Latest / Christians Reading Classics / A. A. Milne - Winnie the Pooh with Ivana D. Greco and Dixie Dillon Lane

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A. A. Milne - Winnie the Pooh with Ivana D. Greco and Dixie Dillon Lane · Christians Reading Classics

• 0:09
  SPEAKER_00: In 1925, the London newspaper Evening News commissioned Alan Alexander Milne to write a short story to publish on Christmas Eve.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_00: So it was that on December 24th, readers were introduced for the first time to Winnie the Pooh in a story titled The Wrong Sort of Bees.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_00: Milne introduced his protagonist as follows.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: Here is Edward Bear coming downstairs now.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: Bump, bump, bump on the back of his head behind Christopher Robin.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: It is, as far as he knows, the only way of coming downstairs.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: But sometimes he feels that there really is another way.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: If only he could stop bumping for a moment and think of it.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: And then he feels that perhaps there isn't.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: Anyhow, here he is at the bottom and ready to be introduced to you.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: Winnie the Pooh.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_00: This first story, right off the bat, featured as a character Milne's son, Christopher Robin, five years old at the time.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: And then the following year, Milne published a full-story collection of tales about this lovable, quote, bear of very little brain, end quote.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: It became an instant sensation and has been translated into over 50 languages.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, the Latin translation, Winnie Illepu, published in 1958, holds the honor of being the first foreign language book that made it into the New York Times bestseller list.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: It is, funnily enough, the only book in Latin to ever make the New York Times bestseller list.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: Clearly, there's just something about this bear.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_00: But what is it?
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_00: I'm very grateful today to be able to talk about Winnie the Pooh as a children's classic with two dear friends who are fellow homeschooling moms and prolific writers.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: Ivana Greco is a homemaker and homeschooling mom of four.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_00: She also moonlights writing about women and families and advocates for stay-at-home parents.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: And Dixie Dillon Lane is an American historian and an associate editor at Hearth and Field Quarterly.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: She's also a homeschooling mother of four and the author of the forthcoming book Skipping School: A History of American Homeschooling and How It Went Mainstream.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_00: It will be released by Erdmans in 2026 to mark your calendars.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: She and her family live in a small town in Virginia.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: So thank you both for being here.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you for having us.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, thank you very much, Nadia.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: So let's dive in.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: So, but first, this season of the podcast focuses on literary classics with a significant anniversary this year.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: And I want to open with a somewhat more abstract question before we get to Winnie the Pooh in particular.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: What is a classic?
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: Like, is it enough that we're reading a book a hundred years after publication?
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_00: And what other criteria might we add, especially as we consider what makes for a classic of children's literature specifically?
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_02: Ivana, do you want to start or?
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_01: Sure, I'm happy to.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_01: So I think that a classic um becomes a classic.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_01: It stays a classic because there's something in it that is appealing to both parents and to children.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_01: And it tells us something special about human beings, whether they're children or adults or both.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_01: It has some story that really resonates with us because it tells us some truth about humanity.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_01: And this doesn't have to be like a kind of sickly sweet story.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_01: You know, when I was a kid, we had a collection of stories from the 19th century.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_01: My family never throws anything out.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_01: So these were read by some ancient uh ancestor of mine, and they were stories written for children that were very didactic.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_01: You know, think of like, you know, Polly stealing a sugar plum and then dying from some foodborne illness, that kind of story.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_01: Those are old stories, but they're not classics.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_01: They didn't stick around because they're not really telling us anything interesting.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_01: So I think what makes a classic, what gives a classic staying power, is it provides some insight that is really valuable for both the child and the parent reading it.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_02: Ivana, I love what you said about it appealing to both children and parents.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and I think I would add there has to be something that appeals particularly to the time in which it's released.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and that can be very different.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_02: And then uh, you know, depending on the time, but it has to suit the time, it has to suit the mood of the nation that it comes out in.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_02: Um and, you know, like Winnie the Pooh, uh the author had been so severely traumatized by his experience in World War I, as so many had.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_02: And then this story is so incredibly comforting and orderly.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_02: And I think there's something about that that really stuck at the time.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but then I think that it has to be passed down with affection in the following generations, because sometimes it doesn't really, if you look at it, if you look at a classic objectively, it doesn't really fit the present day.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_02: And sometimes um it remains a classic anyway, and I think that's because of affection.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: I like that, the affection factor.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_00: And here it matters also not just because I mean it's a hundred time uh a hundred years removed from us, but also this is from a different country.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: Um, we forget, I mean, we read this in English, although actually I grew up reading this in Russian originally.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: But the point is it's a different country, a different time, a different kind of uh background.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: And I guess we'll get into that a little bit more as we keep going.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and yet there's something timeless about it.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: So, Dixie, you said like it's time-bound very much, and yet it's timeless.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: Well, let's start with a few stories and consider like what makes them so memorable.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_00: Can we say there's a typical story plot?
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and also like what about character development?
