Babymouse: The App!!

App-loving Babymouse fans, your wait is over: Everyone's favorite slightly neurotic rodent is now available to play, via both iTunes and Google Play. Let iDevices and Android tablets alike rejoice. Even better, the app is free!

And really good, according to my own wee Babymouse fan. The app uses excerpts from the Babymouse graphic novels as the basis for some seriously  fun word matching, guessing, and spelling. Or, according to the app summary:

Playing the Android version on our Xoom

"Pop the Pic World Puzzle Game based on the popular Babymouse kids comic book series. Reveal the comic book pictures piece by piece and try to guess the word."

And did I mention the Free part? This is not an introductory dealie, the app will stay free. So if you know someone who has read all the Babymouse books and craves more, consider this an Expanded Universe option, and an opportunity to make that fan's day. But the app is a kick even for those who have somehow never crossed over into the wonderful world of Babymouse.

But don't take my word (heh) for it. Here what a dedicated fan (my daughter, who has played both the iPad and Android versions) has to say:

Apps & Autism: Presuming & Expressing Competence

I do my best strive to presume, cultivate, and recognize Leo's competence. To give him opportunities to access information and entertainment. To always consider what is possible, what he could do, how he might thrive -- and not worry about whether we see any kind of  "return on investment." That is why we listen to a variety of music, that is why we listen to books in the car, that is why I chuckle with admiration whenever he punks or outwits me, that is why I always try to give him a few extra beats to process and then act on input.

And that is one of the reasons I love watching him use his iPad, because it lets him explore and demonstrate such competence, whether he's reorganizing icons so his most-used apps are all in the same folder, realizing he can find songs in iTunes via their album art, or practicing typing via finding his favorite videos on YouTube. All independently initiated activities. All evidence of awesomeness.

Leo playing Thidwick the Big Hearted Moose

Awesomeness evidence is also why I get so excited about apps that let Leo express his competence. This is why I have always been such a fan of Oceanhouse Media's OMBooks, especially their Dr. Seuss series -- Leo can explore beloved books however he likes, whether he prefers to have the books read to him automatically, or "read" them himself by touching on each word individually. I've written about this before, many times.

But the reason I appreciate Oceanhouse Media's work so much is that, even while producing a constant avalanche of apps -- they just released another Leo favorite,  Thidwick the Big-Hearted Moose --

Leo & Oceanhouse Media president Michel Kripalani

They also constantly strive to make their existing apps better and more useful. So now apps like Dr. Seuss's ABC, Green Eggs and Ham, and the Cat in the Hat allow users to record their own voiceover. Which means that Leo -- who knows nearly every Dr. Seuss book by heart -- will be motivated to practice reading out loud. He'll then have evidence of his competence, his abilities -- which I love seeing, even though I neither expect nor demand that evidence. He gets to feel proud and happy, and have fun doing what he loves.

We'll also be able to record favorite people reading his favorite books, so he can feel like his grandparents or uncles or aunties are still here, even when they're far away. We'll be able to share those recordings with friends and families who have the same apps. We could -- if we so chose, and assuming it would be within the boundaries of fair use -- play the Dr. Seuss audiobooks we've spent years listening to in the car, and record them right into the app, so Leo can have all of his Dr. Seuss worlds (Green Eggs & Ham and Dr. Seuss's ABC read by Jason Alexander! The Cat in the Hat read by Kelsey Grammer!) finally fold into each other for ultimate happiness. Because that's the kind of experience that motivates him. That's the kind of feature that keeps him pushing and learning. And allowing pushing and learning and demonstrating competence to happen -- keeping apps evolving to better serve kids like Leo -- is something for which both Leo and I are both profoundly grateful.

This is how all apps should be.

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Disclosure: I requested and was gifted a copy of the Thidwick app. However, I am not affiliated with or compensated by Oceanhouse Media in any other way -- as always, I only write about apps I think really make a difference.

Developing Smart, Simple Social Stories Apps for Kids With Autism

Note: This post has been updated.

