Hello,
I know some of you really enjoy knowing about new books. I can be difficult to know which books you might like and which you might not like. I try to choose books that I really like and that fit the criteria we want for our SDA schools.
The Boo-Boos That Changed the World by Barry Wittenstein. 2018.
This is the story of how Band-Aids were created. This book is fun to read aloud. The first page reads “Once upon a time, in 1917 actually, a cotton buyer named Earle Dickson married his beloved, Josephine, and they lived happily ever after. The End.” I read that a stopped. The children were surprised and said, “That isn’t all!?” So I turned the page and read the next ten pages at the end of which stated “The End.” I waited again, and the protests came. The children were laughing by now, so I continued reading four more pages when I again read “The End.” Two more pages – The End. And finally read to the end of the book when it says “The End – Really!” Meanwhile, through all those ‘The Ends” comes the story of how a cotton buyer created bandages with adhesive that was easy to apply with one hand. They didn’t sell well until Johnson and Johnson decided to give them away to the Boy Scouts since boys scrape their knees and elbows. The mothers realized how handy these things were and they began to sell. There is a nice bit of history here and lots of things that you might not know just like the children. This is a book that is appropriate for all ages.
Focused by Alyson Gerber. 2019.
If you have a student in your class with ADHD, they might want to read this book. Clea can’t control her thoughts. She gets distracted; she can’t focus easily especially with others around her making noises. The other kids are beginning to notice and it is starting to affect her grades. Her parents take her to be tested and she learns that she had ADHD. I am processing this book right now and already have a student with ADHD who wants to read it. Alyson Gerber has written a story to help others know what it is like for someone who has ADHD. If you like this one, you may also like a previous book Gerber wrote titled “Braced” about a girl with scoliosis.
Since we are on a roll with medical issues, consider the book Roll With It by Jamie Sumner about a girl in a wheelchair. Not only is Ellie in a wheelchair, but she is the new girl. Add to that, she is the new girl who lived in a trailer park on the wrong side of town. Ellie has cerebral palsy and she and her mom have moved to a new town so they can help care for her grandfather who has dementia. Ellie wants to be a baker and is excited to enter a baking contest. We learn about Ellie and what life is like for her living with CP.
What I like about Focused, Braced, and Roll With It is that we learn more about what it is like for a person with those medical conditions. By learning more about the issues, we become more accepting and tolerant.
I hope you have a great week.
Audrey
Tuesday, January 28, 2020
Tuesday, January 21, 2020
Washington Children's Choice books
Hello,\
You may know about the Washington Children’s Choice program. Each year the Washington Library Association School Division (WLA) sponsors an award for the favorite picture book from a total of 20 that have been nominated. Teachers, librarians, or parents read the books to the children in grades K – 3 and students choose the one they like best. The votes are sent in and we wait as patiently as we can to hear which book won.
I look over the list of nominations and choose the ones that fit my library criteria. This year I found a few I’d like to share with you.
Saving Fiona: The Story of the World’s Most Famous Baby Hippo by Thane Maynard. 2018.
Fiona was the first baby hippo to be born prematurely at the Cincinnati Zoo in January of 2017. She was the first premature hippo to be raised by humans. This is the story of how TeamFiona committed themselves to help Fiona live. Photographs on every page illustrate each step of Fiona’s progress.
The Ugly Five by Julia Donaldson. 2017.
I admit that I almost didn’t even open this book simply because of the cover and the title. But since it was a WCC nomination, I decided I needed to at least give it a half-hearted chance. I am a fan of reading author’s notes and this one got my attention. Julia Donaldson went on safari in Africa and noticed that everyone made a big fuss about trying to spot the Big Five animals – elephant, lion, buffalo, rhino, and leopard. Julia found the Ugly Five more appealing and decided to write a story about these overlooked animals. This book features the wildebeest, hyena, vulture, warthog, and the marabou stork. At the end of this book, she asks if you went on safari would you like to see the Little Five, The Shy Five, the Big Five, or the Ugly Five? I’m glad I got it from the Scholastic Book Fair. I think you’ll like it, too.
Inky’s Amazing Escape : How a Very Smart Octopus Found His Way Home by Sy Montgomery. 2018.
If you take a look in your library, you very likely have books by Sy Montgomery. He is quite a prolific writer and usually writes about science and nature. This is a true story about an octopus caught in a lobster trap in the Pacific Ocean near New Zealand. The lobsterman took him to the National Aquarium of New Zealand. Inky enjoyed his home in the aquarium, but got curious and was able to squeeze out of his tank and through the pipes in the floor which led back to the Pacific Ocean. I just read this last week to my students and we loved it.
Can I Be Your Dog? By Troy Cummings. 2018.
