We have been reading through the Little House series and are now finishing book two - Little House on the Prairie.

We'd read the first book a few times in recent years, but this one is new to my daughter. I love to read of Laura's life and see those experiences through my daughter's eyes. The history is so rich, lending itself to further study in many areas.

In this book, the Ingalls family leaves the Big Woods of Wisconsin and heads west in their covered wagon. They settle in Indian Territory where they start a new life for themselves - building the house and stable from the ground up. A chapter is devoted to how Pa built the chimney for the house and another for the roof. It is eye-opening to see how much work was put into basic shelter and finding food. We take so much for granted now that they used to have to do by hand.

Indians play a large role in this book and eventually the Ingalls are forced off the land on which they built because the government is giving that specific land to the Indians. These events led to some insightful questions from my daughter about how the early settlers treated the Indians and vice versa.

A favorite chapter told of the family's first Christmas on the prairie. My daughter was amazed at how thrilled the children were with their very simple gifts - a shiny new tin cup, a candy cane, a sugar cookie/cake, and a new penny.

We highly recommend this classic book - Little House on the Prairie!

For those homeschoolers out there: check out the free lapbooking materials available here for this book!