Five in a Row

Have you ever looked at the Five in a Row curriculum for young children? I love the concept. You read a favorite children's book every day for five days in a row. On each day you talk about different aspects of the book- like the illustrations, architecture, geography, etc. It is so fun to dig in to one book and learn more about each page. This past week Lydia and I read Lentil by Robert McCloskey and had so much fun with it. We got to talk about small town life in the 40's, practice playing the harmonica and even sampled lemons to see if they made us pucker like everyone in Alto, Ohio. We explored Paris with the book Madeleine. We made a fresh apple pie and learned about several countries while we read How to Bake an Apple Pie and See the World. We learned to draw ripples of water around a duck to make him float on the Yangtze River like Ping in The Story About Ping. There are different guides you can buy for different ages and they are quite helpful, but not necessary. We've explored our own choice of books and truly enjoyed that too. I can't say enough about reading with children to build relationships with them.