Fantastic Free Hajj Learning Resources for Kids

Alhamdulillah, we're approaching Dhul Hijjah and this is a great time to teach our little ones about the great pillar of Hajj.


Ibn 'Abbaas (Radi Allahu Anhumah)  reported that the Prophet Muhammad (Sallalahu Alaihi Wasallam)  said:  " There are no days in which righteous deeds are more beloved to Allah than these ten days." The people asked, "Not even jihaad for the sake of Allah?" He said, "Not even jihaad for the sake of Allah, except in the case of a man who went out to fight giving himself and his wealth up for the cause, and came back with nothing."  ( Related by Bukhari ).


Hajj Story Board Game, Hajj Book of Opposites, Mixed Media Hajj Activity,

Hajj Activity: Introduction to Addition & Subtraction, Ka'aba Sequencing Activity, Hajj Game for Preschool and Kindergarten, and 

Hajj Theme Pack by A Muslim Child Is Born all geared more towards younger kids

Hajj for Kids by Productive Muslim  has a great list of activities for kids.
Umm Maimoonah has a list of Hajj resources with activities for older kids too
Hajj Day By Day- a flash presentation by the Ministry of Hajj


"The Messenger of Allah (SAW) said: 'The best supplication is the supplication on the day of Arafat'. [at-Tirmidhi and Malik] 

Supplication (dua) on The Day of Arafah (9th of Dhul Hijjah)

‘The best of supplications is the supplication on the day of 3arafah and the best which I and the Prophets before me have said (is):

لَا إِلَهَ إِلَّا اللهُ وَحْدَهُ لَا شَريكَ لَهُ، لَهُ المُلْكُ ولَهُ الحَمْدُ وهُوَ عَلَى كُلِّ شَيْءٍ قَديرٌ.

"La ilaha illal-lahu wahdahu la shareeka lah, lahul-mulku walahul-hamd, wahuwa 'aala kulli shayin qadeer."

‘None has the right to be worshipped except Allah, alone, without partner. To Him belongs all praise and sovereignty and He is over all things omnipotent.’

Abu Qatada said "The Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, was asked about fasting the Day of 'Arafat. He said, 'It expiates the past year and coming year.'" [Muslim]

Free Arabic Flashcards and Coloring Book

Sister Thuriayaa from Books to Learn Arabic has a big collection of Arabic Flashcards as well, Masha Allah. Click here to dowload.

Arabic Islamic Coloring Book

Flash Cards

Arabic Flash Cards: Body Parts
Arabic Flash Cards: Fruits

Arabic Flash Cards: Shapes

Arabic Flash Cards: Nature

Arabic Flash Cards: Colors

Arabic Flash Cards: Numbers

Arabic Flash Cards: Animals1

Arabic Flash Cards: Animals2

Arabic Flash Cards: Adjectives

Al Manahel Arabic Books

Al Manahel Arabic Books

These are sets of four levels of books available free for download.

Set 1

Set_01_Book_01My Brother and I

Set_01_Book_02Eid Gits

Set_01_Book_03Long Live Justice

Set_01_Book_04The Fox and the Teasure

Set_01_Book_05It is One lower

Set_01_Book_06Every Three Trees

Set_01_Book_07The Lion and the Three Buffalloes

Set_01_Book_08The Giant

Set_01_Book_09Try To Read

Set_01_Book_10Hammoodah and the Little Genie

Set 2

Set_02_Book_01Hammoodah's Parrot

Set_02_Book_02Hammoodah's Strange Shell

Set_02_Book_03He Who Doesn't Work Doesn't Drink

Set_02_Book_04The Hunter's Punishment

Set_02_Book_05The Clean Garden

Set_02_Book_06The Strange Circle

Set_02_Book_07The Sling Shot

Set_02_Book_08Who Won The Prize?

Set_02_Book_09It Was A Dream Alhamdulillah

Set_02_Book_10The Nice Tree/ The Arrogant Tree

Set 3

Set_03_Book_01Pollution

Set_03_Book_02The Benefit Of Co-operation

Set_03_Book_03Ant's Village

Set_03_Book_04A Drop Of Water Tells A Story

Set_03_Book_05The Court Bell

Set_03_Book_06The Juice Seller/Even Or Odd

Set_03_Book_07Grapes In The Neighbor's Garden

Set_03_Book_08The Hunter and The Bird

Set 4

Set_04_Book_01The Green Spike

Set_04_Book_02The Greedy Bush

Set_04_Book_03The Sultan's Advisor

Set_04_Book_04The Secret of Silk

Set_04_Book_05Witness/Lying

Set_04_Book_06The Camel Is Dancing

Set_04_Book_07The Reward Of Goodness

Set_04_Book_08The Strange Fish

These books are available in mp3 here.

