My First Day

Steve Jenkins and Robin Page have combined to write and illustrate over 15 books, all of them informational.  Sometimes good informational books for reading aloud are hard to find but not when it comes to this amazing duo.  Jenkins is definitely one of my favorite informational authors.

One of his newer books, published in 2013, is called My First Day. In this book Jenkins tells the story of the first day for over 20 different animals.  Some of the animals you have probably heard of before like the manatee and the giraffe, but other animals are more obscure like the sifaka and the megapodes. The entire book is written in first person, so each animal tells the reader what they did on their first day.

Jenkins has a gift of giving a lot of information in only a few sentences.  For example.  In two sentences we learn that it is very cold when a baby penguin is born and that a baby penguin snuggles into his dad's feathers to stay warm.  A muntjac has to stay by itself, blending in with the shadows, while mom goes and looks for food.  If you want even more information about a specific animal you can turn to the back of the book where Jenkins has included information about where the animal lives, what they eat and other fun facts!

Children will love this book not just for the interesting facts, but for the pictures and all the baby animals!  It is definitely worth checking out, especially if you have never read a Steve Jenkins book.

Happy Reading,
Laura

Girl Power

It is always very difficult to find good quality biographies to read aloud.  Sometimes biographies tend to be long or wordy, not ideal for a read aloud.  Who Says Women Can't Be Doctors by Tanya Lee Stone, is not only a great biography to read aloud, it also encourages young girls to work hard no matter what their dream is.

In this book the author tells the story of Elizabeth Blackwell becoming the first woman doctor.  The story starts out giving a history of what the world was like in the 1830's.  It's great to start the book like this because it might be hard for girls now to understand that not too long ago women did not have many choices.  They were expected to stay home and take care of children, or perhaps become a teacher.  Then it goes on to tell about Elizabeth as a child.  From this part of the story children will be able to infer many different character traits like strong, curious, smart and determined.  Then a sick friend encourages Elizabeth to become a doctor, she wasn't sure at first but eventually decided to go for it.

When Elizabeth began applying to medical schools and she always heard back the same answer, "NO."  The author spends a few pages on the fact that Elizabeth was constantly told no, but never gave up.  What an important lesson for our children today- sometimes we have to fight hard for what we want.  Finally, Geneva Medical School accepted Elizabeth, but that didn't mean the job got any easier.

Elizabeth was teased, ignored and disliked by other students and people in the town, but that did not stop her from working hard and studying.  She graduated from medical school with the highest grade in the entire class and the first woman doctor in American, inspiring many others.

We need to make sure to make time to read about amazing women and their resiliency to achieve greatness so that our young girls know they can also achieve greatness!  This book is great from grades 4 and up.  The back of the book also gives more information about Elizabeth Blackwell after she graduated from school.

If your girls like learning about Elizabeth Blackwell check out Clara Barton and Florence Nightingale also!

Happy Reading!
Laura

Patterns

As a teacher, math was always the subject that I struggled with connecting to literacy.  I could never find great books about the topic.  I usually just ended up making up my own stories (which my students loved).  However, there are a few math concepts that have some really great read alouds and one of those concepts is patterns.

Trudy Harris and Anne Canevari Green have collaborated to create two really great books to help teach the idea of patterns in Pattern Fish and Pattern Bugs.  Even though patterns are nowhere to be found in the common core for primary grades, basic patterns are essential for understanding higher math problems- because as these books will show you patterns are everywhere!

The books are both very similar except for one uses bugs and the other uses fish.  Harris, who is a teacher and wrote these books for her class, writes a cute rhyme that has a pattern like, "Up-down-around-around, up-down-around-around.  A silky silver moth takes flight near the lamppost, late at night.  Up-down-around-around, up-down-around-around, up-down-around..." Then the pattern will stop and you have to turn the page to find out what comes next in the pattern.  It is also neat because the illustrations have patterns everywhere.  There might be a color pattern, a shape pattern or an up down pattern.  It is fun to look at the illustrations with your class to see what patterns they can find.

These books have endless ideas for activities from creating your own pattern bug or fish to adding numbers to the patterns to see how patterns look using numbers.

Happy Reading!
Laura

Why?

Do you have a curious little one that loves to ask why?  Why do birds tweet?  Why do squirrels have busy tales?  Why? Why? Why? Well if you do I have the perfect book for you! Why? by Lila Prap takes all those questions kids asks you all day long and answers them in a funny yet informative way.

Take, for example, the question, "Why do rhinos have horns on their noses?"  Well, I don't know about you but I am not really sure why rhino's have horns and if my child answered this I would stumble to find a suitable answer probably making something up that sounds about right.  Well in Prap's book she gives all those silly answers that a parent would make up on the spot like- "They wouldn't grow anywhere else."  But she also gives the real answer in a short, one paragraph explanation.  FYI- rhinos use their horns for protection and fighting.

