Our February Family Reading Goals

Last year, we really enjoyed choosing a book for each new month's category. However, a problem we sometimes ran into was that one of us (my daughter usually--who had more time), would finish their book within a few days and then have no new goal to focus on the rest of the month. So this year, except for the first month--which was a challenging book--we chose two categories per month. We did this with the expectation that there was to be no pressure if one of us only got one of the categories read that month. Nevertheless, it allows early finishers to choose another book goal, and it also gives us more exciting categories per year to read from. So February's book goals are a Bestseller and a Classic. When choosing the categories for the month, we tried to choose two categories that would somehow complement each other. When choosing this duo we thought, "a popular new book" and a "popular old book" or the best of old and new. Well, seeing that I finished "Crime and Punishment" a little early (I am on maternity leave. Normally, a book like that would take me the whole month), I began my bestseller at the end of January. It was so good, and it was an easy read, so I actually finished it before February. That's okay, though, because I know I will get busy come April and May, so if I get ahead on all my categories, that would be a good thing. So what did I choose? I chose the book, "Ghost Boy" by Martin Pistorious. It is an international bestseller and an autobiography (one of my favorite categories) about a boy who comes down with a mysterious sickness that causes him to lose memory of his childhood, but also control of his body. People think he is a vegetable with little brain function, but he is completely aware and intelligent, just unable to communicate at all. Finally, one person believes in him enough to realize he can communicate by staring at pictures, and through time he finds ways to communicate with technology and regains some control back of his body. It was a great story of someone who overcame a great obstacle and the importance of treating all people with dignity no matter what we perceive their level of awareness or intelligence. My girls are choosing their books now too. My third daughter chose a bestselling book of Christian encouragement and began reading it as soon as "War and Peace" was finished, my oldest, Faith, chose a bestseller non-fiction book about octopuses, Kat chose the book "Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children" which is popular enough to have a movie out about it right now, and Arwen chose the new "Diary of a Wimpy Kid" book. Savannah is choosing to take her time with her challenging read from January, "Jane Eyre." It is a classic anyway, so hey, it fits into one of February's categories anyway. Landree and Savannah (in honor of Landree finishing "War and Peace") are watching the History channel "War and Peace" mini-series. I just love to see how reading is becoming a normal part of our family life and how our books give us something new to discuss and share with one another. I am not quite sure what book to choose for my classic read. Hmmm. . . what am I in the mood for? Feel free to comment your suggestions below.

Our January Reading Goal Update

So our January Goal for this month was "A Book that Challenges You." I finished "Crime and Punishment," and I have to say that the first half challenged me. Not because of the fact it was an older classic book, but because the theme was dark, and you kept wondering what he was thinking and what was going on until the second half started answering your questions. The first half of the book bored me. Thankfully, the second half of the book was better, and the last third of the book was so good that I read it in about a day. I came to the conclusion, though, that I much prefer Tolstoy as my Russian author of choice, over Dostoyevsky. His characters are more lovable, in my opinion, and I love his philosophical bent. In fact, Tolstoy is still one of my favorite new authors of late.
My third daughter read "War and Peace" by Tolstoy and loved it as much as I did. A girl after my own heart! And she read it much faster than me, my little bookworm! She said the characters were so well-thought through that you could feel what they felt; I agreed. She said that the war parts were boring, but she agreed with me that they were well worth getting through for the main story. She also liked how the book began by discussing five different families separately and how it ended with all of their lives intertwined with one another. Like me, she liked how it opened your mind up to a different way of perceiving and understanding history.
My first daughter is almost done with "To Kill a Mockingbird." She is not much of a reader, so I have been so excited to see her get interested in the book. She said it was nice to have something else to do besides her normal hobbies. Her and my second daughter are very caught up and busy with their music and band, so they are not as determined to stick with their goals, but they do say they want to read more this year. My second daughter released the pressure from herself to get a book done every month, but she has started "Jane Eyre" and intends to finish it. My fifth daughter got frustrated with her book this month; I feel the author's speech and topics were frustrating for her level of understanding, so she decided to focus on other books. This is perfectly fine with me. I do not want reading to feel forced and unenjoyable for any of my children.
Finally, my fourth daughter finished "White Fang." She had a hard time being committed at the first, and then she really took off about the first third of the way through. I can tell that my little animal-lover enjoyed it, and she asked about a lot of new vocabulary words as she read, so I know it was a good learning experience for her.
I really encourage you, if you are any sort of a reader at all, to try something like this challenge with your children. It really brings you together as you discuss your books, and it encourages your children to become life-long learners. I have also done something like this at school where I share my reading goals with my students, and it is such a rewarding learning experience for children as you model to them reading and thinking skills in real life.

Our January Reading Goal

Well, even though we have a few days left until January, the girls and I were ready to begin our January reading goal. The category we decided upon for January is "A Book that Challenges You." We really felt that reading "A Book that Intimidates You" last year was good for us, so we decided to do something similar again. What is interesting is that a couple of the books chosen were books read by a parent or sibling before. For most of us, we chose an older classic since the older language, depth of thought, and length are often more challenging.
I chose "Crime and Punishment" by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. I chose this for the aforementioned reasons but also for one of my own. I loved Tolstoy last year, and Dostoyevsky is apparently the other highly esteemed writer of great Russian literature from the same time period. We'll see if I like him as much.
Faith chose "To Kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee. She has just decided to get back into reading more than school assignments, comics and fan fiction to better prepare herself for college. Landree highly recommended this book to her (it was her favorite read from last year and one of her favorite books).
Savannah chose "Jane Eyre" by Charlotte Bronte because Landree and I agree it is probably one of our all time favorites, and since Savannah loves things from that time period, we thought she would like it.
Landree chose the monstrous book "War and Peace" by Leo Tolstoy. She is my literature lover, so she really wanted to challenge herself. She saw how much I liked it, and she watched part of the History Channel's special "War and Peace" series (which was really well done and true to the book, by the way). This is one reason she pushed for a head start at the end of December to begin reading, although I bet my fast reader finished in less than the three months it took me!
Katriel chose "White Fang" by Jack London because she loves animals, and the book came highly recommended by Faith. Her and Faith have similar interests, so she took Faith's recommendation to heart. Faith is not much into literature, but is a big fan of Jack London's books "The Call of the Wild" and "White Fang."
Arwen is still learning to read, so she chose one of Landree's childhood chapter book favorites "Clementine." It is a funny and cute book that we both think Arwen will love with her fun sense of humor.

Hopefully, we are all up for the challenge and finish our books for January! I enjoy seeing my daughters share books with each other and have the privilege of observing a sibling read a beloved book. Not only that, but it is so exciting for me to see my child pick up one of my cherished reads and read it for themselves.