Many of you know how much I love Sylvan Dell's books; you can see a few of our raves about their books here, and here, and here. We were fortunate to receive a copy of a timely book about bullying this month; How the Moon Regained Her Shape
. This book is Sylvan Dell's featured book for November, which means you can access the full text here on their website -- for today, at least! In How the Moon Regained Her Shape
, the sun bullies the moon. Where once the moon "danced across the sky, laughing as she twirled her skirts," after the sun's hurtful words, she stopped dancing, hung her head, and "her body began to shrink until she was just a sliver of her former self." Ultimately, the moon's friends help her to regain her self-confidence and return to her former self. The educational section in the back of the book features an essay by the author titled “How to Deal With Bullies," as well as information about the phases of the moon.I would certainly recommend this book for any children having trouble with bullying. Honestly, the Bibliophile didn't care for it much. He made it all the way through, but then said that we should donate it to the library. He is young, though (just turned 3), and thankfully has no concept of what bullying means. The illustrations (and folktale-like text) are clearly Native American-influenced, which might also be of interest to particular readers. I think the applicability of the message here goes beyond just bullying, to any situation which dampers a child's spirit (trying to fit in with new friends or at a new school, worrying what people think of them, or general self-confidence issues, for instance).
Additional bullying resources:
Comment: Have you or your kids experienced any issues with bullying that you would like to share? Do you have other resources to recommend?
Disclosure: We received a publisher copy of How the Moon Regained Her Shape at no cost in order to write this review. If you click on any links in this post and purchase anything, we may earn a small commission through our affiliate relationship with Amazon.com.
) and unwrapped the ornaments, talking about where each one came from (often, who made it or where we bought it while on vacation). And once we had been through them all, we segwayed into a game of I spy with the ornaments. This reminded me of an idea that I had last year. 
when he had just turned 2. I think it is time to dig it out again this holiday season. It is a nice level of challenging without being frustrating.
today. He also spent a long time with some new sticker books - 
(this looks really fun so far) 
and 
, so we can return the library copy! 
. First we sang through the whole book together, then we went back and went through every single carol explaining what each word meant. I was very impressed with the Bibliophile's attention span, and I loved this activity, not just because of the religious significance, but because I have wanted for awhile to work on comprehension more while we read. When Daddy came in to say hi, the Bibliophile explained, "Dada, so, we are reading these, and there are a lot of names for Jesus, like 'Christ' and 'Holy infant.'" After awhile, he decided to come up with his own meanings for lyrics, and then we were just off and running into silly storytelling.
, 
, 
, and this 
from her auntie in New Zealand. What are your favorite infant baby toys? I think I have three favs (other than books, of course!) from the Bibliophile's baby days -- 
Manhattan Toy Winkel
, 
, and 
