Category: summer reading

Summer Reading BINGO 2020 | Free Printable

Posted on Posted in books & reading, family fun, motherhood, summer reading1 Comment
three wooden dinosaur
Photo by cottonbro on Pexels.com

I just finished creating a summer reading challenge for 2020 because my kids have ONE WEEK LEFT of distance learning before our summer break begins! Is anyone else baffled by how fast and how slow quarantine seems to go at the same exact time?

My kids are counting down the days and I’m trying to get a game plan put together so that we don’t spend the entire summer staring at YouTube and playing video games. As fun as that sounds.

I’m not sure what our summer will look like right now – our state is starting to whisper about opening things back up but we as a family are planning to continue hunkering as long as we can stand it. Summers past have involved a lot of trips to the library for free camps and checking in with their summer reading programs because one challenge is never enough for my voracious readers.

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I’ve been making the kids summer reading challenges for a couple of years now to supplement the programs offered by the library and bookstores because those tend to only last us a couple of weeks at best.

Creating these challenges can be tough because my kids are already good readers, and I don’t want to make reading seem like a chore. I’m not going to make them count how many minutes they’ve been reading or how many pages. I don’t want to make a long list of categories that don’t line up with their interests – and often they read such vastly different types of books that I end up having to make multiple challenges – one for each kid.

Anyway – behold: this year’s summer reading challenge! I’ve been pretty into the BINGO format because it lets the kids aim low or high depending on their motivation and gives a fair amount of options. I’m pretty proud of this assortment of categories because I think it will appeal to both my 10 year old and my 14 year old. Wish me luck!

summer reading 2020 bingo

Feel free to save and print this to use with your own kids this summer.

Let me know how they like it!

When do your kids start summer break?

Here are a few challenges from summers past: 2018, 2017 and 2016

Summer Reading 2018: Choose Your Own Adventure (Free Printable)

Posted on Posted in books & reading, family fun, printable, summer readingTagged , , , , 4 Comments

A couple of years ago I started making summer reading challenges for my kids because I found the programs at the library a little lacking / redundant for a family of bookworms. My kids don’t need encouragement to read in the summer so keeping track of pages and titles seemed unnecessarily tedious for us and not really a challenge tbh. No shade, I think the programs are a great idea for kids who need that encouragement, it just wasn’t my jam personally.

This was back in 2016 – I read this post at Kate’s blog and was like YES. I had to copycat and create a challenge for my own kids – and thus our Summer Reading Bingo was born. It went over really well with my kids. You can steal mine or make your own if you want – just click this link.

Last year I felt the need to simplify the challenge because of a particularly busy summer and probably just because I like change. So I made a summer reading challenge that fit on a bookmark! This was great for a busy summer and my kids loved it, too. Again, feel free to go steal that one if you need something super quick.

This year, I continue to need to shake things up because I have too much time on my hands or something. I was thinking about those Choose Your Own Adventure novels from when I was a kid  – did you love them, too? I was also thinking about how sometimes kids need to feel like they are in control – they don’t want to be told what to read or even what genres to read. We all like to make our own choices, right?

And so, I present to you our reading challenge for 2018:

I’m pretty excited and just in case you are hoping to shake up your summer reading, too – feel free to steal my idea – you can right click and save this or make your own in a word document – or picmonkey.com, my fave place to make cute graphics. (This isn’t some sneaky sponser post btw – they have no idea who I am, I’m just sharing and caring like that.)

Do you do summer reading challenges with your kids?

3 Graphic Novel Classics: Anne of Green Gables, Jane Eyre and A Wrinkle in Time

Posted on Posted in books & reading, reviews, summer reading

There is a new fad these days that is combining the world of graphic novel with the world of classic literature. Some seem to be more successful than others. My kids have been all about graphic novels this summer and I joined them in the genre with two graphic novel classics. I’m sharing my thoughts on those as well as one that my son read below.

I recently saw this cute edition of Anne of Green Gables: a graphic novel by Mariah Marsden and Brienna Thurmier on NetGalley and couldn’t resist requesting a copy. I am a sucker for Anne Shirley so I was pretty sure it was right up my alley.

I’m of mixed minds on this one so I’ll give you a pro and con list:

PROS

  • The landscape illustrations are gorgeous and feel very Anne inspired.
  • The book goes further than a lot of other adaptations do, all through Anne’s year at teaching school which I’ve noticed other adaptations don’t always cover.
  • It gets a lot of things right. The emotion is there and the overall essence of Anne.

That said…

CONS

  • I didn’t care for the illustrations of the people in the story at all, especially the noses which seemed weird to me.
  • The pacing of the book felt very fast. I understand that a graphic novel cannot convey as much inner dialogue as a regular book but I felt like Anne’s life flew by in a blur and a lot of the heart of the story and some of the smaller plots were left behind.
  • I’m not convinced that a reader new to Anne Shirley would fall in love in quite the same way as experiencing Anne of Green Gables in its original format. But if reading this graphic novel or another adaption can lure them into the original then I suppose that would be worth it!