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I think um one of the brilliant aspects of Milne's writing in in these stories, and I think it applies to a lot of other children's classics too, including um newer ones, is the characterization.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_02: So I had in my mind when I was thinking about this podcast, I was actually thinking about three different classics together.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I was thinking about the Pooh stories, and then I was thinking about the Beatrix Potter stories, Peter Rabbit, and then I was thinking about um The Wind and the Willows.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_02: So those are all three British classics.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and each of them has something in them, and it's not the same in each one, that appeals to the way that a child's mind works.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm open to the idea that children's minds work differently, you know, and perhaps that's why they don't all appeal to all children.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_02: But in the case of Pooh, you know, Pooh himself is very interested in um understanding his world, even though he knows that he's very small in it.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_02: So as he calls himself, that you know, he he has a little brain, but he tries to figure it out and place order on it.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_02: So his misunderstandings, you know, um, that are sort of funny to adults, I think are actually things that happen in kids' heads.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_02: I I remember when I was a kid not understanding something or another about the world and sort of creating a logic in my head to it, and it taking years till I would correct that.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_02: Um and so I think that that with that particular character, he he shows the the sort of endearing powerlessness of the child, but the way that the child can build his own world in that context.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_02: And that really, that really speaks to a particular kind of interior life of the child.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and I think about this also with how literal he is.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_00: So for example, in that first story about the bees, where he mentioned there's a description that he lived under the name of Sanders, and it's like there's literally just a plaque with a name.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_00: It's so in children's in children's heads, it's like there are all kinds of things that we think of as idiomatic expressions, but they come through as just literally.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_00: It is what what it says.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_02: And that makes so much sense to a child, you know, and and yet it creates a certain pleasure for adults, like like you were saying, Ivana, just like, you know, really good children's movies are enjoyable for adults as well as for children.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_02: And, you know, um, when Pooh is, I don't remember if it's when he's looking for the heffalump or he's looking for the woozle, um, but he's, you know, that they go looking and they they come upon their own tracks and they think, oh, there must be two or something like that, you know.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_02: And it really makes sense if you don't know how the world works.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_02: And I don't know about you both as parents, but I was just really amazed when I had my first young child who was growing to realize how many things are not common sense, how many things are not born into us, knowledge about how the world works, how they have to be learned or taught.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_02: And something like that, you know, it can dawn on you through experience, but you know, it it your mind is going to take that about Sanders literally until something points it out another way.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_02: And we forget that children live in a different world than adults in that way.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_01: I think another wonderful thing about the Winnie the Pooh stories is that they really recognize that children have a sense of humor and that they like to be in on the joke, and that they like to laugh.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_01: And I am not um I'm not opposed to modern kid literature.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_01: I there's lots of modern kid books that I love, so this should not be taken as like a criticism of modern kid books, but I do think that one place that they tend to be lacking is that they talk to the children without that delicious sense of humor that Winnie the Pooh has.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_01: And even as a mother, I know that if I can get my kids laughing, the day's just gonna go much more smoothly.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_01: And if we're reading a book like Winnie the Pooh, where they're asked to be in on the joke, it's gonna be a good read.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_00: That's a really good point.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_00: And I think Winnie the Pooh um may have a lot more humor in this of this sort than say like Wind in the Willows, which tends to be a little more serious in tone.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_00: That's interesting.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_00: And also like being in on the joke, I'm just thinking, for instance, like again, Pooh's story about the wrong sort of bees, where Christopher Rob Robin is in on the joke that Pooh doesn't quite get at first.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_00: That's part of the driving story there, where Pooh uh comes across this tree in the forest and he realizes that there's a beehive at the top.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_00: So he goes to get a balloon, and Christopher Robin is happy to assist him, gives him a balloon, but he is struck that Pooh thinks that he can fool the bees to pretend that he can pretend to be a little cloud.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_00: Whereas Christopher Robin, um, the the delightful phrase there is like, and he thought to himself, silly old bear, but he didn't say it because he loved him so and just sort of like Christopher Robin recognized the joke, and but Pooh has to figure it out for himself.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_00: So it's almost like children at two different, slightly different stages of development interacting here.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_02: Well, there's so much wonderful children's literature that is um, I don't think subversive is quite the right word, but it sort of upends power structures because in some ways to be a child is to be powerless.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_02: You know, even in a wonderful family, you're really just not in charge.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and you're relying on other people for really extremely important things to your well-being.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_02: And so the character of Christopher Robin, you know, the child again can be in on the joke, but but Christopher Robin is the wisest, smartest, most mature person in that book.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_02: And the animals are the silly ones.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_02: But we as adults see that Christopher Robin doesn't quite understand that the balloon is not gonna work, or in it does in the story, but in the real world, you can't grab a balloon and and go up into the sky in that way.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so I think it it allows children to play around with their own placement and their own um growth.
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_02: And it um it also makes me think a little bit of role Dahl's stories, um, which actually they kind of upset my husband.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_02: He thinks they're too grotesque.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_02: And Dahl was a very grotesque writer, and his adult stories are very um frightening at times.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_02: But the the grotesqueness in the Dahl stories is because the child has found a way to take some control and in some way, you know, act against those adults in the stories that are are wicked or act against the order of things, and it'll happen through magic or it'll happen through a trick or or being spirited away by a giant or something like that.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_02: But but when a child is stuck, some sort of fantastical way of getting unstuck may seem the only way out.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_02: So um, you know, with Christopher Robin, we can see a child who's in between those places, a child who's still in the hundred-acre wood, but is starting to see these glimmers of the adult world and and is is wondering how to behave in it.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_02: And, you know, eventually at the end of the stories goes off to school and leaves.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_00: That's a sad ending in a way.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_00: Like it seems this like the stage of life is over.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I think another wonderful thing about many children's classics is that you can read them over and over again, and that a child will get something different out of it as he or she matures, just as with adults.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I reread Jane Austen every few years, and each time I understand the story differently based on where I am in my lifespan.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that happens with great children's literature also, that a child might read Winnie the Pooh purely as an imaginative story as a young child, and then if he or she revisits it as an older child, we'll see more of the theme of growing up in it and have thoughts about that.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_01: So I think that is a gift that great children's classics can offer.
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_00: That's a really good point.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I think of this as definition, kind of integral to the definition of what is a classic.
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's something that we read and reread and reread with profit.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_02: And it becomes part of the lore.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_02: And maybe that's part of the affection, you know, it becomes part of the cultural bank that that people refer back to.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_02: And uh, you know, I think there's some some concern in the present day that that isn't being passed on to the same degree.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_02: So I'm very grateful that things like Winnie the Pooh are still being read.
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, can you talk a little bit about this?
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_00: Because you mentioned um before before this that you've been thinking of Pooh's songs and similarities with Beatrix Potter's riddles and just how these have entered your family lore.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_00: So the conversations um that you have that are inspired by these books.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_00: So can you talk about it more and just the insp implications of it all?
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_02: Sure.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_02: So I was trying to think of some similarities between these two sets of stories, between Beatrix Potter and um and Winnie the Pooh, and try to see if there was something that was similar about them that that made them have staying power.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_02: And these songs and riddles is one of the things that stuck out to me.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_02: And um, you know, Winnie the Pooh, of course, was turned into an animated a series of animated movies, maybe a show, too, I don't know, um, by Disney.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that did a lot for its popularity in America.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_02: And in those shows, so in the stories, Pooh writes these little songs, or he calls them hums and he sings them to himself.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_02: And so in the movies, they are sung, they are set to music.
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_02: And I was thinking to myself about how many of these little songs from the stories uh without ever having seen the movies, my family actually turned into music.
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_02: So there's one in particular about snow and um how his toes are getting cold.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_02: And um, we have our own tune to it, and we we've sort of sung it, you know, and then I realized that that we have done the same thing with a number of the Beatrix Potter riddles.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_02: So um the the probably the best known Potter story that has riddles in it is Squirrel Nutkin.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and he is sort of taunting old Mr.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_02: B the Owl with riddles, but there are also nursery rhymes.
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_02: Um, she has a couple of books that are nursery rhymes that she's either gathered or made up.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_02: And so many of them became songs in my family.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_02: And, you know, children who are so natural, uh have such natural memorization skills, will sort of hold on to these things sometimes and then they they pop up.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_02: I I was actually um in my my editing work, I was working on a piece by uh another friend of ours, Luella Diamico, um, and she made a reference to something uh from one of the Potter stories and how they sang it in their house.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_02: And I thought, oh my goodness, we sing that too, but we have our own music, and so does she.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_02: So um, sorry, I'm getting a little far from the point, but what I was trying to say is that I think that children do things like this.
