Five years ago, we read Rattu & Poorie’s Adventures in History: 1857 at my book club. At that time, I was running two batches of my book club–a weekday batch and a weekend batch. Interestingly, even though the book isn’t exactly an easy read, my weekday book clubbers chose it as their favourite book!
This was one of the many reasons I was excited to learn that the second book in the series is now out, and it focuses on animals in art history, from seals to the Emperor Jehangir’s royal menagerie! Here’s what we will do as we read.
Extinct Animals
If animals from history could visit the 21st century and make friends with you, which ones would you like to meet? What challenges would the animals face, and what challenges would we face if they suddenly became part of the ecosystem?
Animals in Art
Let’s look at some cave art. What animals do we see and why? We will then attempt to draw some animals from memory, trying not to look at pictures as reference points. How easy or difficult is it to draw animals we have seen?
Code
Deciphering old, forgotten languages is a difficult process of decoding. If we have the key, however, it’s quite easy. We’ll work on some cryptograms together, both coding and decoding.
Let’s read together!
Parents often ask me whether a book club will inculcate the habit of reading in children. The short answer is “no”.
Reading with me for an hour a week does very little in the long run! Inculcating the habit of reading begins at home, with a reading time and reading space shared by the family.
Then, what is the purpose of a book club?
The book club is more like an add-on. Often, reading is a solitary activity and children who enjoy it don’t have a space to share it with others, unlike, for instance, sports. It aims to introduce new books to the children, books that they may not otherwise read or even know about. As they continue to read and participate in a range of activities, the idea is to build cross-curricular links and explore creativity, a higher order thinking skill.
Does this sound like something you’d like to explore? Join us!
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