Applying to college early in the academic year — or, more specifically, submitting applications under binding early-decision programs — increases the likelihood of acceptance.
Wonderful Comprehensive Pop Up Mythology Book: Encyclopedia Mythologica (for ages 5-15)
Encylopedia Mythologica covers Ancient Egyptian gods as well as the more famous Greek and Roman gods. The book also covers Norse, Middle Eastern and Native American gods. Like the other books in the series, the pop ups are magnificent and there are pop up pages-within-pages chock full of interesting stories and factoids.
What I love about this book series (and I think I own them all) is that it entertains at many levels — younger kids will love the pop ups and may only want to read selectively, and older kids can absorb a lot of information by exploring all the smaller pop up pages. This is a great non fiction book for reluctant readers and Middle School kids since 6th grade typically covers Greek Mythology.
Picture Book Reviews
I’m been asking for and getting a small pile of books these days and haven’t been posting on them. I was at a loss about how to present them … individual book reviews? But there are lots of bloggers who do that. Sometime in the middle of the night, I got the [random] idea of a short stack of books. Like, it could be any amount from 3 to 10, like a stack of pancakes. I decided to rank the books in the order that we liked them. Let me know what you think.
5 Strategies to Motivate Your Struggling Reader
This is from Imagine Learning who turned to Ann Lodgson, a school psychologist who specializes in helping parents and teachers help struggling students. Click here for entire article.
The Lost Boys and Girls of Sudan: Book Club for Kids
My 5th grade daughter’s book club got invited to the 5th grade boys’ book club because they had a special guest, William Maliul, an articulate and engaging Lost Boy of Sudan, who came to speak about his experiences in Sudan, Ethiopia, Kenya, and the United States. Brothers in Hope was the book club selection and though it is a picture book, the content is suitable for a 4th or 5th grader.
Best Easy Readers: Geisel Award (aka Dr. Seuss)
The Geisel Award is given annually to the author(s) and illustrator(s) of the most distinguished American book for beginning readers published in English in the United States during the preceding year. It was founded in 2004 and the first award year was 2006, so it’s a fairly new award. That’s great because it’s a list that is actually plausible to work through! What Easy Readers have you and your kids enjoyed? Let’s add it to the list!
Partnered Reading to get Reluctant Readers to Read
This is a great blog post on Partnered Reading to encourage your reluctant reader to read from http://PracticalPages.wordpress.com She also gives some great resources if you need further advice.