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_02: I think that in their making sense of the world and creating order out of the world, they do things like make little hums, you know, and you'll you'll hear it in your own children, and sometimes your children will be humming twinkle twinkle, but sometimes they're just sort of making up music and maybe there's wordplay, you know, children play with words.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_02: And in my own family growing up, we did a lot of wordplay.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_02: It was part of our sort of family humor, and I think we do that now.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so when there are little nuggets like that, or sometimes it's an illustration, I don't know if you do, but I have visual memories of illustrations from books I read when I was a child.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_02: An illustration or a description of food, like from Dickens, or one of these little hums, they just nestle into you and they stay there forever.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_02: They stay there forever.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_02: And if the memory is triggered, it comes right back.
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_02: So um I think that's part of the staying power of both of those uh is that they they capture that again, interior life of the child, how the child processes words through those songs and riddles.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and and that's something that I think is is something that is not used in children's literature as much anymore, but I can think of a number of books that are wonderful children's classics that have poetry in them or songs or riddles or something like that that children used to play with even more than they do today, and it's still really relevant.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_00: That's really that's so fascinating to think about.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_00: You know, the hums, the fact that he calls it hums, it just like dawned on me, you know, my kids are hummers.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_00: Like sometimes there will be two different people, little people, sitting on uh sitting in the living room, and each one is humming something to himself or herself, and it's just like they don't even realize they're doing it unless they can hear the other person, and then they get really upset because the other person is distracting them.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_00: But but there is that like the childlike sort of like world of music that's so instinctive, as you said.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_00: And good children's writers um seem to have tapped into it.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_02: I I hope that before we're done, Ivana, you'll say something about um from the mixed-up files of Mrs.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_02: Basilie Frankweiler, which is a newer wonderful classic, because I I saw you mentioned something about what a wonderful characterization of the child's mind there is in that book.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_02: And I think these these books, they don't all grasp the same thing about the child's interior life or the same kind of child, but when they can hit it on the button, it's almost like someone sees inside you.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_02: You know, and you didn't know there was anyone else like that.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_02: And that's really powerful.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, I mean, that is such a wonderful book.
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm reading it to my kids right now.
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_01: And remembering when I read it, I think I was at my grandmother's house.
• 22:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and so it's bringing back very special memories for for me to read it to them now, which is again a mark of a great children's classic that as a parent, you just love doing it because it knits together different parts of your life in a way you never could have predicted when you know I was 10 reading this book.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but one of the great things about the mixed-up tiles of Mrs.
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_01: Basilie Frank Walder is it starts off with this depiction of um a girl, I think she's 12, and she's running away from home because home is unjust.
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_01: She has to do all these chores, she has all these little brothers, life is deeply unfair, and so she is gonna make sure that everybody knows how important she is to the whole family by moving into the Metropolitan Museum of Art and not telling anybody.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_01: And my kids were both incredibly struck by this uh opening of the book, and both started talking about all the different ways in which the family is unjust to them, also, you know, and it clearly resonated uh deeply.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, this is just a very human thing to feel that you know you're you're in a family, you're you're contributing to the family, and people don't appreciate you enough.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, I'm not gonna say as mothers, we may sometimes feel this way too, but you know, perhaps we do.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_01: And um I think that's just wonderful that a book provides space for you to have emotions that maybe aren't particularly polite to express to other people, but that you definitely feel and um makes it clear to the child you're not wrong, you're not weird, you just have a normal human feeling.
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_01: And here is a setting room which we're gonna explore that very normal human feeling that you have.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_01: And I I think that's beautiful.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_01: I think that's a great thing to be able to offer a child.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_00: This makes me think of Eeyore.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_00: He's like the closest figure to that in the Winnie the Pooh stories, the really kind of gloomy um donkey who always thinks, yeah, the world is out to get him.
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_00: And then like there's this surprise that you know what, friends make everything better, which is just like so comforting in a simple yet complicated way.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_02: And Eeyore isn't left out as much as exactly no one cares about him, they they accept him as part of their community, you know, and and of course we all need that.
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_02: And um, I suppose I'm sure literary study scholars have thought of this before and and teased it out, but you know, Eeyore obviously represents this sort of gloomy emotion or sadness and sorrow or lack of hope or things like that.
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_02: And probably you could assign a particular emotion to each of the characters.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_02: It would be kind of like kind of like inside out, right?
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_02: But better.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_02: Um and um, you know, maybe Eeyore's, as Ivana was saying about these emotions is sort of an indication that it's kind of okay.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_02: You know, you can you can have these feelings and and it's very clear in the stories that they're not accurate assessments of the situation, right?
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_02: Um, Eeyore is not actually, you know, that badly off or unloved or things like that, but we all do have that part of of our hearts that feels that way.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_02: And we need someone to come up and and say something a little cheerful or pat us on the back or throw us the birthday party anyway, you know, and maybe that um models not just uh sort of how we should treat others, but also how we can treat our interior emotions for the child, especially in a country that is not known for expressing that kind of emotion.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_01: I think Tigger is also wonderful for this as well.
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_01: I have a child who is very tigger-ish, and um it's not always great to be Tigger, you know, if you're in mass or you're trying to sit for dinner, or um you're in some other very adult situation where you're supposed to be sitting and being quiet.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_01: Being a Tigger is is quite difficult, and yet Tigger in the Pooh stories is just a wonderful character.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_01: And I know, Dixie, you haven't seen the movie, but there is a wonderful Winnie the Pooh movie with just the most delightful depiction of Tigger.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_01: And I should say I love that.
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_01: I love when there are classic stories that then just pop up in all these like many different ways.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_01: I love seeing the movie version.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_01: I love going out and seeking a modern retelling if that's available.
• 27:14
  SPEAKER_01: And my kids love that too.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_01: So I know we haven't really touched on that for Winnie the Pooh, but it is so fun when you read a classic story and then can go also find the graphic novel and also watch the movie.
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_01: And I I my family loves that.
• 27:29
  SPEAKER_01: That it that is something that we really enjoy in our family culture.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_01: But um to bring it back to Tigger, it just it is it is wonderful that kids can look at the Pooh characters and see something about themselves and why that is great, not just why that's something that makes it hard to sit through a church service, and how more effective it is that they're animals because it's one little degree removed from people.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_02: So they can be uh, you know, tigger can be all id, basically, you know, or it can be all energy.
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_02: And it doesn't, we don't think to ourselves, well, that's not realistic, you know, and it's a little bit it's a little bit safer.
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_02: There's one human, and that human is a little bit less wild and crazy and exaggerated.
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_02: But the animals can be all the parts of us that we're not restraining inside, but we have to restrain outside.
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_00: And at the same time, all of those characters do seem pretty developed.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_00: Like they seem a little um, yeah, like all one feature.
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_00: Each one represents like one particular mood, if you will.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_00: But at the same time, they do seem pretty well developed.
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_00: And perhaps that's why um I found my kids also just really relating to them.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_00: And uh speaking of family lore, like how families react to that, there's certain ways that we talk about situations.
• 28:54
  SPEAKER_00: Like if somebody is gloomy, I might say, like, this person is such an eeyore.
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_00: And everybody knows what you mean.
