Humanities Books

Growing up in California you are taught that the future is always gold . "Gold Rush: A Literary Exploration," edited by Michael Kowalewski, pulls back the curtains on perhaps the most important event in the Golden State's history to reveal a place filled with dreams, nightmares, courage and cowardness. A place that became America's future.

Published by Heyday Books and the California Council for the Humanities, "Gold Rush" is 500 pages of short selections (1-8 pages) that lend insight to the California and American character. Writing includes: poems from Robert Frost, Gary Snyder and Wendy Rose; journal entries from William T. Sherman and John Muir; and essays from Thoureau, Dame Shirley, and Emerson.

On the eave of California's 150 anniversary of the discovery of gold (January 24, 1848), this book is a great read for anyone curious about how California shaped America.

150 years later, we in California are still struggling to understand the legacies of the Gold Rush. How much of California's present "character" can be traced to the tumultous 1850s? GOLD RUSH: A LITERARY EXPLORATION attempts to answer this question from two directions: first, by examining the diaries, letters, and journals of the 49ers who actually participated in the rush, and second, though the generations of later writers who have re-interpreted the Gold Rush again and again. The book's many short selections and splendid illustrations provide many access points; though sometimes old, the accounts are never dull. At turns humorous, chilling, and thought-provoking, GOLD RUSH is a compelling read for any Californian interested in the state's roots.

My homeschooled daughter really likes this book (she's in 2nd grade). When we received it, she did 20 pages in one sitting. I had to ask her to save some pages for later :) It states a rule, then has a few pages of different activities for each rule. For homeschooled kid, you can do more per day. For kid that attends a public school, the activities on each page are short enough to be enjoyable. This book came with CD that has a pdf file of this whole book, so you can redo some lessons by printing them later again.

I love this book. It has a section that explains the grammar/punctuation rule, then a number of pages to reinforce the lesson. The examples are quite clear and the rules broken down into the basics. Great for us homeschoolers and terrific for traditional students who just want reinforcement or review.

The author writes with enthusiam and knowledge. The depth of coverage is excellent. There are many wonderful features: art terms, teacher tips, addressing special needs, presenting artworks and dealing with safety issues. It clearly explains what to do and say when teaching art to toddlers through 8 year olds. It covers all art media in depth. Special attention is paid to integrating art using thematic teaching and the project approach. It is rich in appropriate theory and curriculum. This is a book for teachers just starting out and for those who want to up-date their teaching of art.

This art education book is wonderfully presented! After renewing it from the library for over a month, I knew that I needed to own a copy of this book. As an art teacher in a very new and growing facility, I found this book to be a wonderful form of continued education. It is helping me stay up-to-date on theories and practices in the early childhood art field and is helping me grow as an educator. The author offers practical advice as well as situational anecdotes in all categories of art education.

I highly recommend this book! I wish my professor had used it in college, I would have learned a lot more and been better prepared for what I am dealing with now!

While William Frank (Farmville Herald 12-22-00) speaks of the undeniable "moral content" in Lund's "novel of initiation," this reader, on the other hand, would argue that the novel fits more comfortably in the genre of the Antibildungsroman, a niche in the literary cavalcade heretofore filled by a few notable works, most prominent of which would be The Tin Drum of Gunter Grass. Here, Mark Landon, the midwestern Everyyouth, is enveloped by a repressive sexual environment which conspires against his sensual enlightenment in such an overpowering manner that his growth (or non-growth, as with Grass' Oskar) is best described as a hopeless status of sexual cluelessness until it flowers in--or, better yet, bumbles into--the unexpected climax described on pp. 256-58.

Lund's humorous conclusion, hinted at as early as the introduction, lends credence to the assumption that Landon will not change in any palpable way, but, unlike Oskar, whose stunted overall growth was at least partially compensated by a sexual development nonpareil, will remain largely unenlightened until the dawning of his middle age, when a belated epiphany of what had been going on around him his whole life finally sinks home at a time at which, ironically, he's too old to do much about it. The novel, however, does hint at the relevance of several as yet unexplored fields in Landon's life, such as his war experience and his subsequent embrace of the mysteries of Anglicanism.

