Having finished reading Missy Fundi: Kenya Girl, by Mary Anderson Honer, a lovely memoir that my mom edited for a childhood friend, I found myself in Maine with nothing to read. A friend on facebook had tagged me with a “15 books that will always stay with you” note, and I’d done the same and [...]
Number the Stars is a wonderful little book by Lois Lowry, one of the few authors to win the Newbery Medal for the most distinguished contribution to American literature for children twice. I read it aloud to my kids years ago as part of my quest to read all of the Newbery Medal winners. It [...]
I finished the first seven chapters of Objects First with Java, yay! It was fun. I love the approach of teaching about the objects first, just as the title says, and using the bluej environment to manipulate objects in a visual way that is familiar to anyone using computers today, much more so than the [...]
Inspired by Nathaniel Bowditch, who, according to the Newbery Award book I read aloud to my kids years ago, taught himself various languages by reading the Bible, I decided to try reading books in French and Spanish as a way to improve my language skills, at least the reading and writing parts. I tried reading [...]