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_00: Um, or with my youngest, who is very um energetic, we sometimes say, like, the mission today is to unbalance tigger.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_00: And everybody knows what we're talking about.
• 29:09
  SPEAKER_00: It's that's what it is.
• 29:13
  SPEAKER_01: It's so good to have those kind of touchstones.
• 29:15
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, sorry, please go ahead, Dixie.
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_02: No, go ahead, Ivana.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_01: No, I was just I was saying it's so it's so good to have those kind of touchstones and um ways that you can very gently relate to a child um something that is um based in literature again as a you know technique for trying to help children adjust to the environments around them.
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_01: When you can relate it to a book, it is so much better than when you're just like, you gotta sit down, bud, you know.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um I I find that also to just be very helpful.
• 29:53
  SPEAKER_01: That, oh, okay, yes, that's what you mean.
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_01: You mean don't be tigger right now, you know, put in a little more Eeyore.
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_02: Isn't it isn't it also just very enriching to have these kinds of touchstones and references?
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_02: And I I know some families will be more literary than others, and it's certainly not necessary.
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but I know, you know, when we're walking around, whenever we see a squirrel, we say, Hi, squirrel nutkin.
• 30:19
  SPEAKER_02: You know, um, and there's something about that that, well, on the one hand, it it connects literature and reality, which is very nice when we can make those ties, but also it's like a little um inside joke, not just for our family, but for everyone who knows whose girl nutkin is, or at least knows the name of it.
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_02: It's can it connects us as a community that we have those touchstones, or that everyone would know what you meant when you say your child is like Tigger.
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_02: You know, people people know what that is, or or Eeyore.
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_02: And those touchstones do change over time.
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and and um I mentioned earlier, sometimes I have a little concern about it because it's my impression that children are not, for example, learning nursery rhymes the way that maybe they did when I was a kid, and um may not know Jack and Jill.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_02: And it's it's not that it matters so much about Jack and Jill exactly, you know, or may not know certain fairy tales, although they know others, but more that we have um, you know, while we welcome sort of influx of new ideas, that that we also have some things that are shared because otherwise it becomes very difficult to talk to each other if we don't have shared references.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_02: So um I think they're actually they're actually quite important.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_02: And you don't have to know all of them or know all of them for any particular culture, but wow, you know, I was um I was in Spain last month on a walking trip and we were singing, and this older woman in her 60s came up behind me and she said, Do you know this one?
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_02: And she started singing a song that my mother used to sing to me as a lullaby, and that I had never ever heard anyone else sing.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_02: And I sing it to my children.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_02: And I just couldn't believe it.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_02: Like that somehow in our two lives we both knew this song.
• 32:21
  SPEAKER_02: It was just really connective, and and art and literature and music do that.
• 32:27
  SPEAKER_02: They they connect us.
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_02: Straight to the soul.
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_02: Eeyore, straight to the soul.
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we don't think of him, but yeah, that's what it is.
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_00: So far, we've been all like warm and fuzzy with Winnie the Pooh because he deserves all the warm and fuzzies.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_00: And now we're gonna ruin all the warm and fuzzies.
• 32:46
  SPEAKER_00: No, not really.
• 32:47
  SPEAKER_00: But uh, let's get complicated.
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so I'm gonna ask Ivana this really complex question because Ivana, you've mentioned that you've read Winnie the Pooh with your kids, but these stories just haven't clicked so like well with your family so far.
• 33:02
  SPEAKER_00: And you mentioned the same thing applies to Beatrix Potter's books.
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_00: So, what advice would you give other families who might try like a well-beloved popular children's classic and it just doesn't click?
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_01: So um let me let me first paint a picture of how well some of these stories have not clicked.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_01: So Winnie the Pooh, I think I try too early.
• 33:28
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I think of it as like, you know, like a little kid's book, and my sons, when they were little, just were not interested.
• 33:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um the reaction to Beatrix Potter, like they just ran away, basically.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_01: Like Winnie the Pooh, they were like relatively willing to engage for a little bit.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_01: Beatrix Potter, it just did not click at all.
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_01: Um, we have really enjoyed the Winnie the Pooh movie, um, which we watch with my toddler daughter.
• 33:57
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but it is not infrequent in this household that a book will just not click with my older sons who are now 10 and 8.
• 34:07
  SPEAKER_01: And so families have different strategies for doing this.
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_01: And mine is basically okay, you know, if you are not feeling this book and we have tried two chapters, or we have tried three chapters, and the language is too hard, or the storyline is not appealing to you, that is fine with me.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_01: And we'll pick up another book.
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_01: And the reason I do this is I don't see educating children as like a to-do list that you have to check all the things off the list to have an educated child.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's much more relationship-based.
• 34:48
  SPEAKER_01: And so I want our family read alouds and I want the books I assign my children to read to be really positive experiences and really warm memories.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_01: And if a book isn't gonna create that at this point in my children's lives, I'm sort of like, okay, on to the next.
• 35:11
  SPEAKER_01: There are so many children's classics out there that if this one is not doing it for you, we're just gonna pick a different one.
• 35:19
  SPEAKER_01: And one of the nice things about having, I have four children, and my younger two children are two and eight months, is as a parent, I can think, well, maybe the baby will like it when he's six.
• 35:32
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I don't have to put all my eggs in this one basket and think, okay, I have to get through the entire, you know, Western canon with this one child because that's never going to happen.
• 35:47
  SPEAKER_02: That's a that's really really important release to give to parents, Ivana.
• 35:53
  SPEAKER_02: And I think especially homeschooling parents who are in charge of their children's literary development in an even bigger way than other parents are.
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_02: It is not possible to do everything, and in fact, it's counterproductive to try.
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_02: So some of these things, I mean, your kids know who Winnie the Pooh is, they're gonna understand the ticker reference.
• 36:15
  SPEAKER_02: They they just don't have to love it and they don't have to read everything about it, you know, but they will read some good things, you know.
• 36:22
  SPEAKER_02: Everyone will have their 70% knowledge of the canon or whatever, and they'll get to encounter things later in life.
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_02: I remember when I was um a kid, I was in, when I was in third grade, my teacher had this reading group for the um better readers in the class after school.
• 36:42
  SPEAKER_02: And one of the books we read was Anne of Green Gables, and I just I didn't like it at all.
• 36:47
  SPEAKER_02: I didn't finish it.
• 36:49
  SPEAKER_02: I pretended, you know.
• 36:51
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I was about eight years old.
• 36:54
  SPEAKER_02: And then when I was 12, I came across it again and I just loved it.
• 36:59
  SPEAKER_02: And it it could have not happened, you know, I could have never loved Anne of Green Gables, but that was the time for me.
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_02: So, in the same way that, you know, there are probably many really wonderful books that were published in the 19th century that did not become classics basically because of a lack of dumb luck.
• 37:16
  SPEAKER_02: You know, they they they ticked all the boxes, they were suited to the time, and and it just didn't happen.
