Common Core Connections

Over the last year, the schools I’ve been visiting have been a-buzz over Common Core. Like other INK authors, I have had many educators exclaim “What you do fits in perfectly with common core!’  Frankly, at first, I had no idea what they meant other than perhaps what I’ve been doing for years, apparently, is suddenly in vogue and has new buzz words for it. 

But the more I’ve learned about it, the better it sounds. We as a country definitely need to “up our game” in teaching and comprehension of these fields. My math teacher friends are generally pumped about the common core standards for math. 

A great librarian, armed with his/her resources, is the heart of inquiry in a school. Information and resources come and go from that library and feed into all subject areas.  The idea of “library circulation” goes far beyond books. It has to do with feeding inquiry and information, books, whatever it is, coming and going from the library. So, here we are diving into Common Core, when many schools have laid off the very experts in this kind of inquiry: highly trained librarians. I think folks don’t really understand what today’s librarians do. So, I interviewed one about what she does. (By the way, she has freed herself to do this by coordinating an army of parent volunteers who do all the checking in and out of books and such...all those things one thinks a librarian does.) 

Where else have I seen Common Core, librarians, books, and nonfiction authors working in harmony? One surprising place was in my work last year with Authors For Earth Day, a program founded by Brooke Bessesen. Authors volunteer to donate a portion of their school visit fee to an environmental cause the students choose by vote. 

http://www.authorsforearthday.org/april-sayre.html 

The librarians at schools I was visiting during Earth Week jumped on the idea, practically wrestled for the right to do it. And it wasn’t just for the feel good aspect of helping the environment. They immediately knew this was a Common Core bonanza which tied right in to nonfiction research and persuasive writing.   Here’s Hella Rumschlag, the librarian who booked me for the visit.

In advance of the visit, I chose five organizations for them to consider:  American Bird Conservancy, the Elephant Listening Project, the Nature Conservancy, the Pollinator Partnership, and the Rain Forest Conservation Fund. These are favorite organizations of mine and relate to my books such as The Bumblebee Queen and Secrets of Sound: Studying the Calls of Whales, Elephants, and Birds. I tried to choose organizations that would give kids a sense of the wide variety of environmental issues and approaches to solving them. Initially, I had chosen a sea turtle organization among the candidates, but the librarian informed me that the turtle is their school mascot so it would have an unfair advantage in swaying the students.

The 5th grade students researched the five organizations. Because Common Core emphasizes evaluating text, especially with regards to who authored it, the fifth graders could really look at the news about these organizations with a critical eye. They wrote persuasive essays on behalf of whichever organization they had. Some students appeared on the schoolwide television broadcast to advocate for their cause. Students in all grades voted on Google docs in order to avoid any paper waste associated with the project. 

When I arrived, the students were excited about the vote that day. When the winner, Rain Forest Conservation Fund, was announced, the surge of joy from the students was so tremendous, tears rushed to my eyes. It was clear that the students felt a sense of ownership; they had done something great for the planet. 

I gave my donation to Rainforest Conservation Fund and told them how it had been generated. They wrote an incredible thank you letter to the school. The letter added an additional layer of education to the project because it delineated, in detail, where the money went and taught about some fascinating new approaches to grassroots conservation in South America and Africa. The kids were read the letter on their morning school television show.

Next, the event was shared districtwide in an education newsletter.  The librarian was thrilled with the results of the program. The kids were so invested in their research, analysis of texts, and their persuasive writing because, as the librarian says, it had “real world consequences.” As for me, I felt like my donation from my school visit fee had been multiplied manyfold in its positive impact on the earth and education. 

How else have I seen creative educators extend nonfiction to fit the needs of science standards and common core? Actually, many of the activities educators have done with my books over the years would fit perfectly with Common Core. It’s a new framework but this kind of text study and math analysis has been done by dedicated teachers and librarians for years. Over a hundred of those earlier activities are on my website, www.aprilsayre.com. Below are some links to common core standards and lessons that have come up in the last year. (Folks just send me links related to my books but I’m sure many nonfiction authors have terrific lesson plans and activities that educators have shared with them about their books, as well. Feel free to add some links in the comments section if you have some in mind.) 

