I have a friend who asked me what books she should begin acquiring in order to build a good children's library. She wanted to start collecting "classics", but didn't know which books were really considered "classics".
In the past, I've felt the same way. Especially when we decided to homeschool, this became a top priority. Who wants to waste their time reading substandard literature?--especially in today's Children's Literature market, when everyone seems to be writing a kid's book! It made me think, initially, that one ought to have a Children's Lit degree or a teaching credential to sort it all out!
I had heard, once, that the best books are the tried and true children's books that have stood the test of time. I wanted to get the books that have captured the hearts of generations. Those are the Classics.
The best resource, I've found, for a classics booklist especially for my schooling consideration was at AmblesideOnline. There may be other places, but that is the literature-based curriculum that I use. What's nice is the lists are pretty straight forward for each grade level. So, then you know what to start collecting for the preschool-preK years and then for first grade and so on and so forth.
I also like the information on AmblesideOnline because they lists books that are classics specifically rich with literary language and learning--not just any "old" book. AmblesideOnline (which uses Charlotte Mason's philosophies of education) is more about "living books" than a strict trivium classics booklist.
You can also find booklists just by googling "classical homeschool books". You will probably get overwhelmed by the information if you do this. But still, the idea is to just become familiar with book titles and authors.
You may want to try looking on Amazon.com and do a search on their "listmania!" for children's classics. Amazon searches are good because you usually get literary criticism and public feedback and you see what other people "recognize" in a good book. Usually there's some age or grade level appropriated for many books.
It is true that some "classics" are questionable. Many books are thought of as classics, but really are just adult favorites. For example, "Tom Sawyer" by Mark Twain isn't necessarily a classic for children in an education sense because the reader isn't left with impression of a great "ideal" or worth. On the other hand, "Huckleberry Finn" has the more literary merit if you were to study Mark Twain's works. Even then, you'd have to decide if the content is appropriate. You might decide that the issues brought up in the book are more for adults. Truly there's so many other great books to choose from.
A good place to get an overview on the topic of children's literature is on Wikipedia.org The information is organized into manageable chunks. There is an nice section on popular authors.
There are books you can buy or check out from the library that contain booklists. One good one is "Honey for a Child's Heart" by Gladys Hunt and "Books Children Love" by Elizabeth Laraway Wilson. I also know that on Amazon.com they have a "listmania!" for specific booklists that people have kindly generated(i.e. AmblesideOnline year 1, Honey forA Child's Heart, and Books Children Love). You can look around there, too.
I wish I would have worked on my children's library earlier on. Mainly, it helps to know what books to look for and which ones to avoid in the first place.
No comments:
Post a Comment