Monday, March 02, 2009

Reading Habits

We are a family of readers. We literally have bookshelves in every room of the house even the kitchen.

When my children were small, I would read aloud to them everyday and their father would usually read to them at night. We read many books together and now they are part of our family bond. After lunch we would read the Bible together, usually in English, unless we had Venezuelan visitors, then we would read in Spanish. If we had Ye'kwanas with us, we would read the Ye'kwana New Testament.

While growing up in the jungle, my children were able, through literature, to travel and experience many things outside of their life in a small indian village. We read classics, we read fiction, non fiction, anything we could get our hands on. I read many classical books aloud to them while they were still quite young, including Homer's 'The Iliad and the Odyssey'. We read Shakespeare and many others.

I remember reading 'The Hobbit' and the 'Lord of the Ring' trilogy as they rested in their hammocks. Their ages ranged from 2 -11, but we all enjoyed it.We read 'The Chronicles of Narnia', 'Little House on the Prairie', 'The Indian in the Cupboard', which was a big hit as well as the 'Anne of Green Gables' series. And many, many more.

We also read a lot of history aloud during school time and every student wanted to hear what the other students were reading. I rarely used history text books for anything more than a basic guide, or for cutting out maps and charts to use in personal note books. I find history text books to be BORING. I much prefer to read real stories, biographies of people of the time period we are studying. Each child had a Notebook Timeline in which to plot everything we studied, whether it be Science, History, Literature or Bible, it would be added to the timeline. This allowed the child to see the continuity of history and to compare people and events.

Our children grew up seeing that their father and I were both avid readers and they each picked up on the habit of reading at night before bed. Often times this was done by Coleman lanterns or even flashlight. If you fell asleep while the kerosene lantern was still burning, you would wake up in the morning to find yourself covered in a black, oily coat of soot.

The habit of bed time reading still continues. I must read at least a few minutes every night before I sleep, no matter how tired I may be. It is my way of unwinding. Each of my children also have the habit of reading each night.

I went around my house and snapped these shots of our bedside tables (sorry for the poor quality. I think my grand daughter had made some 'adjustments' to the camera). Can you tell by the pictures, which photo corresponds to each family member?


1)Spanish Bible, Cherokee Nation, The Works of Watchman Nee,
1491-America before Columbus.




2)Spanish Bible, journal, notebooks with writing projects.


3)Spanish Bible, English Bible, Midwifery Manuel, journal.


4)Christian Counselor's Manuel, Darwin's Black Box,
The Answer Book (Creation), The Simple Church.

So, which is Jungle Mom's stack of books? Yekwnanman's? Jewel's? and Jayde's?

UPDATE! That was obviously too easy!

10 comments:

Gecko said...

I'll guess...... 1) Jungle Mom
2)Jaydes
3) Jewel
4) Yekwnanman

a few clues given lol...... 1 + 4 share the same bed cover, me thinks Jayde is a tad young for midwifery stuff...... :)

~Karen_ said...

Here are my guesses:
1) JungleMom

2) Jayde

3)Jewel

4)Yekwnanman

We have many books here too. However, the only books in the kitchen are cookbooks!

CrimeSceneFairy said...

I usually read every night before bed too. :)
2 is definitely Jayde's but i dunno about the rest of em.

Liz said...

"I find history text books to be BORING." hehehe...
Totally true! usually history teachers are also boring... Very difficult for children to become interested in history at school.

This year my son has a good history teacher, she actually makes the classes FUN! An example: one of the essays was to write a blog for a month, the posts being each week's assignment. The grades included verbal ability, originality, design etc.

Jane said...

1. You
2. Jayde
3. Jewel
4. Yekwanaman

How'd I do!!

Rosie Cochran said...

Keep reading! It's a great heritage to pass on to your children!

Brenda said...

that was a great idea for a post! You would find something like that at my house, only I have several book stacks all over the house.

Stack 1 Clint
2 Jade
3 Jewel
4 Rita

Betty said...

Nr. 1 - your
Nr. 2 - Jayde
Nr. 3 - Jewel
Nr. 4 - Clint

And I didn´t look at the other commenters before I wrote this!
If I´m not to tired, I read before going to sleep too. But what I love most is to read in the hammock.

Anonymous said...

Hi! I guessed the same as the others: You, Jayde, Jewel, Hubby. My deductions used clues as well. I figure you have the water on your side of the bed and he has the clock! Also, Jayde is still in school so she has the notebooks and Jewel the midwifery book as she must be checking out ideas for upcoming college.
I'm from a family of readers too and often read while doing other things--almost anything! Always got in trouble as a child for reading under the covers with a flashlight and would read in the car even when it was dark by waiting for my dad to stop under a light! When the computer is slow here, I read while waiting! Used to keep a book in the car when I lived in Tampa because the traffic was so bad one spent HOURS (it seemed) waiting for lights! :) Can't live without books!

Kimberly said...

I was going to give you my guesses but they seem to be everyone else's as well!