A science unit lesson with common core aspects from AAAS, the same folks who give those wonderful awards for best science books of the year:
http://sciencenetlinks.com/lessons/april-pulley-sayre/

An article in School Library Journal about Nonfiction as Mentor Texts (It includes my whale book, Here Come the Humpbacks.) 

http://www.slj.com/2013/05/standards/curriculum-connections/nonfiction-as-mentor-text-style-on-common-core/

One of my most widely used books worldwide is One Is a Snail, Ten Is a Crab.  It’s easily extended to fulfill common core math standards at many levels.  Here are some related resources for that:

Initial list of Common Core Standards for One Is a Snail, Ten Is a Crab.

Lesson Plan for One Is a Snail, Ten Is a Crab

Other activities related to One Is a Snail, Ten Is a Crab

One Is a Snail Worksheets

As you can see, Common Core is a natural for librarians, teachers, and nonfiction authors who have been involved in inquiry for years. I say, let's embrace it and expand on it. The ideas seem solid and the thinking aspects of these standards are deeper than most previous mandated curricula. The bureaucratic aspects of how it is implemented are the sticky points and those will be fought in districts all over the country. Most of all, we just need to give our teachers more respect and better tools. And bring back librarians—the champions of deep inquiry!

Pleasures of a Wild Child

I wasn't a "normal" girl.  I loved frogs instead of dolls and golden-colored butterflies instead of pink ruffles.  As a matter of fact, I actively disliked dolls and abhorred anything in pink--for me, pink meant prissy, and that was the farthest thing from what I was.  I spent my summer days zipping around on my bike looking for adventure or trying to keep up with my older brother and the other boys and stuck my nose up at the neighbor girls carefully rolling a baby carriage down the sidewalk with their dollies inside.

But a kid can't be outside every day in Minnesota, where I lived until the age of 9--it's often too cold or too wet or too snowy--so books had a big role in my life.  I wasn't interested in made-up stories, unless they were about a horse, a dog, or a wolf and sounded "real."  For me, books meant a way to find out about the amazing world of nature.  After all, I wasn't in a position to head off to what is now called the rain forest but then was the "jungle," a much more evocative term, to pursue 25-foot long anacondas or bizarre frogs that carry their eggs on their backs, but I could read about them, thanks to great adventurers like Roy Chapman Andrews.

Perhaps my very most favorite and inspiring book was "Nature's Ways: How Nature Takes Care of its Own," by Roy Chapman Andrews himself.  Andrews was a well-known public figure at the time who travelled all over the world but was especially famous for his dinosaur discoveries in Mongolia and the Gobi Desert.  "Nature's Ways," however, was quite a different sort of book.

In a way, it was very modern in format, with each spread featuring an amazing example of how nature works, accompanied by lovely color art.  Unfortunately, my childhood books got lost along the many moves of myself and my parents, but I remember some of the most amazing stories in that book.  For example, Andrews described the archer fish (on the cover of the book), a creature with two parts to its eyes, a lower section adapted to seeing underwater, and an upper section that could see above water.  These fish lurk at the surface.  When an archer fish spots an insect close by, it shoots a blast of water right at it that wets the prey, causing it to fall into the water.  Gulp and it's gone!  What a great story!  Then there's the yucca moth and the yucca plant, perfectly adapted to one another.  The adult moth drinks nectar from the yucca blossoms, helping to pollinate them.  It then lays its eggs on the plant, and the caterpillars feed on the yucca.  What a beautiful synergy.

My love of such stories from nature has helped me in my writing as an adult.  I'm always on the lookout for the special "gee whiz" elements of a topic, knowing that there will always be kids like me out there, who can be blown away by nature's  adaptations.  Nature's wonders are all around us, not only in far away places, and when children can learn about the amazing life that surrounds them every day, they can be engaged in their own lives and will be motivated to read and to have fun learning.

Opening Worlds: Scientific, Religious, Secular

I write children's books because I truly believe that a book can change a child's life. I know, because it happened to me. Twice.  At least. 

I've written about the first time on I.N.K. before. If you go here, you can see that whole post. It's called Why We Write for Kids.  But here's the relevant part:

I remember the day I first discovered I could learn from books. And that changed my life.

For some reason in my school, Muhlenberg Elementary, in Allentown, PA, we weren’t allowed to check out books from the library until first grade. Maybe that was a good idea--we had to wait a whole year, and the anticipation was intoxicating. Then one day, we walked into the library—I can still see the beautiful wooden shelves, smell that old-book, old-paper, new-book, new-paper library smell. (I was back there for a school visit a few years ago and the library smells the same!) For some reason, maybe it was because it was straight ahead, I walked over to the non-fiction section and I pulled this book off the shelf.

