Monday, January 7, 2008

Children's Book Monday - Dan Frontier Series

A Path Made Straight is hosting a "Children's Book Monday" that I am participating in again.

Title: Dan Frontier
Author: William Hurley
Illustrations: Jack Boyd



The book I have chosen, is a actually from a series of books called "Dan Frontier". At one time, this series of books was used in the reading classes at some elementary schools.

I was teaching my ds to read from the book "How To Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons". We were nearing the end of the book and the stories in the book were becoming sillier and not holding a whole lot of interest for this mom. I decided to move on to something that would make my son WANT to improve his reading skills.

I found our first Dan Frontier book on eBay. The books come in different reading levels - but all follow a pioneer Davy Crockett/Daniel Boone type character that likes to hunt, fish, explore and fight with the Indians.

Since my 5 yr old LOVES Davy and Daniel - I knew these would be the books that would work best for him to practice his reading on. He loves the books! Even on the weekends he'll come to me and say "I want a reading lesson."

We've already read about 4 of the books and hope to find all of the books in the series.

The pages have colorful pictures and short sentences/paragraphs in the earlier books and longer text in the later books.

6 comments:

Martha said...

I read this book when I was little! Thanks for the trip down memory lane. I will have to check it out for my son - who LOVES - the old west stories. Thanks for sharing your review.

Blessings,
~Martie

Edi said...

I had never even heard of the books - but my dh remembers reading them in school.

I guess since they talk about Indians - they may not be considered "politically correct" anymore...can't imagine finding them in a public school today.

Renee said...

I've been trying to find some interesting books to get my youngest son more interested in reading and I think he'll really go for this. Thanks so much for sharing!

Melissa Stover said...

that looks good. my kids would like it.

Anonymous said...

I read these in the late 60's when I was learning to read and have never forgotten them, glad to know others are still enjoying them. I was actually searching for information about these books with an eye towards getting them for my 4.5 year old son when I found your post - thanks, great to read.

Starla of Nine said...

I am a mother of nine children and had some that reading was more of a chore than others. My oldest two sons, of seven sons, found the Dan Frontier series in our local library. This was the beginning of their love of reading. When some of the strugglers had a difficult time I went back to the library to discover they had finally gotten beyond repair and were no longer available. Then we went to the internet and found the whole series. We are totally sold on them and have introduced and bought them for other families with strugglers. Since when does politics enter into getting children to read without zombies and demons. Another old series we found are the Happy Hollisters. They are in the style of the Boxcar Children. Lets return our boys to boys and not girls.