Read For The Heart

I admit it. I’m a book-a-holic, and I love to read. Books, books, and more books.

It’s contagious, and my kids have caught the bug. With the way we go through books, well… let’s just say, we can always use suggestions of what to read next.

So of course, books ABOUT books are a particular favorite of mine. I’ve collected quite a few over the years, and each of them have their quirks – some arranged by mood, some by age level, many by genre… and even several created especially for homeschoolers.

I’ve recently had the absolute pleasure of reading through a new title from Apologia Press, Read for the Heart, by Sarah Clarkson. Subtitled “Whole books for wholehearted families”, Read for the Heart has a different feel then most books of this sort. I’ll tell you how this book stands out in just a moment, but first, let me tell you why, even if you already have a book or two or ten like this, you need this one.

First off, I’ve noticed that book recommendation guides for children tend to fall into a couple of particular groups. First, there are the ones, usually written by a public school teacher or librarian, directed at parents, especially parents of children that don’t like to read. These tend to be dominated by subject and/or reading level, and their primary purpose is to help the parent find titles that relate to something the child is interested in. Less importance is given to the literary quality, age-appropriateness, or values presented within – the goal is merely to get the child reading something, anything – so long as they’re reading. Due to their largely public-school audience, matters of faith are generally downplayed, if not outright excluded.

The other common trend among these books are the ones, generally by Christian authors, whose goal is to include and promote only those books deemed appropriately religious, by whatever their particular preferences are. Often the tone ends up a bit high-handed, and if the reader has less stringent guidelines then the author, the reader might well be annoyed at the restrictions, and emphasis given to why “those” books are to be avoided.

Both styles have their uses in their particular niche – but by their very nature, they’re incomplete, and likely to leave many readers wondering what else they might have missed.

In Read for the Heart, Ms. Clarkson takes a true book lover’s approach. She does not exclude books merely by virtue of their genre, though she does point out details that a parent might wish to take into consideration about specific titles. Instead, she puts forth the expectation that reading is a part of education, and a large part of education is to learn and to think about the world as it is. Only by exploring and understanding the world around us can we make informed, educated, adult decisions about how to proceed with our lives and make the best choices for ourselves, our families, and our world.

Ms. Clarkson’s solid foundation of faith is strong, and shines through clearly in her stories of her youth and her family – at home is where character is built, and books are one of the ways in which we may explore outside that safe cocoon.

Read for the Heart is an excellent bridge between the two extremes, and includes several titles and authors that I had never seen recommended elsewhere. The organizational structure is unusual; instead of genre-focus, books are arranged into categories that intuitively usage-based. Groupings include:

• Picture Books
• Golden Age Classics
• Children’s Fiction
• Fairy Tales and Fantasy
• History and Biography
• Spiritual Reading for Children
• Poetry
• Music, Art, and Nature

With nearly 400 pages in a sturdy paperback edition, Read for the Heart by Sarah Clarkson is a useful edition to any homeschool parent’s reference shelf. I especially appreciate the extra sections on history/biography, and music/art/nature – uniquely useful for homeschoolers.

Read for the Heart is just $17, available from Apologia Press, a division of Apologia Educational Ministries. Earlier this year, I reviewed another title from Apologia Press, Who is God?

To see what other crew members had to say about this product, check out the TOS Homeschool Crew blog post, Apologia – Read for the Heart.

**I received this product for free as a member of the 2010-11 The Old Schoolhouse Homeschool Crew so that I could provide you with an honest review of it by our family.**

Related posts:

1. See clearly with See-N-Read
2. Apologia – Educating The WholeHearted Child
3. Faith-based fiction: The Chronicles of Peleg
4. Yesterday’s Classics
5. Ten Reasons To Use Explode The Code To Teach Your Child To Read