All I want for Leo and his also-autistic friends is a simple, smart, well-designed social stories app for around $3.99. But as of now, it doesn't exist. I don't understand why it doesn't exist.

Social stories are incredibly useful tools for folks like Leo: they use clear, focused language and pictures to help an autistic person better understand potentially stressful scenarios, and provide realistic expectations and options. They can be especially helpful for travel, holidays, establishing routines, transitions, or visits to new and unfamiliar places.

We used to make custom social story books for Leo, sometimes through iPhoto or Shutterfly, sometimes just a bunch of printed pages stapled together. But with iDevices and tablets, we now have social stories apps -- which take the social story concept one step farther, with voiceover. On his iPad, my pre-reader Leo can "read" his social stories independently. It's really damn cool, not to mention empowering.

Here's a iPad story we made for Leo two summers ago, detailing one of our family's weekly routines:

Great, right? Absolutely. But you know what is not great and has long made me grumble? The featured app, Stories2Learn, costs $13.99. Its competitor, Pictello, costs $18.99. [updated to add: Pictello features text-to-speech, which is very different than simple voiceover recording, and affects the price point considerably. For more info, see comments.] Similar apps -- like the special education-oriented, custom-content and voiceover-enabled Word SLaPps and Injini's Write My Name -- are $4.99 and $1.99* respectively. Why the price differences? Some of the higher-priced apps are more complicated than the lower-priced apps, but not all. What explanation, then, other than that ever-lingering special needs penalty cost?

With the front-runner social story apps offering more features than many users require, and costing more than many users are used to paying, there's an opportunity for someone else to capture a large, under-served, enthusiastic, loyal, and value-conscious audience. So, what should a potential social stories app developer keep in mind?

To work for Leo and his friends, here are the only functions a social stories app needs:

1. Create/edit story button on home page
2. Upload photos
3. Enter custom text
4. Record voiceover
5. Page through stories by swiping and/or tapping a button/arrow
6. Save stories as graphic icons with text titles, in list or folder format, and place them on the home page.
7. (Optional) Share/upload stories, e.g., to use at school and at home

The interface needs to be smart and simple, in terms of available choices and steps. Any features more elaborate than the list above could be superfluous and confusing -- I just want to make the stories, and Leo just wants to read them. Though a discreet info button for parents/educators/caregivers/authors also wouldn't hurt, in terms of advising about language to use -- short, action-oriented phrases, if-then statements, avoiding pronouns, etc.

Potential developers should look at the striking UIs and graphics of (again) Injini, a company that is in my opinion the industry standard-bearer for simple, elegant, engaging, thoughtful, useful, special needs-friendly kids' app design. Honestly, I'd love to see what Injini could do with a social stories app -- especially as there's no reason the app would need to be limited to the special needs market. Developers could make an app called "My Stories About Me" or some such, and parallel-market it to families of toddlers and preschoolers as a way to connect with family and friend by making stories together or for each other, which would have the extra benefit/hook of reinforcing those reading skills.

I know that folks like Russ Ewell and Pamela Sloan-Bradbury are looking into developing social stories apps. They both participated in  October's Hacking Autism event, where we all observed not one but two groups focusing on social stories -- so I suspect Pamela and Russ are already on the right track, and I have faith they'll do the right thing. I just want them to do it faster!

I want a well-designed, affordable social stories app for Leo, and I want it now. I hope someone will step up.

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And speaking of social stories apps ... you know what I never want to see again? I never want to see a developer make a choice that completely disregards their users' needs. I'm looking at you, Stories2Learn. Your software upgrade obliterated all of Leo's beloved social stories without warning, stories we'd spent months creating, stories that he returned to for comfort and reassurance and nostalgia on a near-daily basis.

I can recreate those stories somewhat, but as Leo has remarkable visual recall and super-precise hearing, he can tell that the new stories are not the same -- especially as some of the original stories' voiceovers were recorded by non-local visiting friends and relatives so Leo wouldn't miss them so much once they went home.