Arfy is a homeless dog who lives in a cardboard box in an alley. He wants a home and writes a letter to the people who live on the street. The whole story is written in letters back and forth from Arfy to each house asking if he can be their dog. If you are teaching a letter writing unit, this would be a great book to supplement the unit. After the story ends, there is information on how you can help homeless animals.
More next week.
Audrey
You may know about the Washington Children’s Choice program. Each year the Washington Library Association School Division (WLA) sponsors an award for the favorite picture book from a total of 20 that have been nominated. Teachers, librarians, or parents read the books to the children in grades K – 3 and students choose the one they like best. The votes are sent in and we wait as patiently as we can to hear which book won.
I look over the list of nominations and choose the ones that fit my library criteria. This year I found a few I’d like to share with you.
Saving Fiona: The Story of the World’s Most Famous Baby Hippo by Thane Maynard. 2018.
Fiona was the first baby hippo to be born prematurely at the Cincinnati Zoo in January of 2017. She was the first premature hippo to be raised by humans. This is the story of how TeamFiona committed themselves to help Fiona live. Photographs on every page illustrate each step of Fiona’s progress.
The Ugly Five by Julia Donaldson. 2017.
I admit that I almost didn’t even open this book simply because of the cover and the title. But since it was a WCC nomination, I decided I needed to at least give it a half-hearted chance. I am a fan of reading author’s notes and this one got my attention. Julia Donaldson went on safari in Africa and noticed that everyone made a big fuss about trying to spot the Big Five animals – elephant, lion, buffalo, rhino, and leopard. Julia found the Ugly Five more appealing and decided to write a story about these overlooked animals. This book features the wildebeest, hyena, vulture, warthog, and the marabou stork. At the end of this book, she asks if you went on safari would you like to see the Little Five, The Shy Five, the Big Five, or the Ugly Five? I’m glad I got it from the Scholastic Book Fair. I think you’ll like it, too.
Inky’s Amazing Escape : How a Very Smart Octopus Found His Way Home by Sy Montgomery. 2018.
If you take a look in your library, you very likely have books by Sy Montgomery. He is quite a prolific writer and usually writes about science and nature. This is a true story about an octopus caught in a lobster trap in the Pacific Ocean near New Zealand. The lobsterman took him to the National Aquarium of New Zealand. Inky enjoyed his home in the aquarium, but got curious and was able to squeeze out of his tank and through the pipes in the floor which led back to the Pacific Ocean. I just read this last week to my students and we loved it.
Can I Be Your Dog? By Troy Cummings. 2018.
Arfy is a homeless dog who lives in a cardboard box in an alley. He wants a home and writes a letter to the people who live on the street. The whole story is written in letters back and forth from Arfy to each house asking if he can be their dog. If you are teaching a letter writing unit, this would be a great book to supplement the unit. After the story ends, there is information on how you can help homeless animals.
More next week.
Audrey
Monday, January 13, 2020
Parent Shelf
Hello, Friends,
I have one idea for you today. You may have some books sin your library that are a little too old for your students, but very suitable for parents. Consider setting up a shelf for parents to check out. We have one and here is how it started.
We are fortunate to have a part time counsellor who had a few books for parents to use. She asked if we would be able to process them and set up a special place for parents to check them out. She would refer parents to the library as needed. We agreed that we could work with her on this and actually bought a few of the books she felt were important for our school community. After that, parents have donated books that were also great additions to the Parent Shelf. We have promoted this in our weekly school newsletter.
The spine label has a capital ‘P’ above the Dewey number to indicate it is shelved in a special place, but they could also be shelved later on the regular shelves if we decided to make that change.
Our shelf looks like this currently.
We don’t have a lot of books, but as they come through, we add to our collection.
If you want to set up something similar, but don’t have the funds to do so, check with your church community. It may be that parents who have raised their children may donate books for your project.
Have a great week,
Audrey
Tuesday, January 7, 2020
New Books
Hello and Happy New Year!
Today I have four new books and I do mean new. They all have a copyright date of 2019. They are all books for older students. I have found that sometimes it is a bit more difficult to find books for older students that they might like.
There is a nice variety of genres represented here. I really don’t like to assign gender to books, but these are great ‘boy’ books.
Secret Soldiers by Kelly Hutton. 2019. 306 pp.
I love the tag line on this book. “Four Boys. One Deadly Mission.” Just that line got my attention. This book is about the young British boys who served in the first World War as tunnellers underground. These underage boys wanted to fight and help the war effort and lied about their ages in order to do so. Secret Soldiers follows the story of Thomas, a thirteen-year-old coal miner who enlists in order to find his older brother who is missing in action. He and three other boys are assigned to help dig tunnels beneath the battlefield. The author’s note at the end tells more about the Tunnellers’ Memorial and books that she used for some of her information.
Fighting for the Forest by P. O’Connell Pearson. 2019. 171 pp.
