I am excited about the Newbery Awards! Amanda Struckmeyer served on the Newbery Committee that selected Neil Gaiman’s The Graveyard Book and her list, I believe, is dead on. Here’s a link to the post that has her Mock Newbery event. But more importantly, here’s her list:
Author: Pragmatic Mom
I am a mom with three kids and a husband living in Newton, MA. I graduated from Harvard University with a degree in HIstory and Science. I went to The Anderson School of Management at UCLA for my M.B.A.My background is entrepreneurial. I started several companies and currently serve on three boards including for my elementary school and preschool. I was a SAHM for nearly 8 years, and went back to work part-time just recently. Now I work almost full time as a WAHM for a consumer electronics start-up in Boston.My blog is my outlet to read children's literature which is my great secret pleasure, and to document any interesting and/or useful information that I acquire as I parent. My kids are quite active and pursue many interests collectively including soccer, gymnastics, rhythm gymnastics, karate (Chung Kook Doh), ice skating, Chinese, Spanish, flute, piano, T-ball, book clubs, and art. In my free time, I have been doing kickboxing, vinyasa yoga, zoomba, and I am trying to learn Spanish as well.Learning about SEO and how to blog has been a really fun enterprise albeit very time consuming. I started a bloggers group that meets weekly called www.coffeeshopbloggers.com. The S.O.S. on SEO. We share our collective frustrations and knowledge from blogging.Now you understand the Type A parent I am...hence the tagline my blogger friends came up for me for my blog:Type A Parenting for the Modern World
Asian Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Alvin Ho
This appealing series is a fun and funny read with great illustrations by LeUyen Pham that really make the book come alive. Look and Pham have a winning combination. Fans of Diary of a Wimpy Kid can have another series to dig into! Hooray for that!
Top 6 Math Apps for Kids
I found this list of math apps from TouchReviews.net that I didn’t know about. You know me, I love math and apps so it’s a match made in heaven particularly if my kids will play them thinking that it’s fun. And one day, when I review enough great math apps, I will do a Top 10: Math App list of my own!
11 Great Books for Parents of Boys
I will confess that I’ve never read a gender specific parenting book. My older two are girls and my husband and I are dreading the pre-teen (now!) and teenage years. The warnings abound of what is to come from parents of older girls and this might drive me to pick up a book on parenting pre-teen or teenager girls. My little boy, on the other hand, is at the stage where he loves his mommy the most and is as sweet as can be. I wish this phase could last forever. Parenting a boy compared to girls seems relatively straightforward — a straight line of screen time limits and outdoor play versus the wiggly line for girls of pissy attitudes and struggles over what to wear. Or could this just be that my son is still little?!
Favorite Books for Reluctant Readers Grades 3-8
This was such a great list of books that I asked LiteratureForLunch for permission to repost and she graciously said yes. Enjoy!
Fun Picture Book Teaches Math: Math Curse
My five-year-old can’t even do half of the math in this picture book but he’s enjoyed this book so much that we’ve read it every night for a week and he insisted that I blog on it.
SAT Vocabulary for Kindergarten from Picture Book Edward the Emu
I know that some moms thought this was a terrible idea, but I am finding that my kindergartener loves big words and his teacher sends a list home each week. We just read the word and the sentence at the dinner table (for the benefit of the two older kids), and let our youngest tell us what he thinks the word means. It’s actually a cute and fun exercise and he’s surprisingly correct most of the time. Try it. Your older kids will be DYING to give the answer. And that doesn’t suck!