Journal entry—trip to Spring Lake

I was really excited on reading this newest journal entry from my kiddo. After we talked at length last week about writing paragraphs that are not only grammatically correct but also interesting it would seem that he put some effort into exactly that art form. I love the varied sentence lengtt, and I love seeing him spell words like couch, beach, night, and aunt correctly all on his own. Who needs spelling drills? Even better, I love that he's developing these skills in what I would consider to be a very authentic way. And if this sounds like a proud parent moment, well I guess that's probably what it is.

The picture is probably of Jon and Calvin playing in the water while other family members (maybe Oma, Opa, and me?) sit on the beach towel on the shore. He's really into the overhead viewpoint these days.

Weekly book shelf, 7/3

Thanks to a somewhat impromptu weekend trip I'm behind on pretty much everything, especially the laundry. But vacation means travelling, and that means lots of reading in the car (though not for me, that's something I've never been able to do with out getting vertigo), on top of other reading times. Calvin is definitely all set for his weekly library reading, and he got lots of extra read aloud time with his Oma on this trip, who was sitting next to him in the car.

What Calvin read to himself this week...still on his Magic Tree House kick, he explored Indpendence Day and some others that focused on the history of the United States. Actually, he spent a lot of the trip rereading these to anyone who would listen. He really enjoys these books, and I have yet to find anything in them about which to complain.

As mentioned, we had plenty of read out loud time this week. Calvin's Oma, Jon's mom, brought with her for the car ride, on our way to a family reunion with a bunch of other Dutch folk, three books about Dutch artists Van Gogh and Rembrandt. All three of these books were wonderful. They are based on historical facts and bring the artists to life, engaging the reader in their stories, and the illustrations are very enjoyable. I was especially pleased with the two Laurence Anholt books and I see that he has a whole series of books on master artists.

Having finished the Royal Book of Oz, we started a new bedtime read aloud this week: The Little House on the Prairie. I have actually never read this series, so I am looking forward to discovering it along with my son.

And on my shelf this week...I am half way through The Women of Brewster Place, by Gloria Naylor, and I finished reading Swann's Way, the first volume in Proust. I am really enjoying Proust, and because I think I'll get more out of it a second time through, I've actually gone back to reread the first volume. Also, I'm in the process of starting a separate blog just for taking notes on the work as a whole.

The Royal Book of Oz, by Ruth Plumly Thompson (review)

First of all, this book, in most forms, is credited to L. Frank Baum, but this is not merely misleading, but completely incorrect: The Royal Book of Oz was written by Thompson after Baum's death. This is what I've read in many places, and certain newer versions of the book do properly credit the real author, but even without having been told nothing could have been more obvious than Baum's absence upon reading the book. If the writing style alone hadn't been a dead giveaway, then the characters having gone through complete personality changes probably would have done the trick. Ozma as cross? Dorothy as annoyed? The Wogglebug as rude and haughty? Though there were hints of their former selves, these were not the characters that we'd come to know and love, a change that was our biggest disappointment. And this was not the smooth and enchanting writing style to which we had become accustomed, either. Though Thompson does include some witty remarks and word play that will be enjoyable to older readers, some of her sentence formation—especially around the speaking of characters—is on the complex side for younger readers to follow. This is a far cry from Baum who, though writing at the turn of the century and with a style did reflect this, was still accessible for the younger set. And you might be tempted to wonder if the book would have been better were I treating it as its own thing, but first, she didn't write it as its own thing—she even published it under Baum's name!—and second, her style is choppy even when held up entirely on its own. This book was a huge disappointment to me, and though Calvin said he enjoyed it fine, for the first time Calvin he not asked me to get the next Oz book "right away", so I think we'll be taking checking out a new series for now.