• 37:22
  SPEAKER_02: They just didn't get picked up or whatever.
• 37:25
  SPEAKER_02: And and there are going to be things like that for us too, and that's totally fine.
• 37:29
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, I think that when people talk about what is good in education, it should almost never bind consciences, should not bind the consciences of parents because education is so expansive.
• 37:42
  SPEAKER_02: So the same is true for us or or for me as a reader, as an adult, and maybe for you too.
• 37:48
  SPEAKER_02: You know, sometimes um there's just a book you don't like, and that's okay.
• 37:53
  SPEAKER_02: And you can appreciate it without liking it.
• 37:58
  SPEAKER_02: You can even think it's not that good, but you can still appreciate the good parts of it.
• 38:03
  SPEAKER_02: And um I think there are some children's classics that are still classics today that we look at and we think that particular aspect of it or something like that, that's not, I don't like that, or that doesn't work anymore.
• 38:17
  SPEAKER_02: And it's still touted as a classic, you know, whatever.
• 38:20
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, just leave that one out.
• 38:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 38:24
  SPEAKER_00: Karen Swallow Primer has been doing a series on her Substack titled Books I've Loved That I Cannot Recommend to Others.
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_00: And it's basically about this.
• 38:33
  SPEAKER_00: It's like, here's a book I loved, and I'm not so sure other people will necessarily love it.
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_00: Some will, some might not, and here's possible explanations why not.
• 38:42
  SPEAKER_00: And um, I'm sure somebody could do that with children's books also, like what Ivana was describing with Minnie the Pooh.
• 38:48
  SPEAKER_00: And it's okay.
• 38:49
  SPEAKER_00: There are a lot of really great classics out there.
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think Dixie alluded to this already, but as homeschooling moms, if you like take out homeschooling books from the library or you listen to homeschooling podcasts, you might be left with the impression that there is like a list of books you have to read to your kids.
• 39:13
  SPEAKER_01: And if you don't read that whole list of books, you get an F.
• 39:17
  SPEAKER_01: And that's and this is hard won experience on my part, but that is not my experience of a positive way to educate your child children.
• 39:30
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, for me, um, part of it is that my older two sons are much more interested in math and science.
• 39:38
  SPEAKER_01: And so they just don't want to sit on the couch and read book after book because that's not where their center of gravity is.
• 39:49
  SPEAKER_01: And following that actually has been, and here we're getting really far afield from Winnie the Pooh, but following that has been just a delight for me to explore mathematics with them and explore science with them.
• 40:03
  SPEAKER_01: Those were not subjects that were necessarily my first interest in school.
• 40:09
  SPEAKER_01: And yet it's just been a total delight to delve into the world of math and puzzles and logic games with them.
• 40:20
  SPEAKER_01: So I would just encourage listeners, if reading Winnie the Pooh is just not working for you and your kids, there is nothing wrong with you.
• 40:30
  SPEAKER_01: And one of the delight of delights of homeschooling is instead of having a particular curriculum that has to be followed for the child to be considered educated, you can decide for yourself.
• 40:44
  SPEAKER_00: I love that the idea.
• 40:45
  SPEAKER_00: Education is not a checklist.
• 40:47
  SPEAKER_00: You've you both have mentioned that.
• 40:49
  SPEAKER_00: Like it's not a checklist.
• 40:51
  SPEAKER_00: Our our children are not just like boxes to be filled.
• 40:56
  SPEAKER_00: Well, so on a related note, I guess uh let's talk a little bit more about um this process of how do we encourage literacy, how do we teach readings, reading uh in your homeschool.
• 41:07
  SPEAKER_00: So all of us are homeschool moms with experience in doing this.
• 41:12
  SPEAKER_02: There's so many different ways.
• 41:15
  SPEAKER_02: And again, this is something where sometimes people get very, they have very strong opinions about curricula or methods.
• 41:24
  SPEAKER_02: And in some ways, there could be generalizations about what might be better or worse for most kids.
• 41:30
  SPEAKER_02: You know, there there are there are things you could say, but um what I would say for new homeschooling parents is if the thing doesn't work after eight weeks, either take a break or chuck it out the window because your children will not always respond like other people's children, especially in the early grades.
• 41:50
  SPEAKER_02: Now, with reading in particular, children develop at very different ages in terms of their ability to read.
• 41:58
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and it's really quite healthy for them to begin reading at a number of different ages, um, all the way up to about eight or nine.
• 42:08
  SPEAKER_02: Um, we have a lot of research that suggests that if they are reading by about nine, there's really no difference later in life in literacy between a child who begins reading at that age and a child who begins reading at four or five.
• 42:21
  SPEAKER_02: So it's not a race to learn to read.
• 42:24
  SPEAKER_02: Now, some children will learn to read quite early.
• 42:28
  SPEAKER_02: Some kids will teach themselves at three, you know.
• 42:31
  SPEAKER_02: Um, my children, my three older children, all it all really looks like for them at seven.
• 42:38
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but my youngest, who's five, she is really rare and to go.
• 42:42
  SPEAKER_02: I think she's gonna learn to read very, very quickly when we start kindergarten for her in the fall.
• 42:48
  SPEAKER_02: So she may be different that way.
• 42:51
  SPEAKER_02: Um but teaching reading, at least for me, is one of the most gratifying things about homeschooling when that click happens and you've kept the faith that it's gonna happen, and you're doing phonics or whatever it is, and there's so many different curricula out there, and you can find one that you like.
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_02: It does not have to cost$300.
• 43:11
  SPEAKER_02: It does not have to cost$50, you know, but just be patient and remember your child is still growing, is what I would say.
• 43:21
  SPEAKER_02: And then the one more thing I'll add is that one of the best ways to encourage literacy among your children is for them to see you reading for pleasure.
• 43:31
  SPEAKER_02: So just sitting in your chair reading to yourself, because especially at those young ages, they love what you love.
• 43:39
  SPEAKER_02: And if that's what people do in their mind, people sit and read, then then they too will sit and read, whether they sit and read a little bit or they sit and read like you know, a bookworm.
• 43:48
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, like Dixie, I'm an incredible pragmist pragmatist when it comes to homeschooling.
• 43:55
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so if a particular method is not working with my kids, I do not have.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_01: To check it.
• 44:01
  SPEAKER_01: Like life is too short.
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_01: And this is one reason why I try not to spend too much money on a homeschool curricula because it's always hard to tell in advance what is going to click with my kids.
• 44:12
  SPEAKER_01: But if it's not clicking, it is very rare that I'll like spend more than three months on something that's just not working.
• 44:21
  SPEAKER_01: With reading specifically, I agree with everything Dixie said.
• 44:26
  SPEAKER_01: And what I would add to that is that reading, like we think of it as being a linear process, but at least with my children, it was not particularly linear and it wasn't particularly step-by-step.
• 44:43
  SPEAKER_01: It was more like a web that they entered into.
• 44:47
  SPEAKER_01: And in some ways, it was very hard to tell the line between when they were learning to read, when they were reading, and when they were like readers.
