Favorite Resource - Dover Publications - Children's Activity Books

Learning to count and control a pencil.

Dover Publications publishes many inexpensive editions of classics, how to books and children's books.  They publish authors that other publishers have ignored pretty much.  They are a wonderful resource for homeschoolers.  I am going to focus here on their activity type books:  puzzle books, coloring books, maze books, sticker books, paper dolls, etc.

How to use this resource in an unschooling way:

1)  Have an activity book 'learning station' (to make it sound all official in educational-ese) in your home.  Mine was a basket under our coffee table.  In this basket I kept fun workbooks, etc.  You can use a particular book shelf or the top of a dresser or cabinet.  Whatever works.  You can keep writing implements with the workbooks or if you have toddlers who might decide to draw on your furniture or walls, you can keep the pencils etc out of reach of the little ones but accessible to the bigger ones.  There was a period in my family life when my older kids would take their activity book outside if the weather was nice or up to their rooms to work on it there, free from grabbing toddlers.*

Learning American History and spelling.

2)  What's great about Dover's children's books is you can easily respond to a child's interest without spending much money.  They've got various types of activity books (mazes, dot to dot, word search, hidden picture, coloring, etc on all different subjects.)  For instance, if your son is going through a phase where he's fascinated with bugs?  Get a bug sticker book or a bug ID guide or a bug maze book.  Is your daughter going through an Ann of Green Gables phase?  Get a coloring book or a paper doll book.  The idea is to strew things you think your kids will appreciate several times a year at this learning station.  This changes things up a bit to keep things interesting, and it makes the kids happy when, surprise!, there's a new book to explore.

Learning the alphabet and pencil control.

3)  Keep a few books in reserve in your closet or buried under your underwear dresser drawer (LOL, that's where I kept mine!).  That way you have an impromptu gift if you forget to get someone something or if a kid is feeling really blue or down (friend moved away, or is covered with poison ivy or something like that) you can surprise him or her with a little something that might distract them.  Also, some of these books are pocket sized.  They are great to keep in your purse and when you need to quiet a child while out somewhere, it is nice to whip one out to distract or occupy a child.  And it's educational too!

Developing more pencil control!

Nota bene:  Sometimes your kids will go through periods where they ignore the activity book learning station.  That's okay.  Give it a rest for a while and then casually and oh so surreptitiously make things more interesting by cleaning out the basket, or adding a new book or two or even deciding to move it to another spot in the home.  It's best not to even remark on it.  Just let them see that you've changed things a bit.  This might very well re-awaken interest.  Or it might happen that just when you think they've completely forgotten about it, one of the kids digs out a partially worked through book, and suddenly goes on a crossword puzzle jag and finishes it with much pride!

*I also got activity books from Barnes & Noble (we used to have one near us we visited often before it closed (sob) or from Target.  But you have more control over the subject matter if you order from Dover.  When I started homeschooling Dover only had paper catalogs but now it's on line which is much easier!