Perhaps, an implied sequel will reveal whether this Everyyouth does at some belated point develop into an Everyman, and might also provide answers to such burning questions as whether Marcia Terrell, the novel's Everygirl and a refreshingly original character, overcomes the burdens of the same repressive environment by taking Route 66 to some pre-Title-IX form of the WNBA, or some other road equally appropriate for a liberated daughter of the American Midwest. We will wait and see.

If given the choice, I suspect that most people wouldn't really want to go back and relive those tumultuous, confusing years of adolescence. But wouldn't it be great if you could do it, knowing what you now know as an adult? You'd probably worry a little more about a few things, a lot less about most things, and you'd certainly have a lot more fun! That's what writer Michael Lund has done through his first novel, "Growing Up on Route 66." We get to experience all the intimate thoughts, embarrassing situations, comedic escapades, and triumphs of teenager Mark Landon and his friends, through the eyes of the adult Mark. Some things have changed since the 50s, and perhaps today's teenagers, sadly enough, aren't quite as naive as Mark. But his struggles and questions are still universal, and you'll have a great time reliving your own adolescence as you read about Mark's experiences. I wish I had known what those guys were thinking when I was Mark's age, and as the mother of two teenaged boys, I think I understand them a lot better after reading this book!

I liked this book because I think Sarah is an adventurous girl and because she is brave. I would recommend this book to a friend because it teaches you about the Indians and it teaches you about how friendly they are.

I liked this book because I like learning about native americans.

The book is an excellent teaching tool for undergraduate and graduate level Philosophy courses. This text would be the only one I would use at the high school level (and Plato should be taught in GATE and AP type English classes, as he was back in the "good old days" when the goal of academic 'arete' had real importance in lesson planning). The book includes the dialogues surrounding the trial and death of Socrates, Euthyphro, Crito, and Apology, the Death Scene of Socrates from the Phaedo, and the "Allegory of the Cave" from the Republic. While the translations are not always the best, they are very good, come from the greatest source (Jowett) and quite sufficient for communicating all the important points in the dialogues.
Best of all are the copious margins which surround the text on every page and serve the wonderful purpose of teaching students to annotate their text with marginalia. The creation of marginalia is an ancient scholarly art, quintessentially described by Edmond Bourdoux Szekeley, one of the last of the old world scholars of that grand continental tradition known as the Sorbonne Method, which he describes in his now out of print masterpiece, "The Art of Study". In that book, Szekeley details the method by which, through nearly a millinium, successive generations of Sorbonne scholars (dating back before Aquinas), parsed and analyzed arguments and extracted the hermaneutic esssence of their texts.
Biffle provides cues and prompts with relevant and incisive questions (he knows Bloom's Taxonomy as well as he knows his Philosophy), which not only makes students accountable to do the reading (you can collect your students' texts to see if their doing it), but provides the student with a time-proven, eminently productive study skill.
Biffle also provides excellent background material, supplementary writing exercises, and material for quizzes, all you really need.
A few points which Biffle addresses "to the teacher" in his introduction are in order: 1) "My philosophy students need a lot of practice in orderly thinking and writing. They need practice in following a logical pattern, giving reasons for assertions, clarifying points with examples, and quoting supporting material from a text. There is plenty of practice here." 2) "The truth is most students will read Plato's dialogues only once in their lives. We need to slow down that precious reading and make it as fruitful as possible. The reading and writing tasks I have incorporated in this book are designed to help students underline, write in margins, reread, paraphrase, outline, and eventually analyze philosophical classics in an orderly way."

Christopher Biffle's A Guided Tour of Five Works by Plato is an ideal introduction to the study of philosophy as an academic activity. While there are several introductory philosophy books that allow the reader to wander and ponder through the dreamy early stages of philosophical wonder, this book gets down to business. Biffle structures his guided tour as an interactive reader of five of Plato's most important and most accessible dialogues: Euthyphro, Apology and Crito complete; the "Death Scene" from Phaedo, and the "Allegory of the Cave" from Republic.