• 45:40
  SPEAKER_01: You know, some kids learn to read essentially by writing.
• 45:45
  SPEAKER_01: And you just don't know what's going to click with your particular kid until you've been working with them.
• 45:53
  SPEAKER_01: And so phonics is important.
• 45:56
  SPEAKER_01: I love phonics.
• 45:57
  SPEAKER_01: I did teach your child to read in 100 easy lessons with both kids, uh, kids old enough to read.
• 46:04
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so I do, you know, that that was positive.
• 46:07
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but I think there can be a lot of emphasis on like, okay, here's the one way kids learn to read, and you gotta do it this way.
• 46:17
  SPEAKER_01: And it at least in my experience, it's not quite that simple.
• 46:22
  SPEAKER_01: And there's just a lot of input that goes into creating a child who's able to confidently read.
• 46:30
  SPEAKER_02: Could I add one more thing too, Nadia?
• 46:33
  SPEAKER_02: I think it's also really important, and I I love what you were saying, Ivana, and it's sort of a know your child kind of thing, and be patient.
• 46:41
  SPEAKER_02: And it it makes me think of other high stress things in parenting, like potty training, and like just because your neighbor's child did it in three days doesn't mean yours will, or vice versa.
• 46:50
  SPEAKER_02: But there's nothing wrong.
• 46:51
  SPEAKER_02: Don't freak out.
• 46:52
  SPEAKER_02: So I would say that about reading, don't freak out, you know.
• 46:56
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but also you matter in this equation.
• 47:01
  SPEAKER_02: So your preferences, your patience level, your training, your family structure, whether or not there are two parents who are able to participate in the nitty-gritty of homeschooling or there's just one.
• 47:15
  SPEAKER_02: Do you have a baby in the house or is your youngest dad of diapers?
• 47:19
  SPEAKER_02: Those things matter.
• 47:20
  SPEAKER_02: So I think it's important, almost as important as observing your child is observing yourself.
• 47:26
  SPEAKER_02: And if something is not working for you, it has to go.
• 47:29
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, if you've if you've put in your due diligence to try it and it's not working for you, it has to go.
• 47:37
  SPEAKER_02: So if you have this beautiful schoolroom and you feel trapped in that room standing there while the kids are doing their work, let it go.
• 47:46
  SPEAKER_02: Let it go.
• 47:47
  SPEAKER_02: Let them work in the living room where you can supervise them while you're doing the laundry.
• 47:52
  SPEAKER_02: Or for reading, you know, Ivana, you mentioned 100 Easy Lessons, which is a very popular book that a lot of my friends have used.
• 47:59
  SPEAKER_02: And I hated it because it was extremely scripted.
• 48:03
  SPEAKER_02: So it tells the parent exactly what to say and then what to ask the child.
• 48:09
  SPEAKER_02: And I think because I'm a teacher and because I'm sort of a maybe an alternative kind of educational thinker, um, my thoughts aren't very mainstream about education.
• 48:20
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I couldn't stand that because I couldn't adjust, I couldn't do my own thing.
• 48:25
  SPEAKER_02: So I learned about myself that I don't like scripted curricula.
• 48:29
  SPEAKER_02: I like things that are very flexible and that I can adjust or put together myself.
• 48:34
  SPEAKER_02: But someone who um is different than me in many things might do a lot better with, you know, in math or anything like that, with one of these boxed curricula that tell them exactly what to do, and they don't want to have to put it together themselves.
• 48:50
  SPEAKER_02: But if I don't get to put it together myself, I feel really annoyed.
• 48:55
  SPEAKER_02: So so you gotta know yourself and accept that it isn't about a right or wrong, and my way is not better than someone else's necessarily, but it is better suited to my family.
• 49:07
  SPEAKER_01: I I was I was gonna say, you know, the the one thing you really want to avoid with reading, or really with anything, but especially with reading, is getting into power struggles with your kids.
• 49:19
  SPEAKER_01: So if it is misery to be sitting at the table and being like, this is a letter A, and it makes the sound ah, and you're both hating it, like that's bad.
• 49:31
  SPEAKER_01: You do not want to be there.
• 49:33
  SPEAKER_01: And um, you are not gonna progress far as a homeschooler.
• 49:38
  SPEAKER_01: And I think this is one of the big differences between homeschooling and schooling in a classroom.
• 49:44
  SPEAKER_01: A teacher can take that approach and it will work because it is a classroom setting, and it is a relationship that is different from a parent-child relationship.
• 49:55
  SPEAKER_01: Trying to make that work as a parent is just incredibly difficult.
• 49:59
  SPEAKER_01: It's just a different setting.
• 50:02
  SPEAKER_01: So my my big encouragement to a parent who's trying to teach a child how to read is you want us to be pleasant for both of you.
• 50:10
  SPEAKER_01: So, like, break out the chocolate chips, sit on the couch, you know, make it really short.
• 50:15
  SPEAKER_01: Whatever it takes, and like kids should learn phonics.
• 50:19
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not saying they shouldn't, but like whatever it takes to make the experience as pleasant and warm as possible is gonna pay off big dividends in the long run, especially for something as key as reading.
• 50:32
  SPEAKER_01: Because goal number one should be don't make your kid hate it.
• 50:36
  SPEAKER_01: Like that, that should be goal number one.
• 50:38
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, you do want your kids to read, but you do not want your kids to hate the process of getting there.
• 50:44
  SPEAKER_00: I love it.
• 50:45
  SPEAKER_00: And it's, you know, as a as someone who is not a native English speaker, um, I'm I also want to remind everyone that learning to read in English is a lot harder than in some other languages.
• 50:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I realized this with my oldest, um, and he's the only one with whom we did this because I don't know, I I think I was a tired mom with a second and third.
• 51:09
  SPEAKER_00: But with my oldest, um, he actually learned to read in Russian first.
• 51:13
  SPEAKER_00: Because in Russian, you take a consonant and a vowel, and they make a syllable and you're set.
• 51:19
  SPEAKER_00: And in English, like, what is all this, like all those extra letters that combined in various ways make a some sort of random noise that like you didn't know?
• 51:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um, it's a lot less intuitive.
• 51:30
  SPEAKER_00: Whereas in Russian, it was like, again, here's a consonant, here's a vowel, you put them together, you're done.
• 51:36
  SPEAKER_00: Like that's so phonics for him clicked so much more easily than for my younger two, precisely because he had that.
• 51:44
  SPEAKER_00: And once he mastered it in Russian, he transferred it to English and it was like, okay, we're ready to go to the races.
• 51:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um yeah, made me realize, like, okay, yeah, that was that made it easier.
• 51:56
  SPEAKER_00: So many rules.
• 51:57
  SPEAKER_02: I was just gonna say some kids will need longer phonics instruction in English than others.
