I have used a Children's Almanac before when the National Trust published it every year, and I loved reading through it to get ideas for what to do with Bear each month thoughout the year. Last year, the National Trust stopped publishing and I had to go a year without. I missed it a lot, and spent a lot of time looking for the facts and ideas in other places, which took up much more time, and never got me the same results.
When I discovered that Harper Collins were filling the spot this year, I pre-ordered this without a second's hesitation. The 2025 Children's Almanac by Colins Kids is a month-by-month guide to the year, highlighting important dates, nature based facts, astronomy infomation like the moon phases, religious festivals and so much more.
It is split into the twleve months of the year, and is set out in a way that older children could enjoy it alone, and younger ones can read through it with an adult.
That's how we are using it this year - I sat down with Bear and The Cub, and we read through the January section, looking at the calendar of dates, checking out when each of the moon phases is due and reading about the winter crafts and ideas to try.
I plan to do this each month with them, then use the information to do my planning for Bear's learning journey, using the craft ideas and puzzles to go alongside the information, encorporating the important dates into our schedule and using the topics to give us starting points for new things to learn about.
Bear loved reading through the January information, and was excited by some of the craft ideas - he was all ready and raring to go right then and there I think, but listened when I explained that each of the activites was intended to go with one of the important dates we'd read about, and that I would organise the things we needed in order to do them whilst learning about new topics. The Cub is just along for the ride right now, but loves crafting too, so I'm sure we will have lots of fun when we get around to the activities.
Do you use an almanac at all, and have you checked out the Children's Almanac?
Mama Bear x
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