It's been a few months since the stories disappeared, and I am no less furious than I was upon first discovering they were gone -- especially since Leo is still plaintively paging through the Photos folder where the original social stories apps photos are kept, hoping they'll somehow magically reassemble into the stories he'll never be able to experience again, and misses so much.

I understand that it is not always possible to keep all original features and content when developers upgrade apps -- I'm a former software producer, so I've been in that position myself. But then I didn't make software specifically for kids like Leo, who have so few tools for creating routine and predictability; I didn't wrench away some of those kids' best tools for making sense of this utterly confusing and overwhelming world. Leo and his social stories-loving peers aren't interested in or in some cases aren't able to conceptualize the explanations why their social stories disappeared, they just know that their stories are gone, and they're devastated.

It was a bad choice to let the Stories2Learn upgrade delete existing social stories. A bad decision not just for financial reasons -- customers may have a hard time trusting you again -- but for compassionate ones. I am extremely disappointed.

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*Please note that app prices change all the time. These prices are accurate as of today.

Leo App Review: Injini's Write My Name

Tracing letters and words.

It's been a while since Leo sat down with a brand new app and just took off with it, but that's what happened with Injini's new Write My Name handwriting practice app ($1.99). Yay! Leo deserves a fun, crisply designed, intuitive and customizable app to help support his reading and writing skills.

You're probably thinking that there are a lot of handwriting practice apps out there, and you're right -- but this one is different, this one is superior.

These photos and video are from the very first time Leo sat down with Write My Name. He was delighted -- he immediately plowed through word after word, animation after animation, letter sound after letter sound, reinforced learning opportunity after reinforce learning opportunity.

The official information about the app follows, but I also talked to the developers and was pleased to find out that they consulted with occupational therapists on the handwriting portion of the app, and tested it with children with fine motor delays:

What's unique about Write My Name? There is plenty of competition in the tracing app category but our features can make a significant impact for children who struggle to learn how to write.

• Create 36 custom name tags with your own pictures and recordings to personalize learning for your child
• Beautiful illustrations
• Animations upon completion of each letter or word
• Easy to navigate to promote independent learning
• Uppercase and lowercase alphabet
• 100+ common sight/Dolch words
• Records student progress as word cards and letters are completed
• Fingerpaint mode shows completed letters in child’s own handwriting
• Distraction-free: No advertisements or in-app purchases

In the same tradition as Injini Child Development Game Suite and My First AAC, Project Injini was inspired to create Write My Name to help children with special needs practice emerging writing skills in a fun and playful way. Mastering writing your own name is often an IEP goal but the other tracing apps in the app store don't make this activity easily accessible AND achievable. We had this particular activity in mind when we created Write My Name. 

I love the customizable name tags -- and I can't wait to see how pleased Leo will be when we help him fill out a bunch of these tags with the names and photos of his favorite people and things -- which will then let him practice writing the names of those items.

Create your own name tag...

...then click on your name tag to practice writing your own name!

Letter tracing option one: Fingerpaint! This lets us see
what Leo's letter tracing ability actually looks like.

Letter tracing option two: clean lines! These lines are automatic,
and dependent on tracing ability but not fine motor precision.

The following video shows Leo and Write My Name in action. He loved this app -- and I appreciate that it broke him out of the Speech With Milo: Prepositions app rut he'd been stuck in this week (we love the Milo series, but right now the Milo music is the soundtrack of my nightmares).

Again, it's been a while since I've been really impressed with an app. This one's more than worthy of you or your child's time, and your $1.99.

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Disclosure: we were gifted a copy of the app, but the opinion expressed here is my own. I only review apps worth reviewing.

Leo the Lightning Bug App!

We are unabashed fans of Oceanhouse Media, the developers behind the interactive Dr. Seuss books apps Leo loves so very much. So we were tickled to find out that their latest interactive book app, just released today, is called Leo the Lightning Bug (introductory price: $2.99).