And on that day, when I was six, as my mother read What is a Butterfly to me on my bed (I honestly remember this moment--my back was up against the wall, my legs too short to reach the other side of the bed), I discovered that a book could teach me things, a book could help me understand how the world works, a book could make me smart. It was my own personal (excuse me) metamorphosis. I returned What is a Butterfly and came back home with What is a Frog? then What is a Tree? and there was a whole series! 

That book, and series, opened up the world for me. And years later I would write a book called From Caterpillar to Butterfly, in the months just after my mother died. That book is part of a wonderful series called Let's Read and Find Out Science. From Tadpole to Frog by Wendy Pfeffer is one of my favorites. I would recommend it and that whole series for books that can change a kid's life, and open up worlds!  

The second time a book changed my life was in college. But I'm going to talk about it because I was still a kid. I was under 20. And in a very significant way it continued what What is a Butterfly started. It opened up whole new worlds to me. 

Here's the book, posing on my desk just minutes before I starting writing this post: 

Peyote Hunt? Yes. Let me explain. In doing so I'm going to be completely honest, and I hope I will not offend anyone. I grew up Jewish. Although we were Reform Jews,  we were what I would call observant Reform Jews. Sabbath dinner every Friday night, services most Friday nights, etc. I had many non-Jewish friends, but I was ensconced in the Jewish world. And I believed it was THE world. The RIGHT way to live and be. I felt kind of sorry for people who weren't Jewish. Take out the "kind of." I felt sorry for them. I knew we were right. It's not that I tried to convert anyone (oh, no, Jews don't do that! We're right about that, too!), but I just felt like our way was THE way. 

Then I read this book by anthropologist Barbara Meyerhoff. And it was as if not a light bulb, but an entire stadium full of lights lit up above my head. These Huichol Indians believed in their rituals and rites and peyote as much as I believed in mine. Who was to say I was right and they were wrong? Like a thunderbolt from above, I knew the answer was NOT ME. Not any more. And no, I wasn't upset. I was happy about it. Thrilled, even. 

I realized then, at the ripe age of 19, that there was a whole world out there to discover--worlds not only of science and nature, as those early books had taught me, but also worlds of religions and beliefs. And non-beliefs. I majored in religious studies. 

To this day I am fascinated by other people's beliefs, and foreign worlds, both religious and secular. (I'm fascinated by plumbers, for example. And mathematicians.) I love peeking into other people's lives. And I especially love celebrating the diversity on our planet.  Reading Peyote Hunt made this happen. 

This led, eventually, to writing books about religion, and religious beliefs.  I wrote ten books in a series for National Geographic (Holidays Around the World), and after that about a marriage between two people of different beliefs: Charles and Emma: The Darwins' Leap of Faith.  

You never know which books might open up worlds for a child. That's why it's so important to keep all of our libraries open, and to keep all books on the shelves.  Open libraries lead to open minds. 

The Power of Non-Fiction

Alex Grant, the young man pictured here, is the subject of this post. Before I get to him, I wish to make an announcement that is tangentially, but delightfully, related.

The power of non-fiction, and the myriad ways that educators, authors and other creative people can harness it, will be the subject of The 21^st Century Children’s Nonfiction Conference, to be held on June 14-16 at SUNY New Paltz, about 80 miles north of New York City. Among many stellar speakers are INK’s own Vicki Cobb and Melissa Stewart, along with Kent Brown of the Highlights Foundation, Robin Terry of National Geographic Children’s Publishing and other luminaries. The conference includes 23 workshops, three intensives, two panels, six meals and unlimited networking opportunities. Details at http://www.childrensNFconference.com; further information from organizer Sally Isaacs, sisaacs@starconsultinginc.com. 