I admit it. I am a visual learner and the covers of books attracts me first. This cover did not. But I have learned to try to look past the cover and when I saw the center medallion and saw “Civilian Conservation Corp”, I knew that this might be a keeper. This is the story of Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s Civilian Conservation Corps or CCC program. The Civilian Conservation Corps was established during the Great Depression. This government agency helped save the United States from economic collapse and environmental disaster by building parks, reclaiming forests, planting around three billion trees, and restoring millions of acres of land between 1933 and 1942.
This book is like reading a documentary. Photographs and sidebar information help us to understand the time period and what people endured during the Great Depression.
The Poison Eaters by Gail Jarrow. 2019. 134 pp.
Come on! Eating poison?! What a pull to check out a book! In looking closer, we see this is about danger and fraud in our food and drugs. Still interesting. The cover illustration is perfect to grab attention, too. A human skull and the crossbones are a fork and knife.
I was unaware that until about a hundred years ago, chemicals used in embalming corpses were routinely added to foods by unregulated and unethical companies. One example tells of borax and boric acid sprinkled on meet and broken eggs to stop bacteria growth and covered up the smell of decay. Dr. Harvey Washington Wiley campaigned to protect consumers from harmful foods and drugs. The title of the book comes from the volunteers who helped test food additives and were dubbed ‘poison eaters’. Thanks to Dr. Wiley, we have much safer foods, drugs, and cosmetics.
Disaster Strikes! By Jeffrey Kluger. 2019. 208 pp.
Another interesting tag line here. “The most dangerous space missions of all time.” Over Christmas break, my husband and I watched a 13 part documentary of the space missions. We both grew up in Florida during the beginning of the space program and my husband’s father did some work at Cape Canaveral, so it is really interesting to us.
Since the title has the word “disaster” in it, you can guess that this tells about the perils of the space race. We learn of minor problems and the tragedies of the men and women who have participated in the space program from the author of Apollo 13.
I hope you have a great week.
Audrey
Today I have four new books and I do mean new. They all have a copyright date of 2019. They are all books for older students. I have found that sometimes it is a bit more difficult to find books for older students that they might like.
There is a nice variety of genres represented here. I really don’t like to assign gender to books, but these are great ‘boy’ books.
Secret Soldiers by Kelly Hutton. 2019. 306 pp.
I love the tag line on this book. “Four Boys. One Deadly Mission.” Just that line got my attention. This book is about the young British boys who served in the first World War as tunnellers underground. These underage boys wanted to fight and help the war effort and lied about their ages in order to do so. Secret Soldiers follows the story of Thomas, a thirteen-year-old coal miner who enlists in order to find his older brother who is missing in action. He and three other boys are assigned to help dig tunnels beneath the battlefield. The author’s note at the end tells more about the Tunnellers’ Memorial and books that she used for some of her information.
Fighting for the Forest by P. O’Connell Pearson. 2019. 171 pp.
I admit it. I am a visual learner and the covers of books attracts me first. This cover did not. But I have learned to try to look past the cover and when I saw the center medallion and saw “Civilian Conservation Corp”, I knew that this might be a keeper. This is the story of Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s Civilian Conservation Corps or CCC program. The Civilian Conservation Corps was established during the Great Depression. This government agency helped save the United States from economic collapse and environmental disaster by building parks, reclaiming forests, planting around three billion trees, and restoring millions of acres of land between 1933 and 1942.
This book is like reading a documentary. Photographs and sidebar information help us to understand the time period and what people endured during the Great Depression.
The Poison Eaters by Gail Jarrow. 2019. 134 pp.
Come on! Eating poison?! What a pull to check out a book! In looking closer, we see this is about danger and fraud in our food and drugs. Still interesting. The cover illustration is perfect to grab attention, too. A human skull and the crossbones are a fork and knife.
I was unaware that until about a hundred years ago, chemicals used in embalming corpses were routinely added to foods by unregulated and unethical companies. One example tells of borax and boric acid sprinkled on meet and broken eggs to stop bacteria growth and covered up the smell of decay. Dr. Harvey Washington Wiley campaigned to protect consumers from harmful foods and drugs. The title of the book comes from the volunteers who helped test food additives and were dubbed ‘poison eaters’. Thanks to Dr. Wiley, we have much safer foods, drugs, and cosmetics.
Disaster Strikes! By Jeffrey Kluger. 2019. 208 pp.
Another interesting tag line here. “The most dangerous space missions of all time.” Over Christmas break, my husband and I watched a 13 part documentary of the space missions. We both grew up in Florida during the beginning of the space program and my husband’s father did some work at Cape Canaveral, so it is really interesting to us.
Since the title has the word “disaster” in it, you can guess that this tells about the perils of the space race. We learn of minor problems and the tragedies of the men and women who have participated in the space program from the author of Apollo 13.
I hope you have a great week.
Audrey
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