Any book with Leo in the title makes me happy not just because Leo is the very best name, but because our boy responds to books with his name in them. The app is also cute as, well, a bug, and has a story that any kid who has ever felt they weren't good enough will identify with:

Written by Eric Drachman and illustrated by James Muscarello, Leo the Lightning Bug captures emotions many children feel growing up. Leo is “the littlest lightning bug of all” who can’t seem to make his own light. Despite other lightning bugs teasing him, with determination, motherly support and a little luck, Leo eventually lights up in the night. With his newfound confidence, Leo now laughs at himself, plays with the other lightning bugs and enjoys a good night’s sleep.

While our Leo enjoys the app thanks to Oceanhouse Media's thoughtful use of consistent interface navigation  -- it works just like every other one of their books -- his little sister Mali has become a big fan. She even found the app in the "to review" folder I'd hidden it in, and told me the entire story before I'd had a chance to read it myself, or with Leo!

Leo the Lightning Bug is a very sweet story for any kid, and (again, like other Oceanhouse Media titles) had the click-each-word-to-hear-it-read-aloud functionality that is especially useful to kids who, like my own Leo, are not yet fully literate, as it allows them to "read" books to themselves.

I hope your child enjoys this book, whatever their wonderful name may be.

Our Leo's other Favorite Leo books, for the record:

• Leo's Tree More sweetness, as a boy named Leo and his tree grow up together.
• Good Night, Leo A "Swashbuckling adventure" as another Leo says good night to each item in his pirate costume. Good modeling for step-by-step transitions!

Directions From BlogHer10 to the My Baby Rides the Short Bus Reading

Are you coming to see Jen Myers, Jen Silverman, Sharis Ingram, and me read our My Baby Rides the Short Bus stories this Saturday night at 7 PM at Bluestockings bookstore in Manhattan? Are you coming from the BlogHer conference? Are you worried about how to get from one point to the other?

No worries, it's actually a simple route. I'm cheap and so will not be taking a taxi -- I'm going to opt for the subway instead, and hope you will follow suit using these directions (give yourself 45 minutes):

From the Hilton:

• Walk three blocks north along Avenue of the Americas/6th Ave to 57th Street station, about 5 mins
• Subway - F - Queens Blvd Express/ 6 Av Local (8 stops), about 15 minutes
• Arrive Second Avenue - Lower East Side - 2nd Ave
• Walk east along Houston, turn right on Allen, walk to Bluestockings at 172 Allen (about 5 minutes from subway station)

I recommend mapping the route yourself using the public transportation directions option in Google Maps so you can visualize it properly. Hopefully an actual NYC resident will verify what I wrote above!


Truly hope to see you there.

So Easy to Love (Modern Times Reading for My Baby Rides the Short Bus)

Honestly, I found it much easier to participate in a radio interview about Leelo than to read a My Baby Rides the Short Bus story about him to a room full of people. Jen thinks the difference is my social awkwardness, but really, I think it's because the radio interview moved too quickly for my emotions to overwhelm me, for me to be at the mercy of my raging love for my son, my fierce need to protect him, yet make other people see him.

No such luck at the Modern Times reading for My Baby Rides the Short Bus. That room, it pulsed with purpose, but also with such deeply conflicted love and sorrow. After three readings, I lost it, completely. I couldn't read when I was supposed to, had to switch places with Jen. I rallied for the Q&A afterwards, probably looked fine. But I felt gutted. And let me tell you why.

Leo has always been easy to love. He's a loving boy, free with his hugs, laughs, and vocal in his desire to spend time with the people he cares about. He wants to cuddle before he gets out of bed in the morning, wants to snuggle whenever he sits next to us, and his reaction to being pleasantly surprised is to jump up and fling his arms around our necks.

And that kind of carefree affection was not what the first three parents spoke about. They spoke about the difficulties of understanding their children, of children who didn't seem to connect at all, though they otherwise seemed so like Leo. Or they spoke of serious medical conditions and complications, of physical challenges and trials like our family has never experienced.

Even though I'd already read their stories and poems, already knew what the writers were going to read, I hadn't prepared myself to hear the stories in the authors' own voices, while seeing their eyes and watching their faces.