Overall: Some Anne is better than No Anne (3/5)

I found this copy of Jane Eyre in the graphic novel section the library and decided to give it a try. I’ve tried reading the novel a few times but stalled through the rather dreary beginning.

I cannot attest to how well this compares to the original. I would not be shocked to hear others give similar feedback to my impressions of Anne of Green Gables above. But I actually finished this, which is more than I can say for the original.

I liked the artwork a lot – the characters are well drawn and feel authentic to their personalities. The scenes are rather lush and dreamy or gloomy when gloomy is called for (which is often tbh). I still found the story rather dreary but the graphic novel version allowed me to plow through a bit faster and get to the good stuff. I think you could consider this a decent Cliff’s Notes version of the real thing.

Overall: Beautiful artwork, decent Cliff’s Notes (4/5)

I didn’t actually read this one but I’m anxious to. My son devoured this graphic novel version of A Wrinkle in Time by Madeline L’Engle and then would not stop talking about it. He’s now working on book two of the series in actual book form. SO, here’s what we know through subtle observation:

  • The artwork is pretty darn cool. This I know from peering over his shoulder.
  • It’s also longer than a lot of the other graphic novel classics I’ve seen so it might do a better job telling the full story. Just a guess.
  • It sucked in the attention of my 11 year old and he didn’t want to do anything but read it once he picked it up.
  • Even better – it successfully lured him into reading the next book despite it being a boring old paperback. I call that a successful mission.

Overall: A rousing success in this momma’s opinion but I still haven’t read it myself so I can’t grade the book only my momma bear satisfaction which is a definite 5/5! 

Have you read any of these? What did you think?

What graphic novel should I try next?

What classic would you like to see turned into a graphic novel?

PRINTABLE | A Quick & Easy Summer Reading Challenge

Posted on Posted in books & reading, family fun, printable, summer reading

Our summer vacation is coming to a close – two more weeks until my kiddos go back to school. I was looking over the summer reading bingo sheets today and thinking about what’s working and what isn’t working.

I love a lot of things about this set up – my kids didn’t seem to get much use out of the coupons that you can win at our library’s summer reading program and keeping track of reading minutes or titles all summer sounded a lot like homework. Thus my bingo sheets were born.

Fast forward two years though and I feel like the bingo sheets are met with enthusiasm for the first week or so and then mostly forgotten. Every so often I’d go over the sheet, asking them questions like “Did you read any books about animals?” or “Did you start reading a new series this summer?” and even though the answer might have been yes, they were often unsure having forgotten exact titles.

My kids have been reading a ton this summer – quantity has not been an issue. If anything, our system just seems to be unnecessarily complicated. And we’ve been busy enough to not have time for unnecessarily complicated systems. So I decided to make a pared down reading challenge that highlights our favorite aspects of the current system.

Anne @ Modern Mrs Darcy does an annual reading challenge that I love and this year’s challenge included a handy bookmark to keep tucked in your current read. I loved this idea and decided to incorporate it into a new reading challenge for next year.

I know a lot of you still have several weeks of summer left and thought I’d share this here in case you want to motivate your kids to squeeze in some extra reading time before school starts.

BEHOLD: The Summer Reading Challenge For People With No Time For Summer Reading Challenges

2018 summer reading

Print it as a bookmark or open up your favorite photo editing site and make your own – I use picmonkey.com to make all my graphics and highly recommend it. It’s all online and has tons of graphics and fonts and flexibility. / Plug

Our Summer Reading List

Posted on Posted in books & reading, family fun, summer reading3 Comments

One of my personal goals for the summer is to read some great books out loud to the kids. We’ve got a lot of great possible read-alouds lying around – here are some of the books I’m planning to read to the kids some classics that I read and loved as a kid and a few new to me stories as well – also, The Hobbit which Dan has been reading the kids on and off for a couple months now.

kidssummerlist

Pippi Longstocking | May B | Little House in the Big Woods

The Hobbit | Otherwise Known As Sheila the Great | Johnny Tremain

The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle | Island of the Blue Dolphins | Sophie Mouse

after thought: I’ll probably read Emily at least one Betsy Tacy book also.

– edit – I’m not sure if I’ll read May B to the kids or not. I’ve started reading it to myself and although I’m enjoying it and think it would sound good out loud, I’m unsure about the material being appropriate – will have to see how certain events play out and then decide. Anyone else read this to their kids? Thoughts?

jensummerlist

And six books I’m hoping to tackle this summer:

Nobody’s Cuter Than You | I Regret Nothing | Paper Towns

Shine Shine Shine | Big Little Lies | The Heir

My list is shorter because my books are longer and I know myself – I probably won’t even finish all of these, but they are the ones I’m most excited to read.

What’s on your summer reading list?