Living Math books that we have used and Loved

Assalamu alaykum( May peace be upon you) 
These are some of the books we used and have found absolutely amazing. in the sense that they have helped us get a better understanding in a non-overwhelming and enjoyable manner.


Nancy Kelly Allen  
Once Upon a Dime: A Math Adventure (Ages: 6 - 9)

 Pam Calvert
Multiplying Menace: The Revenge Of Rumpelstiltskin (A Math Adventure)  (Ages 7-10) - unique story involving multiplying by fractions as well as whole numbers
The Multiplying Menace Divides 


Edward Reinhold
A Very Improbable Story: A Math Adventure (Ages 7-10) - Probability


Scott Sundb
Cut Down to Size at High Noon  (Ages: 6 - 9) - Scale


Virginia Kroll
Equal Shmequal  (Ages: 5 - 8) -Early introduction to algebraic concepts through balancing, Equality


Joanne Anderson Reisberg 
Zachary Zormer: Shape Transformer (Ages: 5 - 10) -  different math concepts (length, width, area, perimeter) with projects that include a mobius strip, a paper frame, and a light show.Instructions included at the end.


Julie Ellis
What's Your Angle, Pythagoras? A Math Adventure (Ages: 7 - 10) -Right Angles Triangles, Pythagorean theorems
Pythagoras and the Ratios  (Ages: 7 - 10) - Pythagorean ratios 

Angeline Sparagna Lopresti
A Place for Zero: A Math Adventure

Cindy Neuschwander
Mummy Math : An Adventure in Geometry

Ann McCallum 
Rabbits Rabbits Everywhere (Ages: 6 - 9) - 

Nathan Zimelman   
Sold! A Mothematics Adventure (Ages: 6 - 9) -


Greg Tang
Grapes Of Math (Mind-Stretching Math Riddles) (Ages 7-12) - advanced addition, moving into multiplication 
Math For All Seasons (Ages 5-8) - combining numbers for addition 


David Birch / Grebu 1988
The King's Chessboard  - Doubling exponentially (therefore intro to base 2). Based on historical tale 


Rolf Myller  1962
How Big is a Foot?  - Size, measurement, story based on historical fact.

Cindy Neuschwander
Sir Cumference Math Adventures (Ages: 8 - 11)
Sir Cumference and All the King's Tens

Sir Cumference and the Dragon of Pi

Sir Cumference and the First Round Table - different geometry concepts
Sir Cumference and the Great Knight of Angleland - different geometry concepts
Sir Cumference and the Isle of Immeter - perimeter and area of a circle
Sir Cumference and the Sword in the Cone - 
Sir Cumference and the Off-the-Charts Dessert -  introduces different methods of collecting data
Sir Cumference and the Viking's Map - coordinate geometry
We haven't used these last two which are more recent but they look interesting.


Theoni Pappas 
The Adventures of Penrose the Mathematical Cat– numerous math concepts explored in each chapter
Further Adventures of Penrose the Mathematical Cat
Fractals, Googols, and Other Mathematical Tales  Many math concepts, lots with topology, logic and problem solving, wide age range appeal
The Joy of Mathematics: Discovering Mathematics All Around You - Math in nature/ science/ art/ history/ literature - classic

Malba Tahan
The Man Who Counted: A Collection of Mathematical Adventures -  Chapter book, loosely based on the story of Khayyam,  many algebraic ideas in the puzzles (some stories are accessible to younger children, but portions are advanced).

Jean Lee Latham
Carry On Mr. Bowditch (accessible to younger, but good reading for adult)- an eighteenth-century Biographical novel on nautical wonder and mathematical wizard, Nathaniel Bowditch.


Julia E. Diggins /Corydon Bell  1965 
String, Straightedge and Shadow: The Story of Geometry - Geometry, math history. Classic back in print.
I really want this book. Have seen excerpts and they're amazing.


Hans Magnus Enzensberger / Rotraut Susanne Berner  1997 
The Number Devil: A Mathematical Adventure- (Multi-concepts, cute illustrations. Fun classic, very wide appeal, can be read aloud to even very young kids) 



Norton Juster 
The Phantom Tollbooth  – a classic chapter book with math and language ideas woven in, fantasy 

Marilyn Burns/ Martha Weston
I Hate Mathematics! (Brown Paper School Books)- General math/math history. Classic
Math for Smarty Pants, a Brown Paper School book  –  (ages 8 and up) TONS of different math ideas in this.


Jeanne F Bendick /Berquis 1962
Archimedes and the Door of Science  Math History. A Classic.