Still, I tried to get up and read. But I couldn't. I almost never encounter that kind of public raw, and it took me out. I started crying, started shaking. Hard. No matter how much I appreciate your stories, and how grateful I am to you for sharing them, I'm usually shielded by my computer screen or the written page. Or we're in more casual social situations, where the tone remains light-hearted even if the subject matter does not. The reality of parenting kids like ours rarely stares me in the face like that. Apparently, I'm not quite up to it yet. I'm so sorry.

Thankfully, Jen Silverman snuck up and handed me a magic pastille. Also Jen Myers took my place in the reading roster -- and her story, in case you haven't read it yet, is wittily written though not funny at all. Iz, who was sitting with me, patted my hand and reassured me, told me I'd be fine. I was, by the time Jen finished. I got up, protested that the person who had previously tried to read wasn't actually me, and tore through my story. (Which is partially about meeting Jen, and in hindsight made sense to read after the audience had already made her acquaintance.)

Here's what else happened when I wasn't in hysterics:

Iz and I rode in with one of the other MBRTSB authors, Thida. What a treat! We're going to kidnap her and bring her to Bad Moms Coffee one of these Thursdays.

The My Baby Rides the Short Bus editors, Furies, Fates -- Jen Silverman, Yantra Bertelli, and Sarah Talbot were all more luminous than imagined. They were also all at the end of individual traveling days and were very tired, though they still crackled with supernatural intelligence and energy. I wish we'd had time to sit and chat. Sigh. In another life.

The house was packed! People were poking their heads in through the door, trying to have a look. And the books sold out! (You should buy a copy.)

Iz came. Her Godfather came. Sarah (!) came. People who'd listened to our Forum interview came. Jen's family came, from several different parts of our state. Seymour couldn't come, because he was giving a talk in a different part of our state. (If you came and didn't say hi, please feel free to do so now. :) )

The Q&A after the readings was interesting. One woman said that she taught our children and thought they were wonderful. I lit up, anticipating hearing other nice things, as we rarely get positive feedback that doesn't devolve into "special angel" speak. So of course she devolved into special angel speak, asking if we didn't think our kids had a different purpose, like a 19th century missionary speaking about how the heathens they live among are touched by God. Sarah Talbot respectfully and forcefully disagreed, and I agreed with Sarah. Though I have to wonder if the first woman was using an outmoded verbal toolbox, and could actually have been saying something I'd be interested in hearing, had she used different terms.

Another woman asked about whether My Baby Rides the Short Bus included perspectives from parents of color. She said her son was already challenged by being black, now he has disabilities as well, and on top of that, she keeps getting asked whether she took drugs while she was pregnant with him (several heads exploded, after that statement). Jen Silverman explained that perspective variety was a goal of MBRTSB, and how the deadline had been pushed back several times while they actively tried to recruit authors, but eventually they had to proceed with what they had.

Which is what we all do, isn't it?

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If anyone knows who that final mom was or how to contact her, please let me know. I'd love to have a conversation with her, for BlogHer.

Review: Daniel X: Watch the Skies

When I found out that copies of James Patterson's new young adult book Daniel X: Watch the Skies were available for review, I immediately asked my eldest child and Patterson fan, Iz, if she wanted me to snare her a copy. She said "yes, please," so I turned around to my computer and wrote "yes, please," too.

The book arrived. Iz gobbled it down. She liked it, she said, because it was never boring, it was funny, it was fast, and it had what she considered to be an interesting twist at the end. She also liked the back-end placement of teaser chapters from other, forthcoming Patterson books, and wanted to know when she'd be getting her complimentary copies of those? I told her I couldn't guarantee anything but we never know.

Then I sat down with the book to see if I liked it as much as Iz did, and initially the answer was "no." The story was creative and exciting enough, about an orphan teen alien hunter and his friends, both imaginary and real, battling a giant malevolent extraterrestrial catfish-like media producer who makes marionettes out of humans before exterminating them, all in the name of "endertainment" and TV ratings; the book features explosions, fast cars, motorcycles, spying, narrow escapes, and chases galore, plus lots of nose-thumbing at school administrators. But it reads like Michael Crichton for kids: an innovative but minimally padded story outline, and it's peppered with too much of what seems like movie, songs, restaurant, and brands product placement. And the chapters were jarringly short -- many were only two pages. Daniel X: Watch the Skies was all bam-bam-bam action, with no time to take a breath or let characters develop. I found it disorienting yet skimpy, and was surprised Iz enjoyed it.