Now about Alex. We met early on a chilly February morning on a footbridge in the Boyce Thompson Arboretum, 60 mile east of Phoenix. We were among a dozen or so birding enthusiasts who had gathered for the weekly guided bird walk sponsored by the Arboretum. Alex and I discussed two related birds, initially indistinguishable to my eyes. Both were wrens, small songbirds with barred tails and thin bills. Binoculars lifted, Alex pointed out the differences: the canyon wren had more distinct coloration  —  reddish brown wings and back, and a bright white throat, compared with the paler, grayish brown rock wren whose throat lacked the lustrous white. Alex spoke eagerly, with the facts at his command and a confidence that belied his age: 15. Very soon he might be leading walks like this, as his reputation had reached the Arboretum and a ranger had invited him to become a volunteer bird guide — the Arboretum's youngest by far. He and his parents had come on this walk while he considered the offer. 

Rock Wren

Canyon Wren

Later, as the sun finally warmed the air enough for us to shed an outer layer or two, I asked Alex’s mother, Sonja Grant, about her son’s zeal for birds. It had begun during the summer between first and second grade. The catalyst was a book called Birds of the World. Alex had checked it out of the library and it had changed his life. True, he had already shown a keen interest in nature, and he'd owned books about birds as well as sharks, insects and other taxa. He’d read some of them so many times that their pages had fallen out. But with its dazzling photos and engaging text, Birds of the World had taken Alex to a new level of interest that he calls “a deep passion.” Before long, the passion spread to both of his parents, and the family had a new hobby. School vacations became extended birding outings in Arizona, California, Texas and Maine, the trips oriented around an important statistic—the number of species seen between Jan. 1 and Dec. 31 of the year. That number had reached 306 in 2012. Birders refer to a year in which they keep count as "a big year"; the Grants decided to do another big year in 2013, and by mid-May their list was up to 263 species.

Finishing his freshman year at Gilbert High School in Gilbert, AZ, Alex is homing in on a college education and career in ornithology. And it all started with a non-fiction book.

I am reminded of a quote I once saw from a Jo Carr (if you know who she is, please let me know): “You can almost divide non-fiction into two categories: non-fiction that stuffs in facts, as if children were vases to be filled, and non-fiction that ignites the imagination, as if children were indeed fires to be lit.” I don’t know anything about the book that turned Alex into a bird lover (a fair number of books bear the title Birds of the World). It may even fall in the “stuffs in fact” genus in Jo Carr’s taxonomy but clearly it ignited Alex Grant’s imagination and illuminated the apparent direction of his life. 

Many modalities of non-fiction (in the form of books and other media) will be explored at the New Paltz conference. Perhaps the one you teach or create will ignite a child’s life, or your own.

Saguaro by the Numbers. Maybe

I’m going to install a little window in my mind so you can see how it works. At least how it is working at this moment. It may not work in quite the same way at any future time. Here’s my promise: other than having decided on the overall idea, I have not planned the specifics of what I’m about to write. Instead, I will record my thought processes (if there are any) as they occur, to see if something interesting, useful or otherwise worthwhile happens. And if not, you’ll get to see that, too. Ready?

Here’s the context. It happened earlier this month. I was in Phoenix for school visits, and I had a free afternoon so I went to the Desert Botanical Garden. Great place! I was looking at an exhibit on saguaro cacti, the Sonoran Desert’s quintessential plant. A mental image of this charismatic cactus with upcurving arms may be the first association many people have with the word "desert," although saguaros grow only in this relatively small desert of southern Arizona, northwestern Mexico and a sliver of southesastern California. I knew these are very cool plants from a very hot place, but of course I was eager to know more.

So I read the interpretive signs and I was bowled over… with numbers. That is to say, numerical facts about saguaros. Being a numbers guy and a math author, the hairs on the back of my neck stuck up like cactus thorns. Here are a few of those numbers:

 — a single saguaro plant releases up to 40 million seeds in its lifetime

 — saguraros grow incredibly slowly: about ½ inch in the first year and one foot in the first 15 years. Then they start cruising: in 40 or 50 years, they may reach ten feet and it is not until they are 50-100 years old that they begin to sprout arm buds. Some live up to 300. Their maximum height is 40-60 feet. When a cactus poacher (oh yes, they do exist) digs up a six-foot saguaro to plant in front of his house, a replacement in the wild will take about 30 years reach the size of the poached plant (which will probably die).

 — one mature saguaro can store 1,500 gallons of water (that’s 6 tons) in its spongy pulp  — enough to last several months. It can lose 2/3 of its stored water and survive.

There were many other numbers but that’s enough for now.

