Gillian Chapman

This is my favourite advent calendar and has been coming out every year since I bought it in the late 1990s. I have more recently bought more through Amazon for relatives to enjoy. It seems to be out of print, so look out for second-hand copies. It is absolutely delightful, and a great way to create Christmas memories with young children. The box contains 24 small books with a self-contained piece of story in each book. The books can also be hung on the tree after reading.

This is not really a children's book. Sure, it contains a lot of information on Egyptians in somewhat of a story mode, but what this book is, is more of a craft book. This book is great for the preschool teacher who needs to do a theme on Egypt.

Along with the short story line on life in Egypt, this book is filled with all sorts of different crafts that an adult and the kids can make together to give a look and feel of Egypt from the days of the Pharohs.

This book is pretty neat, actually.

This is collection of summer crafts for children by Gillian Chapman. This book has a lot of fun and creative ideas for children to create. Some of the craft ideas come from different parts of the world and from different cultures and explains where each one came from or has some information about it. One that I really liked was making snazzy sunglasses. For this craft, you take a pair of sunglasses and glue whatever design you want to create on them. One pictureshows cutting out flower show more petals and making them look like a flower. Another one that I really liked was making sunflower mosaics. For this craft, you take a clean paper plate and glue sun flower petals around it that you cut out of construction paper. Then you glue things in the middle to make a mosaic in the center. It suggests using dried beans or seeds for it. Then you tape a plant stick on the back to make the stem and then plant it in a flower pot with gravel in it.

I really like this book and think that there are great craft ideas in it that children would love and have a lot of fun doing.

One way that I would use this book in the classroom would be get children to be creative and make some of the crafts. You could use this during art time or as some type of project. You could have children make their snazzy sunglasses and also teach them the importance of protecting their eyes while they make them. Also since it has some projects from different cultures, you could do the crafts that pertain to the culture that they just learned about. For example, if they are learing about Japan they could make the craft that goes along with Tangonosekku; which is a Japanese boys' festival. The skies are filled with carp streamers during the festival and the craft that goes a long with it is making a swimming fish. show less

This is a collection of winter crafts by Gillian Chapman. One of the crafts that I really liked was making a pop-up turkey card. That would be a fun Thanksgiving project. A second craft that I liked was making dancing animals. You cut an animal shape out and then cut small holes out of the animal. You turn the animal over and glue small pieces of colored paper to it. Then when you turn it over it has a bunch of colors on it. You can also attach a ribbon or string and make an ornament for show more your Christmas tree.

I really liked some of the craft ideas in this book. I think children would have a great time making these.

One way that this book could be used in the classroom would be to have students make some of the crafts. This could be great during art time. It would also be great to use for the seasonal crafts like Thankgiving and Christmas. Making ornaments to decorate the Christmas tree is something that both students and their parents enjoy. There are also projects that are from other cultures so it could be a great learning opportunity for children to learn about them. show less