Then I put the book aside and thought about its appeal, and the authors' (it is co-written with Ned Rust) motivations some more. James Patterson is also the founder of ReadKiddoRead, a site devoted to getting kids to love books like the author does. And I get the sense that Daniel X, like the Maximum Ride series Iz also enjoys, is about getting kids to do that reading using any hooks necessary. From this perspective, Daniel X is a rich read -- it's full of such hooks.

Many older kids and teens, and indeed adult sci fi/fantasy fans don't want character development. They want action. This book will give them that, in an extremely violent but still relatively sanitary fashion -- people are melted into goo, but there is almost no blood or gore. And the book is so fast-paced and there are so many action scenes that readers don't really have time to analyze what kind of violence & action they're reading about.

The constant citing of contemporary brands might be more grounding and comforting for some readers than a book skirting the retail and cultural footholds of our era in a bid to remain classic. Daniel X: Watch the Skies might not age well, but then again it might remain very much a symbol of that which was 2009. We'll see.

Daniel X has much for a parent to approve of in that it celebrates love and responsibility towards family, friends, the environment, and even animals. It's also quite tame when it comes to teen relations. There are funny feelings in tummies, there are kisses and swooning -- but naught else. Parents or guardians concerned about all that sexy sex pervading teen literature should be pleased.

That tameness makes it rather strange, though, that the authors keep mentioning Stranger in a Strange Land as a pillar of literature, one of the Best Books Ever. I have already been teaching my kids about Stranger in a Strange Land concepts like the Fair Witness and grokking -- but consider the book itself inappropriate for my ten-year-old Iz, who's on the younger end of the Daniel X readership. What are kids to think about Daniel X when they discover the book he adores says it's usually a girl's own fault when she gets raped? That it depicts sixties-style free love? This is a bit of a misstep, in my opinion.

I could also do without the unsubtle preaching about the evils of technology and media and how they turn people into mindless consumer bobbleheads, but I suspect readers who enjoy Patterson's books are willing to put up with that quirk in return for a rip-roaring bit of chaste ultraviolence with the likeable, resourceful, cheerful teen alien hunter Daniel X. They might smirk a bit, though, if they're reading his story on a Kindle.

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MotherTalk sponsored the Daniel X Book Tour. In addition to putting yet another volume on Iz's groaning bookshelf, they provided reviewers with modest Amazon gift certificates. I look forward to using our certificate to replace my son Leo's loved-to-shreds copies of My World, Hop on Pop, and Everyone Poops.

Bee Yourself, but Bee Sweet

The nice folks at Bee Tees sent each of my three kids shirts. I'm not sure if they did so because they read this blog and thought my sometimes cantankerous trio could use good behavior reminders, but the shirts are cute as hell and my kids think they're great.

I especially appreciate a kid with autism like Leo getting to run around town with a t-shirt that declares: "Bee Yourself"! And the fact that the BeeTees folks also do custom Bee-Cause designs for fundraising. SEPTAR could certainly benefit from a design option you might easily guess.



Big sister Iz swiped his shirt later on. She says she's the one who is entering middle school in a few weeks and needs tools like a "Bee Yourself" shirt to remind her about priorities and bucking peer pressure. Her shirt actually fit him better, so I didn't mind letting them swap.



Mali got the same shirt design Iz was supposed to wear, "Bee Sweet." I think it's appropriate. Mali has full-tilt Defiant Little Sister Syndrome, so anything that reminds her to be nice is appreciated (Bee Kind, Bee Happy, and Bee Good would also be options; as her mom I consider Bee Unique self-evident).