So here’s what happened. I thought to myself, “Hey, how about a book about saguaros and their numbers?” Saguro Numbers or Saguaros by the Numbers or Number the Saguaros or something like that. Or maybe not like that. But let’s not get hung up on the title. The thought did not evade me that if I could pull it off, sequel possibilities would be countless:  Elephants by the Numbers, Great White Sharks, Dinosaurs ... even Oceans, Earth, The Solar System, etc.

So what about it? Having an idea for a book (or a series) is the easy part. Figuring out a way to execute the idea is another matter. It’s kind of like the business plan for a book. Without it, all you've got is something to talk about at cocktail parties. With it, you're in business. Maybe. So what should I do with this inchoate idea of saguaros and numbers? Let’s see…

First thought out of the gate: like Harper’s Index. You know, “Rank of Portland, Oregon, of all cities in per capita consumption of Grape-Nuts: 1” or “Number of incidents worldwide last Christmas (2005) of ‘Santanarchy,’ which involves roving mobs of unruly Santas: 29”

So, instead we could have, “Number of seeds a saguaro cactus produces in its lifetime: 40,000,000.”

OK. Possible. But a bit dry, and it seems a bit too much like, well, Harper’s Index. A derivative work. Heaven forbid. And it might get tedious. But with additional text to explain and fill out the saguaro's story, it could work. 

So, maybe this instead: I’ll build the book around a number line. One gargantuan number line could extend across all the pages. Number lines are an important way for children to understand number concepts, and along the number line I could mark numbers of importance in understanding saguaros. At the number 10, there could be an arrow or an indicator that you can follow to an explanation that in 10 years, if all goes well, the saguaro will reach a height of one foot. (I suppose I could just as well put the marker at the number 1 and say that one foot is the height of the saguaro after ten years.) At 1,500, you’d have the number of gallons of water a plant can store. (Or it could be 6 for 6 tons.) And at 40,000,000 the number of seeds produced in a lifetime. Of course there would be many opportunities to add supplemental information to fill out the picture. (Let me not discuss right now the question of whether to use metric units of American units or both. We'll save that for another day. We're just brainstormin' here.)

OK, but a few problems with my number line idea come to mind. For one, how can I set up a number line on a scale that shows 1 and 6 as well as 1,500 and 40,000,000 and plenty of points in between? I guess there are ways. I could leave out sections (showing jagged lines to indicate discontinuities). Yeah, that’s possible. Or how about this: multiple number lines on different scales. One for growth. That would work. Another for production of things like seeds. Forty million. But what else could go on that number line? Maybe nothing else. Does it make sense to create a number line with only one point on it? Maybe not.

But wait a minute, suppose I created a bunch of number lines, on different scales, and I showed not only the saguaro-relevant numbers (example: 1,500 gallons of water stored) but other values that could put it into perspective, such as how much water is found in a large watermelon, in the body of a human, in an Olympic-size swimming pool. 

That could work. But let’s think about it. Do I really want a book of number lines to tell the story of a saguaro cactus? Maybe. Maybe not.

How about a book of math problems related to saguaros? "It has rained for 30 hours in the Sonoran Desert. A 40-foot saguaro's roots spread 40 feet in all directions, and in the area above the roots, 100 gallons of water fall each hour. The saguaro can absorb half of that water. How much water can this giant cactus absorbed?” (Do you need the Teachers Edition? The answer is 1,500 gallons.) Then some narrative can explain that these plants really do this, how amazing they are, etc., etc. Nah, too much like a math textbook.

OK, how about a book with chapters that are numbered in an odd way. Instead of Chapters 1, 2, 3, etc., we can number the chapters according to the number being discussed. So it could start with Chapter 1 in which we feature the number 1. All the things about saguaros that come in ones. Or just one thing: in one year it grows half an inch. But then we might skip to chapter 10. That's how many years it takes for the saguaro to grow to a height of one foot. And I would talk about water absorption in Chapter 1,500.  Chapter 40,000,000 is for the seeds. (Hey, I could start with Chapter ½ because it grows half an inch in the first year.)

Hmmm. Not bad. Original (I think). Maybe I could pull it off. Maybe not. That’s all I’m coming up with right now: lots of maybes and maybe nots. 

And maybe, since the great horned owl of my bird clock just hooted (as the clock’s little hand reached the number 12), I’ll sleep on it. Tomorrow is another day for a few more maybes. And then maybe I’ll start writing to see which of these maybes I like best. Or maybe I’ll think of a better one. (In the meantime, feel free to vote for your favorite or suggest your own maybe.)

