Being homeschoolers, we love books: the older the book, the better. Buying old books is something we just can’t seem to stop doing.
Last summer, my husband and I were at a book sale up in Door County when we found the cutest book. It’s a kindergarten story curriculum published in 1890. The author, a teacher, organized it into a school-year’s worth (September to June) of stories and object lessons for young children.
Our youngest is 17, so we didn’t really need this book, but I just couldn’t resist it. We bought it, and both my husband and I read it. We were quite taken with the animal and nature stories, fairy tales, fables, and simple object lessons that explained how items in daily use at that time were manufactured. In fact, we agreed that it would be a great book for homeschooling parents except that the print is so small that it would be hard to read aloud. And that got us thinking……
What if we republished the book with a larger font and wider margins so it would be easier to read aloud? Then my husband said he thought he could find some nice illustrations, appropriate to the time period and even the specific stories. After all, kids today are very visual. They love storybooks with pictures! So he spent ages finding the coolest illustrations to go with the stories. Being the artist he is, he also came up with a beautiful cover. The whole process took several months.
And the result? We’re happy to announce that the book, Kindergarten Stories and Morning Talks With Over 125 Illustrations, is now in print! It’s available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble and pretty much everywhere you can buy books. It was just published, so it’s not in the homeschool catalogs yet, but we’re working on that. In the meantime, we just put it up on our site if you want to learn more.
I wish I’d had a book like this when I first started homeschooling…. I think it’s an ideal first curriculum for homeschooling parents and teachers of young children who enjoy and appreciate vintage texts.
Congratulations!!! So proud 🙂
Congratulations, Barbara. I’m going to check this out! My kids are past Kindergarten but they still love stories.
Blessings,
Carol
How exciting! I’m going to have to check this out.
Ooh, this looks great! My 2nd is turning 5 this fall, I will definitely have to look into this 🙂
Thanks, everyone…..we’ll be posting a pdf sample from the book very soon!
I’m from Door County! And my mom ran the Ephraim Library Book sale for years ~ which book sale did you get it at? This is our first year of homeschooling, and I cannot wait to get a copy of this! It sounds just so perfectly up our homeschooling alley. Thank you!
Alissa, thanks for stopping by. We got it at the DC library sale in Sturgeon Bay, where we used to live. Ephraim is beautiful! Hope you enjoy the book! We just put up a free downloadable sample of it on the sale page……http://www.cardamompublishers.com/free-kindergartenstories-sample.htm