Iz complained that Leo's the one who needs the Bee Sweet shirt anyhow, as he's been going after his little sister again. I let him wear it not because of her griping but because most eight-year-old little brothers could use such a reminder. Plus at Leo's team meeting today, we had two main discussion points: 1) How close he's getting to reading -- we think he might be doing some real work by the end of the year, in which case shirts with one or two words on them can help reinforce reading skills, and 2) The importance of using very firm and direct language and a commanding tone of voice with him when he misbehaves, to help him understand when he is doing something that is not okay. If we want him to be sweet, we have to be firm.

Regardless, these are truly very cute shirts, and I'm glad to know about them before the holiday shopping season starts. I know quite a few kids who could use or would appreciate them. And I might just get a Bee Unique shirt for myself.



The kids and their BeeTees in front of a bee mural at the BeeKind apiary products & supply store in Sebastopol.

Double Daring Book Review

Before I had children, I would obsess about a theoretical future daughter and the critical information I simply had to impart to her. Epiphanies would strike -- Fair Witness! She'll need to know how to be a fair witness! -- and I'd pull the car over, write my revelation down, and then daydream about compiling a D'Artagnan-Rosenberg infostream manifesto to hand to that girl, once she appeared and when she was ready.

Lucky me, I got my daughter -- and a spare (and a handsome son as well). I never put together that manifesto, but also no longer fret about it: Andi Buchanan and Miriam Peskowitz let me off the hook two years ago, when they published their own compendium of core girl knowledge, The Daring Book for Girls.

Lucky us, they've now published a second collection: The Double Daring Book for Girls.

Do I love their Daring books? Yes I do, passionately, and so does my ten-year-old daughter. She squealed when our copy of The Double Daring Book arrived (the good folks at Houghton-Mifflin sent a complimentary copy), immediately dispatched the whole thing, and dove straight into the activities. Here's her first attempt at Calligraphy (p. 256):

I too read the entire Double Daring Book (though a bit more slowly than my daughter), and was delighted. Look how many pages I dog-eared, so as to remember the best of the best of its activities, biographies, and histories:

Honestly, I want to hand this book to every girl I know, and the boys as well (pink typeface and Girl label be damned, this book is a powder keg of information and ideas for any kid). I am pleased that it contains overlaps with that imagined manifesto of mine, e.g., batik techniques and history (p.99), commonly confused words like imply and infer (p. 141), and the specifics of quality private eye work (p. 177).

What I truly appreciate, and what makes the Daring books transcend the How To label, is the activities' historical and often rebellious context. Why should our kids want to know how to waltz (p. 78)? How about because it was considered scandalous -- the dancing partners touched! And vulgar, forbidden -- it was easy to learn and didn't require a dance master!

Mostly, I am dazzled by the amount of good, hard, enticingly written information amassed in this book. I want kids to know everything in it. I want them to know exactly who Eleanor of Aquitaine was, and how startling her long, accomplished, independent life was compared to most women of her era. I want them to know the fundamentals of rhetoric, how to make a raft, the story of Ada Lovelace, how to join the circus, how to say thank you in scores of languages, how to make snowglobes, how to conduct an orchestra, and how to make rope ladders.

One quibble: The entry on Running a Magazine (p. 204) never mentions the word "zine," or how those handmade magazines helped drive the relatively recent Riot Grrrls feminist movement, which is perplexing, but I suppose in keeping with the book's overall timeless and classic feel. Don't let this one item keep you away.

The Double Daring Book for Girls is buoyed by positivity, and focuses on cultivating competence, independence, willingness to experiment, and open-ended fun. It provides multiple short biographies of women whose lives exemplified these attitudes. These role models and this book are antidotes for heavily-marketed (and in some cases marketing-originated) books like the one pictured below, the title of which I will not type here, which my daughter and her friends crave, and in which junior high-aged girls live lives of insecurity, negativity, and cruelty, while obsessing about label-spangled fashion, unrealistic body images, and social machinations. Ptui.

If you want your girls to value knowledge and abilities like they do store-bought items, get them The Double Daring Book for Girls. I truly believe it has the power to inspire and edify any child with a curious mind, while simultaneously countering media-induced materialism. It is a treasure.

No Brain Scan for You!

