Two Favorites

I was just working on a list of books that concern homeschooling in one way (how they influenced the development of my philosophy) or another (that they are actual homeschooling books) but the list was growing far too long to finish all the explanations that have to go with each of them. So real quick, here are two of my favorites that don't really apply to the other list.

I love this puzzle! They've got one for a girl, boy, frog, duck, butterfly, what appears to be various ages and stages of human development, and apparently since I last visited the site pizza, cheese, honey, chocolate (have got to get that one!) wool, and the 4 seasons. They're layer puzzles, five layers each, and I just think it's the most ingenious thing. It's interactive learning because the puzzle tells a story, but to get the story you have to actually do the puzzle...I'm sure there's a much more intellectual way of putting that! We have the boy puzzle, and it's very anatomically correct, complete with all the inner-workings of one's body. This is one of the few things I have purchased full-price. I think it was $25 dollars but it is European made and a very high quality so it was well worth it.

I love this book! So much so that, like the puzzle, it is one of the very few books I paid full-price for. It's called Diary of a Worm, by Doreen Cronin. I first saw this book in Marisa's pre-school when Jacob and I were visiting there one day and I was just tickled by it. I'm all about different perspectives and surrounding Jacob with materials that are going to help him to become a fully-conscious, open-minded person and this books fits the bill. I was at the library yesterday, trying to do a search for books on foxes and books on dragons because that's what Jacob was asking to learn about. All I could come up with was stupid fiction books with a fox as the title character who goes to a party or flies a plane or some completely unrealistic plot line that has nothing to do with what a fox is. I get so sick of anthropomorphism in children's books, but this book is a refreshing change. Sure, the characters sometimes don baseball caps, hair bows or glasses, as well as writing in English, but they live in appropriate places, eat appropriate things and the story has just enough human in it so that we can we relate to the worms but not too much that you lose the perspective of the worm.