• 52:02
  SPEAKER_02: So, like I've observed with my own children, and what I what I use for them is Noah Webster's Blueback Speller, which is very old and it's been updated, but it's very basic, costs about 10 bucks.
• 52:14
  SPEAKER_02: And we go through that, and then I have a set of readers we start reading, but we never finish the blueback speller, and then we never finish the whole set of readers because at a certain point they start to be able to intuit the differences between though and through.
• 52:31
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but other children don't learn that intuitively, and they will need more phonics instruction and more, you know, about different combinations of letters.
• 52:42
  SPEAKER_02: And either way is fine.
• 52:44
  SPEAKER_02: So again, don't freak out is the rule here.
• 52:46
  SPEAKER_02: Don't freak out.
• 52:48
  SPEAKER_02: You're, you know, um, but a lot of families will have one kind of one, one kind of child and another kind of child.
• 52:57
  SPEAKER_02: And as Ivana mentioned briefly, some children write first and then they read, and others read first and then they write, and it's all okay.
• 53:06
  SPEAKER_02: And as long as you know they reverse their letters, it doesn't mean they're dyslexic, it's normal at that age, and when they get to be eight or nine, maybe eight, you know, if they're still struggling, that's the time to have them evaluated.
• 53:20
  SPEAKER_02: But at five, it's just so totally within the realm of normal.
• 53:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I I always think that the hardest thing as a parent is to know when you need to seek outside help and when just to let things kind of develop as they are.
• 53:38
  SPEAKER_01: So that is a really tricky question.
• 53:40
  SPEAKER_01: I agree with Dixie.
• 53:41
  SPEAKER_01: If you have an eight-year-old who's still not reading, that's probably the time to go looking for outside help.
• 53:49
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but in the early years, the the other big thing, and this is hard-run wisdom.
• 53:55
  SPEAKER_01: These are mistakes I have made personally, um, is to recognize that incremental progress, really slow progress, is still progress.
• 54:07
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you know, this is on my mind because I'm potty training a child.
• 54:12
  SPEAKER_01: And I, you know, I've read those three-day books.
• 54:14
  SPEAKER_01: I have never potty trained a child in three days.
• 54:18
  SPEAKER_01: It always takes eight months because there is, at least for my children, I don't know if I'm doing something wrong, but there's just like a lot that goes into that process for my kids in terms of like being able to take their pants off themselves, you know, and recognizing when you need to go to the bathroom.
• 54:37
  SPEAKER_01: These are not simple things.
• 54:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um, they are um things that require a lot out of the kid.
• 54:46
  SPEAKER_01: And I think reading is like that, that it is not a simple process, Dixie.
• 54:53
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and Nadia, you both talked about how complex reading is.
• 54:57
  SPEAKER_01: And so sometimes you just need to go really slowly and recognize that that's fine, you know, that's good, you're making progress, and that's what we want.
• 55:10
  SPEAKER_01: And the same with reading classics, you know.
• 55:14
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I I know a lot of parents have strong feelings about like what kinds of books their kids re read.
• 55:22
  SPEAKER_01: But for one of my sons, the thing that really got him willing to read is uh we bought these like really stupid, like superhero early readers, but he man, he was excited about those.
• 55:37
  SPEAKER_01: And that was the thing for him that he was like, Yeah, I do want to do it now because I want to read about Batman.
• 55:43
  SPEAKER_01: And so I think um it's important to realize, okay, your kid is not you and has their own tastes and interests, and at least with something like reading, like it's okay to go get the stupid graphic novels out of the library if that's the thing that's gonna make your kid really excited to jump into a book, in my opinion.
• 56:06
  SPEAKER_01: You know, every family is different.
• 56:08
  SPEAKER_01: But for me, I really want my kids to like reading, and so the way that I do that is figure out what they want to read and then use that as a bridge.
• 56:17
  SPEAKER_02: Doesn't mean that they'll always be reading Captain Underpants.
• 56:20
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know, and I know, I know, Ivana, that you have managed to introduce your children to some pretty wonderful literature um as well, you know.
• 56:30
  SPEAKER_02: So you can you can always adjust, you're just doing it for now.
• 56:34
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you're just doing it for now.
• 56:36
  SPEAKER_00: Well, as we wrap up, I have a final question for both of you.
• 56:41
  SPEAKER_00: What classic book, whether fiction or nonfiction, do you wish you had written and why?
• 56:48
  SPEAKER_02: Are you going first, Ivana, or am I going first?
• 56:51
  SPEAKER_01: I think you have to go first, Dixie, because I have a long answer to this.
• 56:58
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 56:58
  SPEAKER_02: I well, mine might be long too.
• 57:00
  SPEAKER_02: Watch out.
• 57:00
  SPEAKER_00: Um, Captain Underpants.
• 57:05
  SPEAKER_02: Diary of a wimpy kid.
• 57:07
  SPEAKER_02: No, um, you know, I tried not to overthink this.
• 57:11
  SPEAKER_02: I tried to think of a book that has had staying power in my life um from when I was young until today.
• 57:20
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, so my my longtime favorite author as an adult has been Will A Cather, but my lifelong favorite has been Mark Twain.
• 57:31
  SPEAKER_02: And so I was thinking of his book, and I have so much admiration for the adventures of Huckleberry Finn.
• 57:37
  SPEAKER_02: And I know that if we were to write it today, we would probably do some things differently about the characterization of Jim.
• 57:44
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but the character of Huck, I think is one of the best characters in literature.
• 57:50
  SPEAKER_02: He is so precise, precisely described and authentic.
• 57:56
  SPEAKER_02: And um if you haven't read the book, there's there's an awful lot of his interior life that comes through.
• 58:01
  SPEAKER_02: And he's this little scamp rascal alley rat that's abused by his father, and everyone discounts him, you know, as compared to Tom Sawyer, whose friend, about whom there's also a book, who is actually much less um morally admirable, but is part of the norm, and Huck is outside.
• 58:26
  SPEAKER_02: But the whole story is about Huck coming to grips with um the great moral dilemma of his time and place, which is slavery.
• 58:35
  SPEAKER_02: And he comes to see things about it that people like Tom simply cannot see because they can't see past their own noses.
• 58:42
  SPEAKER_02: And um so I'm a great admirer of that character.
• 58:45
  SPEAKER_02: I also, as a historian, love that time period.
• 58:48
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and I think it's I think it's masterful.
• 58:51
  SPEAKER_02: I would like people to continue to read it.
• 58:53
  SPEAKER_02: I know it's sometimes banned, but I think that's usually through misunderstanding.
• 58:57
  SPEAKER_02: I think that teenagers and adults can read it um with an understanding of the context and see what a just a moral blockbuster it is without being didactic.
• 59:09
  SPEAKER_02: So that's my answer.
• 59:12
  SPEAKER_01: So mine is maybe an unusual one.
• 59:14
  SPEAKER_01: Uh it's The Giver by Lois Lowry.
• 59:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um this is it's such a good book.
• 59:22
  SPEAKER_01: Um, it's a kind of dystopian book.
