Tea, Tales, and Tomes

28 Episodes

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Finding Science in Fiction: Leave the Droll Science Lessons Behind

2026-09-1501:03:36

We'd love your feedback. Send us a message. I kick off this episode with a vampire story but it lands somewhere unexpectedly practical: how to raise scientifically curious children without turning your home into a worksheet factory. We’re making the case that fiction, not just non-fiction science books, can build the real foundations of scientific thinking: attention, observation, affection, and the courage to keep asking questions when you don’t yet have answers. We walk through a carefully...

Tea, Tales, and Test Tubes: Award-winning Author Elizabeth Shreeve Talks Dinosaurs To Dragons

2026-08-2057:16

We'd love your feedback. Send us a message. What do house-sitting for a world-renowned scientist, a fascination for deep time and dinosaurs, being a self-confessed book dragon, and drinking copious quantities of tea have in common? Absolutely nothing… unless, of course, you’re Elizabeth Shreeve! And luckily for us, she is our guest today. In today's episode, we are continuing our exploration of the intersection between science, storytelling, and wonder and trace a thrilling path ...

Tea, Tales, and Test Tubes: When School Kills Scientific Wonder

2026-08-1740:10

We'd love your feedback. Send us a message. A rotten bean in a glass jar should be a brilliant science moment, right? Instead, it becomes the moment my child looks at me with worry and says, “I’m going to lose marks.” That fear is what sends me down a bigger question: when primary school science education becomes worksheets, right answers, and ticking boxes, are we accidentally teaching children to hate science and even to hate learning? The shock! The horror! We start with the “growi...

Reading Aloud To Raise Readers: Let's Solve The Literacy Crisis, Simply

2026-06-1037:12

We'd love your feedback. Send us a message. A child can read every word on the page and still not understand what the page is saying and that’s the heart of today’s season finale. We’re responding to a literacy crisis that doesn’t only live in under-resourced schools; it shows up in thriving homes, in “fine” report cards, and in older children and teens who decides they are not readers. When reading becomes performance, measurement, and pressure, the love drains away, and the gaps in vocabul...

Gendered Book Lists: What If The First Manosphere Is A Bookshelf

2026-04-1435:29

We'd love your feedback. Send us a message. “Boy or girl?” sounds like a helpful question in a bookshop, but it can be the start of a much bigger problem. After watching Inside the Manosphere, I couldn’t stop thinking about where boys first learn the idea that empathy is weakness and softness is shameful. Long before algorithms and influencers, those messages show up in less obvious places: toy aisles, classrooms, and the way we sort children’s books into pink shelves and “poop and fart joke...

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