Exuberant Days

Sometimes life is so beautiful it’s almost hard to live it. At times, the work, too. In Spring, there are days when I actually live the life that people imagine children’s book authors do every day of the year. 

Yesterday, I had a big plan for serious checking things off my list. (Respond to book proposal from editor who wants me to write to go with a photographer’s photographs, write endmatter on current nutty main project, update website, respond to someone about changing a talk description, sort three weeks of photographs from marshes in Ohio, file bills, make travel decisions, book necessary travel, set up house repairs, etc.) 

Chickadees interrupted me with flurry, alarm calls, and general fuss, and before I knew it, I was out in the yard with my camera.  What could I do but witness and somewhat photograph what was going on? 

Chickadees cleaning out the next box. 

Chickadees leaving the nest box for the first time...and predators threatening the chicks. 

Three species of woodpeckers feeding babies high up on the oak trees. 

Squirrels being squirrels. (Three species of those, too.)

An indigo bunting popping in and out of the scene.

I did eventually manage to get back to my computer to announce the release of my new book Go, Go, Grapes: a Fruit Chant. Then I got to work on my current work, the sequel, Let’s Go Nuts: Seeds We Eat. 

I needed to chase down some coconuts for the next photo. So in the mid-afternoon lull of bird activity I traveled the world in our small town. I spent time talking to Saigon market grocers about how soy beans are used in Asian cuisine, and the many forms of mung beans, shelled and otherwise.  Gave them my fruit chant book, in which their durian fruit, dragonfruit, and mangosteen star.  

Stopped by the farmer’s market to coordinate Go, Go, Grapes signing.

At El Paraiso, a wonderful Mexican market, I found (finally) some young coconuts and some purple varieties of corn for an upcoming photograph. I also got permission to photograph beans in their store.

Then, all afternoon, I photographed and fussed over various beans and seeds. Perhaps the neighbors thought I was slightly nuts, walking around the yard photographing trays of nuts in various colors of full and dappled light with an assortment of flashes. I was also picking off cottonwood fluff falling from the trees, brushing aside errant ants, and waving away a few flies that kept hopping into the picture. Nothing worse than taking the perfect picture and then finding out when you see it on large screen that the star player is an ant you did not know was there.

At one point I was sitting in the grass test photographing a tray when six feet from me, in the now empty chickadee house, a bird emerged. A wren was already stuffing the house with sticks and emptying the earlier tenants’ contents from inside!

Spring is like that. It’s at times almost too exuberant to manage. I know my friends, celebrating childrens’ proms and graduations from high school and college, feel that way. Here, in the world of nature and writing, there’s that wild sweetness, too. 

For me, enjoying this peak time, this immersion, came with some work. I could not have done it six weeks ago. After two years of glorious but goofy overwork, some of the most challenging, stretching, and joyful of my life, I could not breathe properly or even speak about writing. I still had school visits but I cut back my writing schedule and expectations for a few weeks. I had to literally not get excited about new projects. In other years my school visit/deadline schedule has been so heavy that I have been fried by the time that the bird migration began and unable to actually settle in and enjoy it. 

Animal migration has been my main study subject for the last twenty years although I haven’t published extensively about it. (Once had an eight book series contract on it; editors were laid off in a reorganization.) We plan all our travel around migratory events. Jeff and I love migration so much that bird migration time is blocked off on our calendar. This is sacrosanct nature vacation time. Over the years I’ve gotten better and better at saying “no” to deadlines and talks during these weeks. Because a birder has only so many wildflower blooms and migrations to see in her lifetime. 

This year my only transgression was to pop into Chicago for IRA for two days. Mistake. I was in the halls at IRA in Chicago and Jeff called me to tell me the winds and storms were in the right spots for a possible fallout of birds. A deep feeling came over me: THIS IS NOT WHERE I NEED TO BE. As I hailed a taxi, dashed back to my lodgings for my suitcase, and caught a train home, I made the necessary calls to cancel dinner and meeting plans. 

Such a surge of choice and freedom. This was what I needed to do. Had to do. A day later, we were watching warblers and photographing them. Step-by-step, my brain began to settle and joys and new ideas began to arise. With lots of warblers and walks, my peace and balance returned.  Now nature time and projects are particularly sweet because I can deeply experience them, not just flutter about in over-revved spaz.