The Story of 1  (PBS Home Video) One hour well presented video on the history of the number 1.  Online at Google Video. 



to be continued...

Good Books for Elementary Geography

The shape and motions of the earth are fundamental ideas--however difficult to grasp.

Geography should be learned chiefly from maps, and the child should begin the study by learning

"the meaning of map," and how to use it.

These subjects are well fitted to form an attractive introduction to the study of Geography: some of them should awaken the delightful interest which attaches in a child's mind to that which is

wonderful--incomprehensible. The Map lessons should lead to mechanical efforts, equally delightful. It is only when presented to the child for the first time in the form of stale knowledge
and foregone conclusions that the facts taught in these lessons appear dry and repulsive to him.

So said Charlotte Mason when she wrote her Elementary geography Books.

I'll let you know about some of the books that I have and used with my 8 year old most of which is through Mapwork.

Geography A-Z by Jack Knowlton- He loves this book. We have used it a lot with notebooking pages that helped us sort of solidify and understand the terms. It's actually just a glossary but when we use the text for copywork and draw our own illustration, it helps. We do it once a week.

The Complete Book of Maps and Geography Grade 3 has, I think, 6 or 7 sections(units) the first three of which are about the US states and then the 4th has other countries of North America. It covers mapskills and many things but it does not have anything for World Geography.

The Everything Kids' Geo Book- This one has activities and puzzles on some countries, areas and continents with fact snippets. It is black and white but has really interesting facts which kids might enjoy when they study them in context with more detailed study. It is Not a good stand alone book but it can be fun as an add-on with some solid Geography.

A Child's introduction to the World by Heather Alexander is a cute book with lots of info on many countries. I would recommend it since I have found it useful especially with notebooking. It has nice illustrations and comes with a popup globe and stickers that you need to stick on the globe as you learn more about the places. If the copy of the book is not too old, the stickers will not have dried out. Other than that this is a really interesting book. The pop-up globe is a hit.

The Geography Book: Activities for Exploring, Mapping, and Enjoying Your World You might find this books really interesting and fun with kids. It has a wide range of activities including many things that kids can make and it is also available in printable format.

Maps and Mapping (Science Kids) I have not used this Kingfisher book yet. It is short -just 47 pages and looks really fun. It has beautiful pictures and nice topics.

Maps and Globes (Reading Rainbow Book) I really like this book which is again by Jack Knowlton, the author of the Glossary book.

Geography Centers, Grades 3-4 It is a neat book just like the other Centers by Evan Moor.

All these books work well when used together and alternatelingly, bi ithnillah.:)

Arabic Talking Stories For Kids

Arabic Talking Stories
These are zipped folders to download free Arabic audio books, from sister Thuriayaa.

Kids Stories – in Mp3 – NEW.zip

mp3 of arabic stories.zip

mp3 talking Ar stories.zip

Geography from A-Z -A picture Glossary by Jack Knowlton

Assalamu alaykum( May Peace be Upon You),

Geography from A-Z -A picture Glossary by Jack Knowlton, is one book that we got last year in the Summer. It is a cute, comfortable size and not too thick with geography terms and their definitions in easy language and a nice cartoon-like illustration by Harriet Barton accompanies each.

It looked really useful yet was in the shelf  where it stayed for months until I ran across these cute and simple printables while searching for ideas to use this book.

I'm sure DS would have read it and might've remembered a big part of it but these printables have helped him solidify a lot of that information. He understands what Continental Ridge, Mesa, Lagoon, and Palisade are can recognize them when he sees a picture.

 We started last September and did them off and on. We have completed about half of the book using the printables since we took a long break but we're back again. These printables are really just the Term and definition on the top with space to draw the picture followed by lines to copy. They are Free to download and use. All she asks is that we give her credit and link them to her blog. Thankyou Jenn :) from MamaJenn. This has helped incorporate Art, Copywork into Geography.

Arabic First

Assalamu Alaykum ( May Peace Be Upon You)

This is a quick post to share a wonderful resource that a sister kindly shared. It is really amazing Subhan Allah.
It is called Arabic First.They have a really nice Downloads section that has Free resources to download that include:
Arabic Curriculum
Arabic Grammar
Arabic Reading Tree
Animated Series
Hadeeth
Quran
Stories of the Prophets

They have other sownloads and a free game as well.
I'll extend this post InshaA llah once I start using the material, Insha Allah.

Classic Literature arrives in batches.

