Would you believe that I’m not yet completely done with this book? Surprised? I didn’t think so. It is not really that far-fetched is it! Despite the fact that we (as in my boys and I) are proceeding with a one disc forward, one disc backward disjointedness – I am in love with this book!
With this selection for my Fall into Reading list I was looking to refresh my rusty science knowledge. But I am finding that I am also re-igniting my inner science nerd. It has been a joyous reunion for me. Once upon a time not so very long ago I was a science major. I wasn’t very successful at being a science major and thus switched to Psychology and Business. Despite the lack of success as a science major, I have continued to be a science nerd. And in the Canon I am at home.
Natalie Angier has a wonderful way of placing humor among the “hard” science in The Canon. I’ve actually been surprised at how much I’m laughing. I am thrilled beyond measure to listen to this audiobook with my boys. I have caught a couple things that might make some people wince if their impressionable children heard them. But me – well I’ve tossed caution to the wind and played the discs loud and proud. Questions I can handle and most of the “winces” would require a level of communal (societal) knowledge that thankfully my 7 year old doesn’t have yet. Much seems to float right over his head and that of his younger brother.
Why would I throw caution to the wind like that? For vocabulary. I can’t begin to fully fathom the expansion of the science vocabulary in my children. The other day we finished up the disc for the Chemistry section specifically this disc talked bonds. Ionic, Hydrogen, Covalent, Carbon. Bonds everywhere floating around our van. In and out of the ears of my children. Children I hope to turn into tiny science nerds.
“Childhood, then, is the one time of life when all members of an age cohort are expected to appreciate science.”
We’re about at the half way point at the moment and I will probably revisit the book here when were done.
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