I grew up in New York City and had occasion to visit Coney Island. The illustrations in this adventure to Luna Park will blow your mind. Based on original vintage photographs, they pop off the page and draw young readers into the story..
Selena, a courageus young rabbit, faces eviction from her beloved home among the sand dunes. A new development named Luna Park will erase it from memory. Millie spies Selena and they become good friends. Together they transport readers on a fantasy adventure as the amusement park materializes. I was impressed by the historical accuracy of the tale, but it is the whimsical fantasy adventure combined with lovable, delightful characters capture the young readers’ attention.
A fine way to introduce history, empathy, friendship to the minds and hearts of readers ages three to eight.
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The Amazing Snowman Duel (bedtime story, children’s picture book, preschool, kids, kindergarten, ages 4-8, Snowman Paul): A humorous tale about friendship, bullying and rejecting violence
Written by Yossi Lapid
Illustrated by Joanna Pasek
Another fabulous adventure in the Snowman Paul series written and illustrated by this talented team. This time around Bill and his friend, Snowman Paul are challenged to a duel by a Nick, a local bully, and his Snowman Nick. Nick is much larger than Paul and very well-armed, but Paul agrees to fight as long as Nick sticks to “snowman rules.” Will this bully play fair?
On the night of the duel, animals arrive by land, sea, and air, to watch the battle. Bill covers his eyes because he fears for his friend, Paul. Who will prevail? Are Paul’s fears justified? I am rooting for Paul, who always seems to come up with the right idea.
This book teaches preschoolers and primary grade children lessons on how to treat a bully, reject violence, and develop the skills to get along with others. I recommend that teachers, parents, and librarians add this beautiful picture book to their collections.
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Santa’s Lost Sleigh: A Christmas Book about Santa and his Reindeer
Written by /Rachel Hilz
Illustrated by Ramesh Ram
This book is part of a series of picture books about Santa’s problem, losing things. In Book One, Santa ventures outside to find the parking spot for his sleigh empty.
He enlists the help of his elves and reindeer to search. When he finds the answer, all are astonished to find out the reason. It appears there was no bad intention. The lesson for readers is to ask before you take something, which is certainly important for primary grade children to understand.
This book is written in rhyme and illustrated though some of the pictures are a bit strange. My suggestion would be to enlarge the size of the text as it is difficult for the target audience to read.
This book would be especially enjoyed by children who love humor and nontraditional types of storylines.
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You can’t believe they did it. Of all people, turning on you this way. You want to react in kind, drawing on the anger flowing through you to lash out. Make the other person hurt every bit as much as you do right now.
Wait a minute. You can’t. You’re not that person. You don’t want to BE that person. You’re better than this.
But how do you stop anger in its tracks before it gets the best of you?
Take a Walk
The physical act of walking will burn off some of the adrenaline while getting outside, giving you a distracting change in scenery. And it works even better if you’re walking away from the object of your anger. Sometimes all you need is some space.
Pay Attention to your Muscles
Like walking, exercise is good. Also, anger tends to tighten you up, so a good stretch, or even better practicing progressive muscle relaxation, will knock the tension out.
Say Something
Choose a pet phrase or mantra which calms you. Say it several times, slowly, and deliberately to put your focus elsewhere.
Visualization
Escape somewhere else. Remove yourself from the situation that has made you mad and find a quiet place where you can visualize something peaceful. Build in as much detail as you can to make it as real as possible. Stay in this vision until you feel yourself start to calm down.
Do Something Grand
Take your anger and turn it into activism. How can you use this to change the world? Sign (or start!) a petition. Volunteer. Get involved in the community and make the world a better place.
Write About It
Journaling can help you to work through your emotions in a way that might even help prevent you from getting mad the next time around. Understanding what it was about the event which triggered you will help reshape the trigger entirely.
Switch Perspective
It can be hard to use empathy when you’re upset. But if you can see things from their perspective, it might help you to calm your response. Many times anger comes from misunderstanding the situation.
Forgive
This technique falls under expert level of anger management. By being the bigger person and forgiving the other, you’ll find you no longer have reason to be mad at all.
The key to all of these is simple: don’t let anger take control. The last thing you need is for you to fall under the power of negative emotion. Use the anger to make a better place or let it go entirely. In the end, you’ll be happier you did.
This book is part of a series of illustrated, beginning chapter books featuring Tweet Tweet and her penguin friends.
In this adventure, the Aurora Borealis is beginning to appear in the skies. Tweet Tweet, siblings, and friends understand this means it is almost time for the Christmas festival on Christmas Eve. They wait for their teacher to assign each a special role to prepare. They work together to prepare food, gather stones to decorate the tree, dance, and prepare for the parade. This book teaches children the lessons of the need to prepare ahead of time, work as a team, share tasks, and show empathy for each other.
The illustrations are in full-color that provide extra encouragement for beginning or reluctant readers. I recommend this series for readers in the six to nine year old age group.
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What Am I? Christmas: A Picture Book of Read-Aloud, Rhyming Christmas Riddles
Written by Shana Gorian
Illustrated by Art Porta
A beautifully illustrated Christmas holiday picture book!
Children (and adults) love solving riddles. This book could easily become a family holiday tradition passed down from one generation to another. These rhymes contain riddles about easily recognizable holiday objects appropriate for all ages from preschool on up.
Suggested for families and classrooms. Siblings or classmates might even want to turn the fourteen riddles into a competition to see who might get the most correct answers. Fun for all ages.