We have added a HUGE as in HUUUUGE list of books from the classics. I'm planning to write a teeny tiny review of these very popular books as we go along. Here's a list of the Literature Collection. Now, I thought I would just post a list of these and add reviews as we would read them. And then, life got busy and I totally forgot to continue my post. Anyway, I returned and realised that I was in two minds now. 1. Post a list of all books ordered and recieved. Add reviews later. 2. Write a review as we go along without posting the list. As is obvious now, I went with option 1. :)

Jack's Insects

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This is one book among the ones out of copyrights that was not available online. A friend had got a copy from Amazon and was reading aloud to her children. It was on her own suggestion and experience since her children enjoyed it a lot, that I bought the book. 

Here is what i already knew:

Originally published in 1910, Jack's Insects by Edmund Selous and illustrated by J. A. Shepherd, is a classic living science book. Charlotte Mason used it in her schools and their lesson plans are available online which contain a reading schedule they used. It was for Grades 4-6. It has fascinating facts about insects interwoven with the story of Jack and Maggie's adventures inside Jack's new insect book.

.
This is what I found:

When Jack receives a book on insects for his birthday, Maggie wishes one could get inside a book. They end up in the insect book, experiencing adventures with insects of all sorts as they travel. Along the way they encounter a butterfly with a grievance and other insects like caterpillars, spiders, as well as fireflies, locusts, grasshoppers, wasps, bees. Since we are in the second chapter(we started last week), it would  not be possible to give a complete review but I have had my son begging for more when I stopped reading while trying to keep my eyes open before bedtime. :).

Edmond Selous wrote many books about animals for both children and adults which are still popular today. There is a great amount of information about animals that is transmitted to the reader through the conversations his youthful protagonists have with the animals they encounter. 'Each animal is brought to life so vividly through the story that the reader unconsciously absorbs the details of its existence: its physical characteristics, its habits and preferences, and its interactions with other animals.'

The quality of language and scientific information is hard to find in today's world. Even though Charlotte Mason actually used this very book in her schools, it still remarkably holds its charm for today's children almost a century later.

This thick 430 page book with 20 chapters book says that it is for ages 9 and up but can be read aloud to kids a bit younger, too if the reader is prepared for some explaining along the way. This book however has very long sentences and requires slower reading and sometimes re=reading of phrases. (The language is not dumbed down as in today's books).

I feel it was a good buy and am looking forward to more of Jack's Insects.

The Story Book of Science

Assalamu alaykum ( May Peace be Upon You)

I promised that I would write about the living books and I'll start with the first we started using.
A Story Book of Science by Jean Henri Fabre in French and translated to English by Florence Constable Bicknell, is a wonderful, true living book about nature and science from a perspective of a believer. My son LOVES it and so have I loved reading it to him. It is a book that all ages will enjoy.
It is perfect for read-alouds.

We spend about 30 minutes a day. This has 3 phases.
1-I read aloud a chapter while explaining the difficult phrases or new vocabulary.
2-We read that chapter that we did the previous day together, taking turns paragraph by paragraph.
3-I read the next chapter aloud.
I find it time well-spent since he learns a lot from this. We do this 3 days a week along with RealScience 4 Kids on the other 4 days.

It is a very mature yet storylike compilation of science stories that honor the Creator while teaching about His creation. The topics include and are not limited to Insects, Animals, Plants, Metals, Printing, Clouds, Sound, Atmosphere, Sun, Locomotive, Fruit, Pollen, Shells, Peals, Corals, Wax, Volcanoes and Earthquakes. We are on the 6th chapter. The chapters from 1 through 7 are about Ants and Plant Lice.

The Story Book of Science

All stories feature Uncle Paul who with rare literary charm tells these stories in conversations with three children. The books cover mentions it as Suitable for ages 9 and up but as with most good living books, the younger children can pick up a lot from listening to it read aloud. It has 438 pages and 80 chapters.

This book got my son interested in the real story of Jean Henri Fabre when he leanrt that the three children in the story were his own and we went here to learn more about him.

I also found these notebooking pages shared by a kind homeschooler but I am yet to use them. But they are so simple and easy to use, I am thinking of adding them soon.

Jean Henri Fabre has another book with Uncle paul and the children titles The Wonderbook of Chemistry. We are yet to use it though since it is considered a sequel to this one..

Totally New Way Of School For Me

We started school in a different way last month. DS had a burnout phase and had refused to do any kind of workbook. We had been following a curriculum for Math and had added the workbooks for Treasures from McGraw Hill in October. Some of the excercises in these three workbooks are extremely easy and 'boring' especially the ones in the Spelling Book. The ones in the Grammar book are mixed, some he enjoys and some he doesn't. Most of the ones in the Practice book is what he totally dreads. Anyhow, last month he said he wanted NO ENGLISH.