Through this tour students will have an opportunity to actively engage in philosophy as they move through the text. Biffle prepares the reader for the journey by providing just enough background about Socrates,Plato and the history of Athens to satisfy a rudimentary curiosity. As the reader embarks, he will begin to encounter some of the features which make Biffle's book so valuable. This tour is an adventure in thinking, and the reader is challenged to summarize and extract important developments as the tour progresses. The reader is asked to respond to prompts such as "The main things I want to remember about Socrates and the history of Athens are..." Thus the reader himself becomes a participant in the dialogue.

From this introduction Biffle guides us into the dialogues themselves, beginning with Euthyphro. Each selection is introduced with a series of questions designed to open up the reader's mind to some of the ideas and issues to be explored in the dialogues themselves. During the reading of the dialogue, the reader is asked to underline and annotate the text as he goes; thus the reader becomes actively and critically engaged in the text rather than passively drifting through it. By clarifying and analyzing Plato, the student begins to clarify and analyze his own thinking. This approach to philosophy is also an ideal approach to developing reading, writing and critical thinking skills for students.

Although Biffle's tour can be taken solo (in the capable hands of both Biffle and Plato), it is best taken with a group of fellow travelers who can share the journey. It is a fantastic text for use in a class or as the basis for a philosophy discussion group. There are quizzes and exercises to check understanding, but the book really encourages the reader to develop his own thinking, and ultimately to become a curious and critical questioner of the world--what Socrates or Plato would have called a philosopher.

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This book contains some of the best articles of recent times published on Roma identity and culture throughout the world. I recommend this to anyone who wants to get a "feel" of Roma culture today!

I bought this for use in a high school classroom setting. Every day is laid out, there are quizzes and tests and other worksheets provided. Even a crossword puzzle for those days when you have 20 minutes to kill or want to give the students a fun review activity. You can't beat the price if you compare how long you would sit at the computer creating it by yourself. I highly recommend all of Teacher's Pet Publications.

It is hard to know what you're getting just from the explanation on this site but I bought the CD anyway. I am ever so glad I did because this is going to be so helpful for both myself and my students. Whether you're teaching a full month or only a week on "Hamlet", this guide gives you invaluable tools. And the ages of your students shouldn't matter because there is something on this CD to fit every level. If you're pressed for time like I am, the lesson plans, quizzes, etc. will help. It's an extraordinary deal for such a low price and I urge everyone to try a copy!

This book is a great resource for projects in art for children. You could say that I was the test subject for a lot of what's in this book. Willard was my grandfather. This book is a treasure that every elementary school teacher should have. My grandfather would take me to the university to work on projects and then put them in the book. What fun that was. Share this book with your children as my grandfather enjoyed it with his son and grandson.

We used this book as a textbook for my Elementary Education Art Methods & Materials class. It is jam-packed with projects to do with children. Highly recommended.

It is Buber, who more than any other writer or thinker,made the works of Hasidism first known to the Western world. He found in their lives of devoutedness to God, in their holy simplicity a message for Modern Man.
In this work Buber outlines the principles of Hasidism, and provides us a picture of a whole way, not simply of seeing holiness, but of living in Holiness in the world.

Martin Buber recounts tales and parables of previous generations of central European hasidic Jewry to illuminate a life philosophy with appeal for today and tomorrow's interested generations.He communicates his vast love and respect for what he sees as a treasure trove of wisdom and insight into the human condition as found in hasidic lore.This book is very readable and speaks more directly to the reader without the dense philosophical phraseology which makes other of his books difficult to get into .I have heard criticism that one is actually hearing Martin Buber's humanistic philosophy of life with reference to his interpretation of hasidic folk culture.Be that as it may there is a universal self help appeal to this book.Martin Buber communicates the idea of humankind as consisting of free thinking individuals who can shape destiny,"every man's foremost task is the actualization of his unique ,unprecedented and never recurring potentialities,and not the repetition of something another,and be it even the greatest,has already achieved"This is a book that might change the reader's life.