Ladybird Tuesday: Learning with Mother, Book 2

As part of this week's Ladybird Tuesday I want to share with you Learning with Mother, Book 2. This book is part of series 702 which appears to have been known as the "Under 5s" series. There were 5 titles in the Learning with Mother series, all written by Ethel Wingfield between 1970 and 1972, and illustrated by Ethel's husband Harry who was one of Ladybird's most popular artists.

The Under Five series is "intended to help those parents who wish to make sure that their children have every opportunity to develop fully" and this book contain a series of simple activities that "mother" can do with her children to entertain and educate them. The emphasis is once again very much on mother being the one to do all these activities with the children – but then at the time of writing it's most likely that mother was the one to stay at home with the children whilst father went out to work.

As is the case with many of the Ladybird books from this era, the projects all have a certain innocent simplicity about them. Most of the apparatus used is based on everyday objects that people had around the house at the time rather than encouraging you to spend money on loads of toys as is often the case today.

In the days of dedicated children's TV channels and computer games it's hard to believe that a toddler would be fascinated by fruit peeling but you never know (although I wouldn't say that the boy in the picture looks all that interested in what his mother is doing!)

There are some nice ideas in there though and it's a lovely alternative to all the paid for classes that parents seem to think that they need to do with their little ones to either educate them or keep them entertained. People are these days looking to re-engage with simpler lives and following some of this book's suggested ideas would certainly help to do that.

If you have a collection of old Ladybird books then please feel free to join in with Ladybird Tuesday. There are no formal rules to follow, just leave a link to any post you write in the comments below and if you're feeling kind link back to my Ladybird Tuesday category here on Being Mrs C. Thanks!