02 May Five in a Row: Harold and the Purple Crayon

We love Five in a Row: Harold and the Purple Crayon!  This book is an absolute creative delight – and in this house, we love anything creative! 

Book Review

This is the story of a cute little, bald-headed baby boy who, instead of going to sleep, decides to go for a walk in the moonlight.  Little Harold creates his own adventures using only his purple crayon and a huge imagination.

I loved this book on many different levels.  I initially wondered why this very simple book was assigned to Volume 2 of the Five in a Row workbook and not the first Volume. But, as you will see, the book has many levels that can lead you to go as deep as you like. The simplicity, in contrast to the unlimited boundaries of the imagination, was awesome.  

I love that Five in a Row led us away from the traditional subjects of math and geography and language, so that for a moment, we could take the time to explore the creative side of our brains that requires no words.  Most of all, I love that this book represents to me much of what homeschool is really about.  It is a venture into the world of imagination without any confines or walls. Although I am a planner, I find the most delight when we simply follow where our minds lead us, learning as we go.

Clark and Luci immediately loved Harold and the Purple Crayon.  They very quickly memorized the sequence of his adventures and were acting them out themselves.  We found several episodes of it on YouTube, too.  Clark and Luci couldn’t get enough of it!

A Pie Picnic, Just Like Harold

To start our row off, Luci, my foodie, suggested that we have a picnic with pies, just like Harold.  How awesome is it that the children are getting into the spirit of Five in a Row?!  I thought it was a great idea, so we had a fun dinner of only pies – which just so happened to be on “Pi Day (3.14).”  It was a lucky coincidence, so we made the most of it!  I wrote about our all-pie dinner HERE.

Art

For us, this book has a very strong creative, artistic component.  We began rowing it in the middle of March, when everyone else was taking a break from school, so I thought we would take our own little “creative break.”  We used the opportunity to focus more on the artistic aspect of the book, since this is where my children find the most joy.  So, one afternoon, when the weather was too perfect to resist, I took them to the park along with some sidewalk chalk so we could draw our own adventures, just like Harold.

Clark and Luci wanted to duplicate Harold’s adventure.  They drew long lines and apple trees with apples on them, and a huge hot air balloon.

Another day I put out a long roll of white paper for them to fill with whatever they chose.  You would not believe how their eyes lit up at the sight of this blank paper!  They spent hours on it and kept going back to it throughout the day.  There were spiders and crocodiles and mermaids and beaches, restaurants and fences – all kinds of imaginative things!

Science

As part of the science component, we decided to study the moon that lit Harold’s way in the beginning of the book.  I wrote about our introduction to the moon and how we learned the phases of the moon with Oreo Cookies HERE.

The study of the moon actually sparked a fair amount of interest from Clark.  We decided to venture a little further and did a lesson on the Solar System, which I blogged about more in detail HERE. 

It is with reluctance that we are moving on from this study.  We took a few detours through this row, which added a lot of time.  One of the awesome things about this curriculum, though, is that the time spent on each book is not really relevant.  The important thing is that we are learning and loving it!