• 59:25
  SPEAKER_01: Um and it discusses so many critical moral issues, but in a way that's really um palatable and understandable.
• 59:39
  SPEAKER_01: So it's often assigned in fifth grade and it discusses euthanasia.
• 59:44
  SPEAKER_01: Um, it discusses infanticide, so it sounds very grim, and in many ways it is grim, um, but does it in a way that a child that's kind of like moving out of early childhood and into puberty and into adolescence can grapple with.
• 1:00:04
  SPEAKER_01: And I think we didn't talk about this, but this is something that is great about some children's literature that it gives the child a way to take bite-sized pieces out of huge moral issues and kind of chew on them and I digest them before moving into adulthood.
• 1:00:26
  SPEAKER_01: And that is so um important that children are confronted with the big moral questions of our time before they move out into independence so that they can discuss them with parents or teachers.
• 1:00:44
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I've probably read that book a dozen times, and it was such a good choice.
• 1:00:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's one of those books where I think about that book all the time, you know, when I'm reading the news or um on social media, and uh it's rare that a book is written that stays with you like that.
• 1:01:09
  SPEAKER_01: You know, that that that's unusual and that still resonates so strongly in um our current times.
• 1:01:20
  SPEAKER_01: So um I'm I'm getting ready to read that one with my oldest son, and it's a it's a serious one, it's a hard one to talk about, but it's a really good one.
• 1:01:29
  SPEAKER_02: I was just gonna say I I'm thinking about the character of Jonas and the giver, the main character, and how he just has inner conflict as he's coming of age.
• 1:01:38
  SPEAKER_02: He starts to have realizations and he has a very painful inner conflict.
• 1:01:43
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that's actually true about Huck Finn, too.
• 1:01:47
  SPEAKER_02: And I don't know if there's something that I think I read it about when I was about 12, which is about when I read The Giver.
• 1:01:54
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I know your son's a little bit younger than that, and I think that's appropriate for his age too.
• 1:01:58
  SPEAKER_02: But I think that when you are entering into adolescence or you're waking up to the world, that that kind of powerful interior experience just really you need to hear it.
• 1:02:10
  SPEAKER_02: You need to hear examples of it.
• 1:02:12
  SPEAKER_02: How do we deal with that inside ourselves?
• 1:02:14
  SPEAKER_02: And how do we deal with our darker impulses as well as our better ones?
• 1:02:19
  SPEAKER_02: So um, I was what you were gonna say.
• 1:02:22
  SPEAKER_01: Go ahead, Ivan.
• 1:02:23
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, I was just gonna say that a fabulous thing about the giver is that it it tells you explicitly that memories are painful, uh, that the society has tried to deny the pain of emotion and of memories, um, and ends up dysfunctional in all these ways, but it explicitly makes the point to the child that look, emotions and memories can be really hard.
• 1:02:47
  SPEAKER_01: And like that is a critical lesson for a child about to go through puberty or who's going through puberty and who's getting ready to become adult.
• 1:02:56
  SPEAKER_01: Like you, you that is a hard lesson, but you have to learn it.
• 1:02:59
  SPEAKER_01: And again, that's just something that classic books can teach in a way that you can't just sit a child down and be like, hey, here's what you got to know.
• 1:03:08
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, you could, but it it wouldn't work very well.
• 1:03:11
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, but a book can provide the mechanism for that.
• 1:03:14
  SPEAKER_01: So Nadia, but I would love to hear what what book you picked.
• 1:03:19
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, actually, Tim Larson um on a another podcast episode uh asked me this also um as we were talking.
• 1:03:27
  SPEAKER_00: Um and my answer was Virgil's Aeneid, uh, because I kept somehow encountering it first in high school.
• 1:03:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um, that was the first unadapted Latin poetry that I read, um, you know, painfully with the dictionary, and it was still gorgeous.
• 1:03:42
  SPEAKER_00: And then I read it again, um, the Aeneid in its entirety in Latin in college, read it again in grad school, and just kind of every few years I keep coming back to it.
• 1:03:52
  SPEAKER_00: And every time I notice something very different and new, and it's so powerful, but it's also such a reminder of like what is it, what it's like to be a creative person and a writer, but also using that creativity to talk about difficult questions because writers are people too.
• 1:04:10
  SPEAKER_00: And it's one of those um, for example, um, how slow and meticulous Virgil was in writing.
• 1:04:18
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm just too fast a person.
• 1:04:21
  SPEAKER_00: So to me, it's always convicting because when he got to the Aeneid, he was writing one verse per day.
• 1:04:28
  SPEAKER_00: Can you imagine just one line a day?
• 1:04:30
  SPEAKER_00: Like I could never.
• 1:04:32
  SPEAKER_00: I'm too impatient, but it's beautiful.
• 1:04:35
  SPEAKER_02: It sounds like I don't know if there's a theme to our conversation today, and maybe it sounds trite, but it seems like we're all caught by the way that these really especially wonderful books show children something about themselves or reach out and connect with something that the child knows is true about himself but doesn't know is true of others.
• 1:04:57
  SPEAKER_02: And then those books become part of the child long term because they're really, they really feel understood by it and sometimes understood by it in a way that they've never been understood, or they don't, they're not aware that anyone understands them or is like them.
• 1:05:14
  SPEAKER_02: And it's it's very much like good history, you know, as a historian, and maybe you'll relate to this, Nadia, that that we can figure out it helps us parse how we're alike and how we're different and and be comfortable with that without saying that people are either totally other or or need to be exactly like us.
• 1:05:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:05:37
  SPEAKER_00: I just started uh William Marks' new book, Libraries of the Mind.
• 1:05:41
  SPEAKER_00: So the idea of the books that we carry with us that become part of our DNA.
• 1:05:46
  SPEAKER_00: That's and it is like those great books are libraries of our mind.
• 1:05:51
  SPEAKER_00: Like what you were saying, Ivana, with the giver that like lives rent free in your head forever.
• 1:05:57
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, uh man, that's just something.
• 1:06:00
  SPEAKER_01: A book can do that social media can't, you know, or you need to spend time with it to have it connect like that.
• 1:06:12
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I think a really good movie can offer some of the same benefits, but like the bite-sized information environment just it doesn't do that.
• 1:06:23
  SPEAKER_01: It does other things, but it doesn't do that.
• 1:06:25
  SPEAKER_01: So when I hear about kids not reading books anymore, my big concern is not um, I don't know, it's not like moral.
• 1:06:35
  SPEAKER_01: It's not like it's moral to read books and so you gotta do it, you know, or like it's just there's some ideas you can't access unless you read a book.
• 1:06:45
  SPEAKER_01: You're just not gonna get it through TikTok.
• 1:06:48
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 1:06:50
  SPEAKER_00: Well, thank you both so much.
• 1:06:52
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you, Nadia.
• 1:06:54
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you, Pixie.
• 1:06:55
  SPEAKER_00: This was delightful.