DragonFly's Book Suggestions

Interactive Books: 9 Subcategories of Interactive Books   Over Spring Break I was reading an interactive book,  Bunny Slopes , to my daughter with my daughter on her Grandma's lap. We got a couple of pages in and she looks over to her Grandma and says "I love this book, this is my favorite, do you love this book?" So what is an interactive book? An interactive book draws readers in and asks them to participate with the story in some way. When books are fun and playful, it strengthens their love for reading which in turn makes learning to read easier for them. Print Motivation is one of the six early literacy skills  that have been identified that children must know before they learn to read. In order to promote print motivation one must enjoy books. Interactive books can also: promote independence, hand-eye coordination, understanding that reading is from left to right, fine-motor practice, sensory outlets and other skills like 'good readers make predictions' (wha...

5 Alphabet Books We Have Been Reading My daughter, now 3 years and 9 months old, was talking with me after school earlier this week. She was asking me to tell her how many letters I knew, I quickly answered "26." Then I asked her how many letters she knew. Her answer was "29."  Letter knowledge is one of the skills needed before one can read. Yes, there are 26 letter names but letter knowledge is also knowing the sounds of those letters which includes 44 English phonemes (25 constant sounds and 19 vowel sounds). Learning 26 letters includes knowing both upper and lower case letters, so knowing how to identify 52 shapes. And then there is the issue of different fonts and sizes of the letters. My daughter has been enjoying the magnetic alphabet letters that we have and we were just gifted a set of lowercase magnetic letters. She loves to line up a long string of letters and have us read what she wrote, ha! An uncle of hers does a great job of reading her writing and i...

  Camping Books We bring books along with us camping. They are not always nature or camping themed, but we have found some camping themed favorites that we would like to share with you. These four books have camping specific vocabulary and show four thoughts about camping: 1.) camping brings along the unexpected 2.) when camping we are immersed in God's creation 3.) when camping we can find silence and a break from our daily life 4.) when camping we can dream and create magical moments in our lives. 1.  A Camping Spree with Mr. Magee  by Chris Van Dusen. Published by Chronicle Books LLC, 2003. Ages 3-7.  Camping thought #1 brought out by this book: Camping shows us to expect the unexpected and trust God that He will bring us home in the end. This is the second book in the Mr. Magee series. If you haven't already, you should differently check out this book and his other books. Our daughter has had me read her this book, and the Down to Sea with Mr. Magee  book, o...