Say you have a cute four-year-old girl whose older brother has a few developmental issues.

Say you have become a sucker for researchers who want to run tests on your little girl, as long as those tests are free, and do not involve injecting radioactive materials into her veins because even though that's how you paid for your second trip to West Africa while you were in college*, you haven't entirely worked through your feelings about irradiating children. As long as those tests are part of developmental evaluations that will reassure you that your tiny monkey is fine, just fine.

Say you've hit the jackpot: a study that provides not only a small stipend, but also thousands of dollars' worth of free developmental evaluations -- including an MRI and genetic screening.

The researchers are excited, they think your daughter might be perfect for their needs. Then they tell you what the study is about: Reading acquisition/pre-readers. And this is your daughter:



This is the same kid whose preschool teacher told me, during today's parent/teacher conference, that they'd had to break out new reading learning books for my girl, because she'd already blasted through all the levels they have at her school. (A school which includes kindergarten).

What do you do?

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I have a few scruples, so I sent the study coordinator a link to the above video. She told me that, alas, since Mali can already read, we no longer qualify for the study.

I would be a ball of conflicted but amused irritation if she hadn't already pointed us towards a different researcher and a different study.

*Oh my god this must be why Leo is autistic!

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Clarification: I am much more amused than irritated. I am used to being told that Leo doesn't qualify for such-and-such; it didn't occur to me that Mali might be disqualified for very different reasons.

Please know that I am helping the original researcher find Mali substitutes who are at a different point on the reading learning curve.

Persian Girls

A MotherTalk Review



Nahid Rachlin has taken her own story, interwoven it with the plight of women in Iran and contemporary Iranian history, and given us an intelligent memoir that will satisfy even those who usually crave frothier fare. Persian Girls is so beautifully and lucidly written that I kept hiding in the bathroom to binge-read it.

Nahid and her sister Pari were outspoken, free-thinking girls in a family that allowed its sons to embrace the Shah's love of all things Western but held its daughters to more traditional Iranian values. Pari in particular dreamed of America and of being an actress, but as the older daughter was pressured into marrying a man who considered acting on par with prostitution. Nahid, who wanted to become a writer, managed to persuade her father to send her to college in the United States, where she married an American and became a citizen herself. From childhood through adulthood, the sisters' love for and delight in each other is clear, despite their divergent paths.

While Persian Girls is an autobiography of Rachlin, it is also a portrait of women and girls in urban Iran in the decades before the Islamic Revolution. Rachlin makes tangible the intellectual agony of living in a society that considers women chattel, in which even during Rachlin's lifetime allowed men to marry nine-year-old girls, and in which women's behavior is still legally restricted. Sometimes it was even more heartbreaking to read about her sister Manijeh -- malicious as she was to both Nahid and Pari -- who behaved exactly as society and her parents expected her to, and yet was still blindsided and crushed by her arranged marriage. And, as the mother of a special-needs child, I couldn't help but sob at the description of a woman who was pressured by a suitor to abandon her blind toddler.

I was also heartened by Rachlin's many descriptions of women creating their own societies and taking care of each other. Rachlin's beloved aunt Maryam, who was the author's adopted mother from infancy through age nine, raised Nahid in a loving and traditional Islamic community of women, one in which the rhythms of their daily routine created a comforting cocoon. Even Pari found some solace in her neighborhood female friends, though it was not enough to alleviate her depression after losing custody of her son Bijan to her cruel first husband.

In the Iran Rachlin describes, women can never depend on men, but they can sometimes depend on each other. And sometimes, that is enough.

A final note: while I have gobbled up many memoirs by Iranian women, including Azar Nafisi's Reading Lolita in Tehran, Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis, and even Firoozeh Dumas's Funny in Farsi, I have never before encountered such a vivid description of life under the Shah, and the American and European complicity in his corrupt rule. I would like to thank Nahid Rachlin for helping me to be a little bit less ignorant.

Want more Persian Girls information? read Ms. Rachlin's Persian Girls Backstory, or discuss Persian Girls in the MotherTalk Book Club.

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