily's home page

I've been seeing commercials for ABCmouse.com since Emily was small and we started watching cartoons. But I didn't think to try it out until now. We were watching TV before church and I saw another commercial and decided to go to the website.

Since they were offering a month for free, I decided to sign Emily up. We didn't get a chance to check it out until after church, but she was hooked right away. She wanted to keep playing the games, but we took a break to go to the movies and take a nap.

So far, Emily is having a lot of fun. I’m not sure how much she is learning yet but we’ll see how it goes. We have a month for free and I’ll give updates as the month goes on.

Has anyone else used ABCmouse.com? Did your kids learn a lot?