Learning writing style, and journal entries

Calvin has been writing for a while now. He started keeping his journal almost a year ago. At that time it was mostly a sentence, or even just a few words, describing an activity from the day, or sometimes a book that we'd read, and I was helping him form his sentences and sound out and spell the words. I got him started on the journal before he could read in part because he was interested in doing so—he'd noticed me keeping journals for some time by then—and also because I thought it might be empowering to be able to share his thoughts with the world at large. He enjoyed it, and I'm pretty sure the process helped him learn to read a few months later, though learning is a very fluid process, and like the proverbial chicken and egg I can't tell which drove the other—the journal the reading, or the reading the journal. And as Calvin gained his own writing legs I slowly stopped helping him with his journal, and some time early this year I left him sitting on the couch writing while I ran on the treadmill, and since that time all the entries have been entirely his—spelling, punctuation, composition, and all.

Recently he and I had a chance to talk about sentence formation and about telling stories with written words. The topic presented itself because after having read all the Oz books by L. Frank Baum we graduated to the subsequent books by Ruth Plumly Thompson, only her writing just isn't as good—it's not as clear, it's not as bright, it's not as enjoyable. We compared some of their methods for story telling, and some examples of their sentence formation as well. From there we started talking more about what makes a sentence interesting in general, and about rhythm and flow in a short work.

We explored Calvin's own journal next, and found that some entries were more fun to read than others—he found that the ones that had been short, quick, and easy to write were the least interesting to read later. Then we tried something: he wrote a quick entry about our Log Cabin Weekend trip, then asked me to help him rewrite it. I helped him by asking leading questions about the day itself, by talking about different ways to phrase the same thing, and by encouraging him to vary his sentence length. He seemed surprised by the difference between the two entries, and excited, too, as though a new window had opened in his mind, or a new door in his life.

Journal entry original:

Journal entry rewrite:

Weekly book shelf 6/25

It was our first week of reading for the library summer reading program, and I think that any concerns I'd had have been put to rest. I'm not sure Calvin thought even once about needing to read a certain number of books for the program. He read plenty, and on my urging added the books to his log. I can see this will be no problem.

What Calvin read to himself this week...I let him count the Twisters on Tuesday for this week's library list because he checked the book out the same day he signed up for the program, which was a little ahead, and because he read it at least one more time this past week. The topic turned out to be timely because in addition to tornadoes it touches on the prairie and the pioneers, and this was Log Cabin Weekend at our local historical park. It was amazing how much Calvin had picked up from Twisters on Tuesday when we started talking about covered wagons and going west. On a similar topic I pulled out Civil War on Sunday because Civil War historical actors were also a part of Log Cabin Weekend, and he read that as well.

I Can Read About Weather is a book I've had on our shelves for a while, and which Calvin discovered of his own accord this past week over days of threatening rain clouds, sudden downpours, and severe weather alerts in our area. I'm fond of this book (and the rest in the series as they were printed in 1975, I don't know about any new printings) because they are really cool media wise—pencil and watercolor sketches in gray tones with only one color added in—and are serious about the science while being readable for Calvin. He read this one, then proceeded to tell my mother about the different kinds of clouds, and even how to spell them, before I even knew he'd found it on the shelf. And the fourth book for his weekly reading was Spider's Lunch, which he liked for its illustration method (paper, probably emulated by computer), and I like, again, because it doesn't really shy away from the science.

Out loud we finished The Magical Monarch of Mo this week, and The Royal Book of Oz. He read some more Arabian Nights with his dad, and now I'm faced with finding our next adventure. We haven't reviewed the Royal Book yet, but I was so disillusioned by the author switch, and Calvin seemed far less interested than usual, that I think it's time to move on. I'm looking for good suggestions for sure. In the meantime we're going to pick up another Baum book, I think.

And on my shelf...I didn't finish anything grand and new this week. Instead I devoted all of my reading time to Proust and i am a handful of pages from being finished with Swann's Way. I am very much enjoying the work, which really has to be called a work because that many words cannot seriously make one book, can they? Proust is like a more practiced, more polished D. H. Lawrence, one of my favorite authors. When I get to the end of Swann's Way, though, I have a couple of other books I'm going tread before going on, beginning with The Women of Brewster Place by another of my favorite authors, Gloria Naylor.