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Meet the Faith & Family bloggers. We invite you to join us in encouraging and helping the Faith & Family community grow in faith!

Danielle Bean

Danielle Bean
Danielle Bean, a mother of eight, is Editorial Director of Faith & Family. She is author of My Cup of Tea, Mom to Mom, Day to Day, and most recently Small Steps for Catholic Moms. Though she once struggled to separate her life and her work, the two …
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Rachel Balducci

Rachel Balducci
Rachel Balducci is married to Paul and together they are the parents of five lively boys. Besides being a mom, she is also a writer and a newspaper columnist for the Diocese of Savannah, Georgia. For the past four years, she has maintained her personal blog at Testosterhome.net where she …
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Lisa Hendey

Lisa Hendey
Lisa Hendey is the founder and editor of CatholicMom.com, a Catholic web site focusing on the Catholic faith, Catholic parenting and family life, and Catholic cultural topics. Most recently she has authored The Handbook for Catholic Moms. Lisa is also employed as webmaster for her parish web sites. …
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Arwen Mosher

Arwen Mosher
Arwen Mosher lives in southeastern Michigan with her husband Bryan and their young children Camilla and Blaise. She has a bachelor's degree in theology. She dreads laundry, craves sleep, loves to read novels and do logic puzzles, and can't live without tea. Her personal blog site is ABC Family. …
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Rebecca Teti

Rebecca Teti
Rebecca Teti is married to Dennis and has four children (3 boys, 1 girl) who -- like yours no doubt -- are pious and kind, gorgeous, and can spin flax into gold. A Washington, DC, native, she converted to Catholicism while an undergrad at the U. Dallas, where she double-majored in …
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Robyn Lee

Robyn Lee
Robyn Lee is the managing editor of Faith & Family magazine. She is (yikes!) an almost 30 year-old, single lady, living in Connecticut with her two cousins in a small bungalow-style kit house built by her great uncle in the 1950s. She also conveniently lives next door to her sister, brother-in-law …
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Hallie Lord

Hallie Lord
Hallie Lord married her dashing husband, Dan, in the fall of 2001 (the same year, coincidentally, that she joyfully converted to the Catholic faith). They now happily reside in the deep South with their two energetic boys and two very sassy girls. In her *ample* spare time, Hallie enjoys cheap wine, …
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Fr. John Bartunek, LC

Fr. John Bartunek, LC

Fr John Bartunek, LC, STL, received his BA in History from Stanford University in 1990, graduating Phi Beta Kappa. He comes from an evangelical Christian background and became a member of the Catholic Church in 1991. After college he worked as a high school history teacher, drama director, and …
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Guest Bloggers

Kate Lloyd

Kate Lloyd
Kate Lloyd is a rising senior, and a political science major at Thomas More College of Liberal Arts in New Hampshire. While not in school, she lives in Whitehall PA, with her mom, dad, five sisters and little brother. She needs someone to write a piece about how it's possible to …
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Elizabeth Foss

Elizabeth Foss
Elizabeth Foss, an award winning columnist for the Arlington Catholic Herald, published her first book, Real Learning: Education in the Heart of My Home in 2003. The book is now in its third printing. Her popular blog, In the Heart of My Home is a source of inspiration and support for Catholic women …
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Teach Your Children Well

Coffee Talk: Education

(Join each day’s Coffee Talk discussion: Mon: Parenting; Tues: Open Forum; Wed: NFP; Thu: Marriage; Fri: Education; Sat/Sun:Homemaking)

Whether your children attend school or are homeschooled, this is the spot to ask questions about curricula, religious education, parent-teacher relationships, or academic concerns of any kind.

Please join us!


Comments

Page 1 of 1 pages

 

I had the chance to take a good look around our Catholic elementary school’s library and was disappointed in the amount of good Catholic books they have, particularly for the younger grades.

We’d like to donate some books to the library. I’m not sure yet how much we can afford, but I was looking at these items:

The Vision series of books from Ignatius press (they say “young adult,” does anyone know what ages can enjoy them?)

Angel in the Waters
Joseph and Chico
Lolek
Adventures of St. Paul

What would you consider essential to a K-8 Catholic school library? (They do have the Chronicles of Narnia.)

 

One more thought - I thought the Fr. Lovasik books would be great, but I don’t know if they are durable enough to withstand library use.

 

You might want to see if you can look at what is in the primary classrooms as well.  When I was teaching, I don’t think there were any religious books in the easy reader section of the school library because those books were in the classroom libraries.  (I think each classroom had their own set of Fr. Lovasik books, but I might be thinking of a different school.)  The school library did have a religious section with picture Bibles and books about saints, including some of the Mary Fabyan Windeatt books from TAN.

 

I spent a lot of time volunteering in our school Library when it first opened. I would recommend talking to the Librarian. She very likely has a wish list of books she would like to have, compiled after some research and based on her knowledge of her students.  Also, I seem to remember that some books are published in special editions just for Libraries, so they are made of stronger stock with more durable covers.
Good for you for doing this! I know our library benefitted greatly from donations. For example, someone once donated the entire Tommie Di Paolo collection, the kids loved it!

 

the Treasure Box books are really good!

 

My “original” reply is actually below, but I thought of something else. Hillside Education has a book list under the listing for Catholic Mosaic that is worth perusing if you’re making a “wish list” of books for Catholic children

 

I would recommend The Weight of a Mass: A Tale of Faith by Josephine Nobisso and Katalin Szegedi.

