From Amelia Bedelia to Henry Berg.....

you may recognize the Easy reader confused easily character of Amelia Bedelia. She is the housekeeper who mixes just about everything up that is asked of her. When asked to put out the lights, she literally brings the light bulbs outside for some air.
The early books by the original author, Peggy Parish are silly and and fun to read. Johanna loves them. I tire of them easily but they do make her laugh.
Within their silliness there is a lesson of homonyms/phones and Johanna loves to point them out. The later books written by her nephew miss the mark sometimes as they seem to be trying to make point or prove a school of thought. In Amelia Bedelia the bookworm it seems the author is trying to teach kids to love to read instead of just having fun at the library with Amelia Bedelia.
I grant him a little slack though b/c he did keep the character alive after his aunt, Peggy Parish dies. He was never a writer and only wanted to keep the books alive.
Now that is an easy reader that kind of has me as the teacher. I do the reading Johanna learns and recognizes homophones/nyms and since the books were written ad illustrated by 2 different people over time Johanna tries to figure out who the author or illustrator was based on comparisons.
So that's a lot of learning in one style of book and we certainly don't stick to one style.
However, I was surprised when I picked up an easy reader at the library titled, The Man who loved animals.
I started to glance through b/c Johanna loves animals and the titled sounded like something she would enjoy.

As I started to read I was compelled to keep reading b/c this was not some silly easy reader with the same words over and over.
This was simple book with simple language but it was factual. I sat there in the kids section while my kids colored and *I* learned about Henry Berg.
I had never heard of him but he is the man who created animal and child protection laws. He founded the ASPCA and created laws against beating both animals and children.
When I read it to Johanna I do edit out the part where people used to drown puppies for a dime but I leave the rest in.
We read about how people worked horses too hard and Henry berg made water fountains for the horses in the street. We see an illustration of people being shocked when Henry Berg tells them , "they get thirsty too"
Johanna's favorite part though is when Henry Berg gives the kids puppies and kittens and says, "Kids have the kindest hearts and make the best pet owners"
So as I have been promised by all the homeschooling books..we are all learning together.
Stay tuned for how I learned to make paper boats!