I left hm alone and did not ask him to do any work for a month and just read a few classics to him. He LOVED this! Alhamdulillah.
We started with
Pinnochio, The Phantom Tollbooth, Mrs. frisby and the Rats of NIMH. One chapter from one book and another from the other the next night before bedtime. He would beg me to contnue but I wouldn't :). I found out later that he had been reading these and had finished the first already and was rereading on his own masha Allah
He had moved ahead on the second book soon, too.

We remade our schedule - DS and I- and added more Science since that's where his passion lies.
We have a new Science curriculum- Real Science 4 Kids by Gravitas and it is really nice. It warrants a separate post so that's where I plan to write about it.

Another addition has been loads of Living books Charlotte Mason Style complete with narration. These make me wonder why I didn't add them sooner. I'll write about these in a separate post Insah Allah along with how it is working for us.

We have also included the Perfecting the Pillars series from Ad-Duha and this has been wondeful! :) We have learnt so much Alhamdulillah. We decided we wanted to do lapbooks on the topics we covered so i made a few minibooks on tawheed, Shirk, Salaah, Pillars of Islam,Imaan and Ihsan taking help from Talibiddeen Junior and printed them out. Alhamdulillah DS enjoyed this activity and gave wonderful suggestions, masha Allah.
 I'll add the link to these minibooks here incase someone wants to make on similar topics.

All in all these changes resulted in something that was a pleasant surprise, masha Allah. DS decided that he needed Math since he wanted to be an astronomer and added Math to his schedule 6 days a week on his own. Masha Allah la quwwata illah Billah.

Then we started watching Arabian Sindbad on Youtube. They have some of the clips from their program available there. The kids loved these and learnt so much from it. We have decided to get their deluxe package InshaAllah.
Last but not the least, after hearing and reading so much about life of Fred series by polka Dot, we decided to go ahead and but the complete Elementary set and Middle School set. We havent received them as yet. Let's see how Ds take to this. .

Miquon Journey

It had taken some time to start Miquon and I talked about it here. It's been 3 years now since. In the begenning, I intended to follow the typical suggested schedule starting at age 4 doing as many pages as to complete a book in six months.

I was already doing a typical but really thick Kindergarten Math Addition book which I talked about here with him so I continued with that and introduced Miquon Orange after he was 5. I don't know if my son wasn't ready or I gave up too soon.

Anyway, after starting, I did a few pages from the Orange book and by the time we got to the middle, I started feeling that DS was trying to avoid math.  Since he had really enjoyed it in the beginning, this was a concern. I totally stopped using the Miquon book and started with the  Addition-1 book from Math Mammoth Blue series. This was easy for him since he had done a thick book already for Addition. Anyway, this got him back. I gradually introduced the Cuisinaire rods too but just used them for building stairs and few free games. I reminded him that the books that go with them. This got him back on track :).

Well, we started again, this time when he was a few months short of his sixth birthday. He flew past the sheets and enjoyed them. He also understood the Math Concepts and was happy to have graduated into the net book- The Red Book. We moved steadily through the Red book but we used a variety this time. we also did Subtraction -1 from Math Mammoth having completed Addition-1. This was a good mix. We did a page each from the two books 4 days a week and he breezed through both the books.

On a sidenote, the most useful method I have found, for teaching Subtraction has been :  Spending a LOT o time on Addition until the child is thorough with his Additiion facts for numbers uptil 10. Then the whole concept of Subtraction becomes easy.- through the missing addend method.
Doing the opposite however, has been found to have lead to the child not understanding subtraction and developing a hate or fear of it leading later on to a fear of Math.

Anyway, thus we continued with Miquon along with Math Mammoth and have loved it.
We completed Miquon last year and have just a few books remaing from Math Mammoth Blue series. Since we are already loads of Living Math this year, we are planning to continuing doing so along with some Key To.../ Fred Math together after this.

What we have liked about Miquon:
It is thorough.
It provides a good understanding of numbers and how they relate to each other especially using the colorful Cuisinaire rods, essential to the program, are very helpful in teaching this concept.
Very advanced concepts are introduced at an early stage but are comprehendable by the child.
They learn how Math works.eg. They work problems to solve square number by working with figures of squares.
Children make up their own math problems and thus solidify their understanding.

What someone might not like:
It is non-conventional.
This means the teacher/ parent might not be used to the method and could find it confusing.- The Teacher's Manual(Lab Sheet Annotations) are a must-have and the First Grade diary are really helpful to overcome this.
It does not follow a set grade level.
It is dificult to decide what program to use after this series is completed. -though the KeyTo.. series is pretty good and on the same lines.