Summer Reading Challenge: The End

Posted on Posted in books & reading, summer reading

summer reading button

My son just got onto the school bus for his first day as a second grader – so the summer vacation is officially over here and of course the summer reading challenge ended September 1st. I know I’m a day late posting the wrap up post but Labor Day was a full and busy one and I decided nobody would be too upset about the delay. You forgive me, right?

So my goal for the summer was to read 9 books, preferably ones I already owned.

Unfortunately, I didn’t quite make my goal, reading only 7 1/2 books:

  1. The Age of Miracles by Karen Thompson Walker (June Book Club) – Finished June 12, 2013 – This is going to be one of those books that stays with me for a long time. The overall concept of this story is both fantastical and disturbingly plausible – the way any good dystopian kind of story should be. I think the author did a great job of fleshing out her story, providing a main character that was both realistic and likeable with plenty of side stories that had less to do with the world potentially ending and more to do with coming of age. This was a book that really sucked me in while I was reading it – I really liked it. – Full Review –
  2. The Extraordinary Education of Nicholas Benedict by Trenton Lee Stewart – Finished July 5, 2013 – It was really fun to read a little of the back story on Nicholas Benedict from the Mysterious Benedict books – he was a pretty amazing kid! The story itself stands on it’s own so if you haven’t read the other books in this series, you can feel free to read this one first. I found the book to be well written and funny with plenty of mysteries to solve.
  3. The Paris Wife by Paula McLain (July Book Club) – Finished July 21, 2013 – I’m kind of grateful that I didn’t previously know very much about Hemingway’s life, much less his wife Hadley’s, because there was never any moment in this book where I definitely knew what would happen next. Beautifully written, this book was a favorite of mine. I really sympathized with Hadley and found the book to be a fascinating look at marriage, literary history and life in the 1920′s. – Full Review
  4. The Selection by Kiera Cass – Finished July 24, 2013 – This book just sucked me in and refused to let go from the first page. Though the writing is fairly simple (YA book), the story is fascinating and the characters are even better. I downloaded the following book, Elite and her novella, The Prince before even finishing this one. – Full Review
  5. The Prince a novella by Kiera Cass – Finished July 25, 2013 – It was really interesting to get a chance to get to know Prince Maxon a little better and see the Selection through his eyes. There were a few funny moments when you see his reaction to something that you remember America going through – and it’s a nice quick read – it took me an hour to finish the story.
  6. The Elite by Kiera Cass – Finished July 27, 2013 – Good lord, I could not put this book down. I am really enjoying this series and anxious for book three.
  7. Moranthology by Caitlin Moran – Finished August 20, 2013 – I think I enjoyed this book even better than her last. With a variety of topics, this book is hilarious and insightful, but mostly hilarious. Interviews with famous musicians, reviews of Downton Abbey and Sherlock and stories about her marriage and childhood and everything in between. If you like Caitlin Moran, you will LOVE this book. If you don’t know who Caitlin Moran is, but you like Tina Fey or Jen Lancaster or The Bloggess – you will LOVE this book. – Full Review

I am halfway through reading Secret Lives of First Ladies by Cormac O’Brien, a non-fiction book that gives you the low down on all of the first ladies and also a few quick paragraphs about the rest of the president’s wives who weren’t first ladies for one reason or another but mostly death. I’m really enjoying it but my reading time seemed to evaporate in mid-August and I’ve been having a hard time getting in a lot of time with my books at night.

So even though I didn’t finish my challenge, I did read some great books and feel accomplished and pleased with what I did read. As far as how many of these books I already owned BEFORE the challenge started: 5. Not… awful. It’s more than half.

How about a bit of superlative fun?

Let’s pretend our summer reads are classmates in a yearbook. Tell me your favorite book, least favorite, most educational, cutest couple, etc. Whatever you feel applies!

Cutest Couple: America and Prince Maxon from The Selection series by Kiera Cass. Followed closely by America and Aspen from the same series…

Sketchiest Husband: Ernest Hemingway for the win! I think I thanked my husband every night for not being Ernest Hemingway while reading The Paris Wife by Paula McClain.

Biggest Gossip: Cormac O’Brien – his book, Secret Lives of First Ladies is kind of one big omgdidyouhear??? giving you the skinny on ALL of the first ladies that your high school history teachers never told you.

The Class Clown: Caitlin Moran of Moranthology by Caitlin Moran fame. Need a laugh? Caitlin’s writing will keep you up at night cackling and jabbing your significant other in his sleep to read him hilarious passages whether he likes it or not.

Book Most Likely to be thrown across the room: That would be the one I didn’t finish – The Alienist by Caleb Carr just wasn’t doing it for me at all and brought back memories of reading Nathaniel Hawthorne in high school except much more gruesome.

Most Likely to Succeed: Nicholas Benedict. Whether you’ve read previous books already or not, after reading The Extraordinary Education of Nicholas Benedict by Trenton Lee Stewart you KNOW that Nicholas is going places!

Alright guys, if you participated in the challenge and would like to share your results and / or superlatives, you can submit your links in the Mr. Linky below or leave me a comment!

I hope you all had a great summer!