Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Teaching History to a Toddler

I checked out some books from the library today.
Two of them were historical children's lit.   (Note, there were other nonsensical books and simple stories; I am not trying to rob my son of his childhood, just to provide a broad scope of children's literature.)

One of the historical books was about Abraham Lincoln.
And the other was about Edgar Degas.

I had a hard time not laughing during the temper tantrum my son threw because I put "Aybeeham Winky" back in the bag after nearly an hour of his not even letting me read it.  He just liked looking at the cover and saying "Aybeeham Winky smile; Aybeeham Winky happy."  I managed to hold my composure through the temper tantrum, until he was distracted enough.  Then I guffawed.  That was our belated President's Day celebration today.

And Degas?  When I said "Degas" Million looked at me and said, quizzically, "Mommy pray?"
Maybe we'll save Degas until he can delineate between "Degas" and "Dear God." 

3 comments:

  1. This is so funny! Which "Aybeeham Winky" book was it that so enthralled Million?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Ingri and Edgar Parin D'Aulaire's version. (Not the most racially sensitive version in the world---due to its being written in 1939, but not a "bad" version.)

    ReplyDelete
  3. I should note by "not racially sensitive" I mean phrases like "the little black babies" and "Negros all gathered around Abraham and said "Glory glory hallelujah!" Very obviously written from a white perspective and not in politically correct language.

    ReplyDelete