 

anything from Bethlehem Books. novels and stories that are good, entertaining and wholesome.
http://www.bethlehembooks.com

 

Thanks for all the great suggestions! Books and checking the classrooms and with the librarian as well!

 

I second the Fr. Lovasik books, even if they might have a tendency to wear out (though not, I’d think, any more than other paperbacks)—they’re absolutely great content, and you can get them very inexpensively—enough to replace regularly or give multiple copies!

Here are some “mainstream” children’s titles that I think would be perfect for a Catholic school library. The saint books of Tomie de Paola would be a beautiful addition—if you are limited by funds or availability, I’d choose the ones about St. Francis (Poor Man of Assisi), St. Patrick, Mary Mother of Jesus, and Guadalupe. There are other good ones, though, so that’s my own personal pick. Also, The Clown of God, and Now One Foot, Now the Other teach love of God and love of fellow man, respectively. I haven’t read his books about the Miracles of Jesus, Bible Stories, or other books specifically about Jesus, but I think they’d be worth investigating.

The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien is appropriate for most middle-school students, and some other writings of his would be a good introduction—something with Farmer Giles of Ham, for example.

Wow, this is getting lengthy. Some more titles, Catholic and mainstream:
Saint George and the Dragon by Margaret Hodges
Know Your Mass by Fr. Demetrius Manousos
Beauty by Robin McKinley (more for older kids)
Catholic Tales for Boys and Girls by Caryll Houselander
books by Inos Biffi
Because I Love You and other books by Max Lucado
The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein
The Princess and The Kiss; The Squire and the Scroll by Jennie Bishop
The True Princess by Angela Elwell Hunt

One more note: I discovered the best fairy tales and Greek mythology in my Catholic school library as a child. I recommend the d’Aulaires and Andrew Lang.

 

My kids usually started with the vision books about age 9 or 10 - maybe 4th or 5th grade.  Also consider the Mary Fabyan Windeatt saint books and the series of saints books from Daughters of St. Paul (Encounter the Saints) - both of those are for a little younger readers (2nd - 3rd grade).  Also, the Bethlehem Books for quality fiction.

 

Homeschooling boy with ADHD?

My 10 yo son has recently been diagnosed with ADD- inattentive type.  I don’t want to argue about the diagnosis- I believe it, but we’re also not going to medicate him, at least not yet.  We homechool, and he is the oldest of 5, with one on the way.  Unfortunately, our home is often noisy and full of distractions during the day- the toddlers have a meltdown, the baby cries for attention, that kind of thing- which makes it especially difficult for him to focus.  Even if I put him in a quiet room by himself, however, his mind wanders and he’s unable to concentrate on the task at hand, even if it’s something easy for him.  He can literally sit at his desk, in a quiet room, doodling or staring out the window or noticing the ants on the baseboard for an hour before finishing what should be a 10- minute worksheet.  If I could stand next to him, hovering, he will focus and do the work, but I don’t have the luxury of doing that with the other four needing my attention, plus I want him to learn some independent study skills.

Any ideas on how to help teach my ADD child?  I’ve thought of putting him in school (he’s never been), but neither of us really want to do that and I’m not sure it would help.  I’m tired of feeling like I need to constantly push, prod, remind, and cajole him to do his work!

 

I know this is outside the scope of your question, but I read an interesting article recently about helping ADHD with Omega 3 fatty acids.  I thought it was fascinating, a mom started giving her son supplements and it helped him as much as medication.

 

Re the homeschooling situation and your boy with ADD, have you tried doing something like, do the first 3 questions and you can do X (whatever activity he loves to do for 5 min.), then the next 3 questions, etc.  Or tie an amount of screen time to how quickly (not to rush, to stay focused) he gets it done—like finish 10 ques. worksheet in 15 min. (or however long you think it should take) and you can have 15 min. of screen time.  The reward has to be whatever is motivating for him, that’s the key as we all know! 
Eventually you can go for the intrinsic rewards learning can bring, but to get him going, you may have to try this type of thing.  This kind of jump-starting children with extrinsic rewards to do their work is so hard for me (even as a teacher!), as when I was a student I got a great deal out of the resultant learning, grades, comments, discussions, etc.—it was rewarding in and of itself However, many children just don’t, at least for certain periods in their learning years certainly.  My heart is with you. 
Also, re the medicating, it likely will be completely shocking how much he will be able to focus and if he has handwriting problems, you will barely recognize his beautiful writing withinn a half hour of him taking the med., if you eventually decide to do that.  However, having said that, I suggest going for the non-stimulant type of meds, as my son lost weight on the stimulating kind.  (Also, he had other issues ongoing, so it wasn’t a cut and dried thing with him.) 
Finally, you may want to see if he has sleep apnea—easy to get tested at home.  My son had sleep apnea and after he had a tonsillectomy/adenoidectomy it helped his symptoms some.
God bless you and your family.  One day at a time!

 

I know this isn’t exactly homeschooling advice related (I’m just starting with my son this Fall, so I don’t feel too equipped to give advice on that), but I wanted to share anyway.
My husband was held back in grade school because of his inattentiveness.  It wasn’t until he was an adult that he discovered how much of a role his diet played in his abilities.  He has severely restricted dairy, wheat, and several other things, and does take regular vitamin supplements, and it has made a HUGE difference!  I can’t say if it would help your son, but I wanted to mention it anyway.
And, in encouragement, despite his difficulties my husband learned to cope - he now has 2 Masters and a Doctorate with a GPA over 3.8!


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