If you have a young one who is really curious try making a why book with them.  Together you can record the questions that they come up with then pick a few and research the answers.  Parents can scribe the text and children can work on the illustrations.  A perfect snow day project when someone has a bad case of the why's!

Happy Reading!
Laura

50 Years Ago...

I am sure that if you have turned on the news today, or really anytime this week, you know that it was 50 years ago today that John F. Kennedy Jr. was assassinated.  I think that often when we talk to children about different presidents we focus a lot on Washington, Lincoln and our current president Obama. Today would be a great day to take time to focus on Kennedy and read aloud to your children about his inspirational life.

Doreen Rappaport has a knack for elegantly writing biographies.  She writes them in a way that keep children enthralled as well as teach them a thing or two about the topic.  In her book Jack's Path of Courage: The Life of John F. Kennedy, she intertwines her rhythmic text with quotes of his to paint a great picture of the type of man Kennedy was.

Children will get a good idea of his entire life because the book starts in his teenage years and continues on through his presidency.  They will get a good picture of his personality and charm that so many American's appreciated and adored.  As a bonus they will know more about him than the fact that he was assassinated and is known for saying, "Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country."

Here is the book trailer, check it out today!

Happy Reading!
Laura

What Do You Do With a Tail Like This?

Back for round 2 of Informational Fridays.  This week I want to dispel the myth that all informational books are wordy, technical and difficult to read aloud.  Steve Jenkins is a very popular author of children's informational books.  His book What Do You Do With a Tail Like This? is a great example of informational books that can be used for primary children.

This book has a question and answer format.  On the first two page spread a question is posed and on the next two page spread the question is answered.  For example, on the page, "What do you do with a nose like this?" there are pictures of 5 different animal noses.  It is fun for kids to try to guess which animal the different noses belong to.  When you turn the page it shows each of the 5 animals in full with a fact about how that animal uses its nose, "If you're a hyena you find your next meal with your nose."

The book is perfect for younger children because of the short facts and their ability to interact with the text by guessing what animals the author might be getting ready to teach you about.  It also gives children many opportunities to connect with the book by sharing their own knowledge of any of the over 30 animals that are represented.  As an added bonus, if the child or class you are reading to has a particular interest in one of the animals you can turn to the back of the book to find out more information.

So I will leave you with one question for the weekend.

What do you do with a tooth like this?

Happy Reading!
Laura

Informational Fridays!

I started to realize that I have not posted any informational books (informational books are what we used to call "non-fiction").  I hate that I have totally ignored this genre for reading aloud because it is often the favorite of many children.

One reason we tend to not read aloud informational books is because they can be wordy and technical. It can also be very hard to find a "good" informational book to share with a child or children.  Before I share with you my informational pick of the week I want to offer you some tips for reading aloud informational books.

1) Pick a topic that interests the child.  Think animals, biographies, places or even how-to books.

2) Preview the text.  Before you sit down to read the book to a child or an entire class look at the book.
If it is wordy and technical pick out a few pages that are the most interesting and then leave the book setting out for the child to pick up and look through on their own.

3) Read only a section at a time. There is no hard and fast rule that when you read a book aloud you need to read the entire book.  Begin reading the informational book and when you can tell that interest is lost put it down only to pick it up and resume reading later.

4) Read the text features.  Informational books are known for their great pictures and text features (maps, diagrams, labels, charts etc.) If there are too many words on a page simply read and talk about the text features.  Sometimes that is the part that is the most interesting anyway!

So, now onto my recommendation.  This week I chose a book by Gail Gibbons.  She is a very popular informational text author and has written over 100 book on a variety of topics.  The one I am sharing with you today is Alligators and Crocodiles.  

I chose (actually my son chose) this book because right now alligators are an obsession in our house.  When we arrived at the library he immediately wanted a book about alligators so after setting out a few choices this is the one he decided to bring home. 

At first I was worried because I thought that this book might be a little too much for him but it has the perfect combination of words and pictures to keep him interested and learning about alligators.  Of course since he is only one and a half he mostly likes looking at the pictures but there are some interesting facts in there for me!

The book covers everything from habitats, diets, body features, babies and even threats to the alligators and crocodiles.  Gail Gibbons uses a lot of labels on her pictures to give even more information about the animals.  It is a lengthy book (32 pages) so we have read it in several different sittings but if you were using it in a classroom you could definitely pick out the relevant pages to read aloud.  

So make sure to add some informational books to your daily read alouds!  I am sure your audience will love them!

What are some of your favorite informational books to read to children?

Happy Reading!

Laura