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This past year has been a hectic year for many all over the world. People have been coping with all that life brings in many ways. One way is working on self-care practices. There are many reasons why introducing practices of self-care into your life can make a pivotal difference in your life. For many, these practices and habits get overlooked in the chaos of the day, particularly during the busy holiday season.
What Is Self-Care
Self-care is defined as any activity that is intentionally meant to care for our mental, physical, emotional, and even spiritual health and wellness. Certain activities are common self-care practices. This means taking care of yourself so that you are healthy physically, and mentally.
You are at your best so that you can work, interact with friends and family, and you can do all the things you need to and want to in a day. This can look very different for each individual but some common self-care activities are listed below.
Self-Care Practices:
Yoga
Taking a hot bath to relax
Enjoying a cup of tea
Journaling
Meditation
Spirituality Practices
Getting a massage.
Listening to calming music
Cutting down on screen time.
And many more.
Why Is Self-Care Important
Adding self-care practices to your life has many benefits. Self-care is shown to reduce stress. In addition, many people feel that making time in their lives for self-care practices improves their own mental health greatly. Many people also report greater levels of happiness in their daily lives when incorporating self-care practices.
Taking care of yourself can also improve physical health. In addition to self-care on a personal level, self-care is a factor when facing illness, disease, or disability. Many health care professionals are adopting an integrative health care style approach that includes checking in with patients to help them seek balance in all aspects of life. This helps people facing illness or disease recover faster, better, and more successfully overall.
Tips To Practice Self Care In Your Life
Get enough sleep
Balance your commitments and priorities
Make a weekly schedule
Say no to optional tasks or events you don’t want to take on.
Stay on top of physical and mental health
Exercise
Allow quality time for friends and family.
Making space for self-care in your life provides great benefits to physical and mental health. Some aspects of self-care are personally enriching and fun.
Self-care is not selfish; it is vital to being a well healthy and balanced person. This lets you face whatever life throws at you without breaking your stride.
Schoochie and Skiddles: Schoochie’s Adoption Story
Written by Tom Tracy
Illustrated by Dustin James
Scoochie has been adopted by two men. She understands that her mother needed help in raising her. Scoochie explains the steps in the adoption process and how she feels loved and accepted. The subject is handled in a non-judgmental way that clearly explains the adoption process for children of all ages to understand. Non-traditional families with two dads as the adopters willing to maintain a relationship with birth mother and sister are presented simply and logically so that even the youngest child may grasp the situation. This picture book is part of a series that focuses on the non-traditional family.
I would highly recommend it for all parents, teachers, elementary and middle-school children as a springboard for discussion about both adoption and non-traditional families.
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Publisher’s Synopsis: The world is not always a perfect place. Needles, a scraggly little tree, must endure criticism, laughter, and setbacks to realize his goal of becoming a beautiful Christmas tree.
This is a story of dreams, desires, hope, determination, and never giving up. It also offers the observation that what others think is beautiful may not really matter. Beauty is truly in the eyes of the beholder and paired with the spirit of Christmas, maybe we can make the world just a little more perfect!
Richard Wagner grew up in Southern California. When he was fourteen years old, a business friend of his father’s had a small Christmas tree delivered as a thank-you. Their family already had a large tree decorated in the house. Not being able to find anyone who needed a tree, that small Christmas tree stood outside by itself for the remainder of the Christmas holiday. Needles, the Forgotten Christmas Tree is a tribute to that little tree and what might have been, but more importantly, to all the beauty, goodness, and hope that Christmas brings to us all. Mr. Wagner continues to reside in Southern California with his wife and two children.
What a perfect picture book to celebrate the meaning of the season! Needles is a short, scruffy evergreen tree growing on a Christmas tree farm. The adjoining trees make fun of him, but Needles firmly believes he will achieve his goal to become a beautiful Christmas tree in someone’s home.
The trees are cut down and brought to market but as day after day passes, Needle’s friends are chosen, while no one seems interested in him. When the owner of the lot, decides to gift Needles to a friend, Needles is elated. Now he will have a home! Will he achieve his dream to become a beautiful Christmas tree?
The story contains many twists and turns. Children (and the adults who read this story to them) remember that the promises of faith and hope are at the heart of the Christmas season. Even more important that sharing and caring for others is the true spirit of Christmas.
A perfect holiday choice for a bedtime story or read-aloud with elementary school children.
GIVEAWAY
Enter for a chance to win a copy of Needles, the Forgotten Christmas Tree, autographed by Richard Wagner.
One (1) winner receives:
– An autographed copy of Needles, the Forgotten Christmas Tree
Title: Writing Prompts For Girls: An “A+ Teacher Design” to motivate girls to write for homeschoolers and teachers. Targeting Grade 1, Grade 2 & Grade 3.
Written by Christine Calabrese
I recently reviewed Writing Prompts For Boys: An A+Teacher Design and you can see my complete review for that book on Amazon.com.
Calabrese recently released this edition for girls and it does an excellent job just like the previous edition for boys. The author selects a wide array of topics like the princess theme, horses, snowy days, music, sports, secrets, and fantasy to name a few of them. She encourages girls to use their “w” words and imagination to write and draw their way to success providing exciting vocabulary, simple rules, and exciting scenarios.
Children see writing as a fun exercise not a laborious chore. This book is perfect for the primary grades but also wonderful for older reluctant readers and writers.
As a former teacher, I would highly recommend these resources to parents and teachers.
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December 28, 2022
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