In between writing some of these sentences, I have paused to photograph an oriole at the oranges we put out for it, woodpeckers feeding again, and a butterfly up on the lilac. I just saw and photographed a flicker feeding in an anthill. In between, I am trying not to allow the sun onto the light focusing lens  I have attached to my camera flash because it can catch things on fire. A chipmunk is now under my chair. That’s Spring. Here comes a downy! Chattering and chirping. 

This time of year, I keep thinking of things I want to share/post but then, the Spring is so packed full with life and lovely interruptions that most days, I do not post a thing. I wish I could bottle this time, keep it potent and powerful, for  darker seasons of life and year. Oh, twell! I have the photographs to help me remember. 

The Math Behind Poetry

Consider a series of names. 

Of fruit. 

And the few words that rhyme with those fruit. 

Or rhyme with some kind of descriptive about fruit.

Now consider which fruit names bounce and bump against each other in a tongue-pleasing way. 

Next consider which fruit are in season. In. The. Same. Month.

And can be sourced by someone in a town with no Whole Foods.

Consider which fruit happen to be in season and available in the many weeks a certain person struggling with permutations is off speaking at ALA, a conference, or photographing whales in Canada. (Totally worth it for the whales!)

Now, try to take the picture in between the moments when other people are buying fruit for the shocking purpose of actually eating it. Do not interrupt the commerce of the kind fruit and vegetable vendors who put up with your crazy ways even back during the Rah, Rah, Radishes adventure. 

If you’ve had to buy an entire case of cactus, calling all over town, or found longyans in Ohio, or lychee in Chicago, in Chinatown, make sure the photo is good. Because you might not get that chance again. 

Make sure that the fruit all looks fresh.

If it is a slice of watermelon, dab it often because it will soon begin to sweat and melt like a beauty pageant contestant under hot lights. 

Oh, sweet little fruities. 

Now, retake some of the photos because you and the editor have suddenly decided to shift a word, which has knocked out another stanza, which has caused a cascade of unforeseen PERMUTATIONS. 

Permutations = a poet’s daily life.  Because April is poetry month and I'm in the blog therapy over whether or not I might actually be a poet (see Katie Davis's blog tomorrow, April 27th.) it seems a good time to understand choice and variability and order. Poetry is math. Poetry is permutations. 

For some of the permutations, I have stories of misadventures and photos. For instance, we did not call the book Paw Paw Pomegranate, as my husband suggested, because of the photo below. I had to do a conference and when I returned all the wild Paw Paw gatherers in Michigan could only find this...um...sad looking, though surely delicious example of the fruit. 

Paw paw not looking like a cover fruit. Sorry!

The best part of the book was that it gave me to poke into places I’ve never been. I was a culinary tourist in my own town, and every other town I visited last year. While in New Orleans for ALA I heard of a far off market, the Vietnamese market, and got a taxi to take me there. Loree Griffin Burns, a nonfiction author adventurer I’d just met, came along for moral support. Oh, how exotic we were...to find such a place tucked away where no one would know it existed. (It is awesome. The seeds of many of the fruits and veggies were originally brought to Louisiana by Vietnamese refugees in the 1970s and now a huge urban farm has been created to sell the vegetables to major New Orleans restaurants. Yes, I am pondering doing a book just about that.)

When we showed up to our secret spot after the $50 taxi ride with a doubtful driver, we found an entire television crew was set up and rolling to shoot a segment for Travel Channel “Bizarre Foods” episode with Andrew Zimmern. Scoop! While we watched, he tasted breadfruit. While rolling, he reached behind the camera and handed me a slice of breadfruit to taste. Here I was preparing to be the photographer but I ended up having to sign a photo waiver for his crew. Ooh, turnabout! No, I did not make the show. But you can see the priest and breadfruit tasting scene in one of his New Orleans shows.  None of my many photos from there made the book. But it was fun.

How New Orleans Vietnamese Market looks
 before you wipe your glasses (and camera)

Camera now wiped after emerging from air conditioning

Bizarre Foods crew got there first. Scoop!

Andrew Zimmern of Bizarre Foods tasting breadfruit

whole breadfruit

The bonus of this crazy exercise in permutations? There’s a lot of leftover material. Oh, sad and soggy stanzas. Oh the fruit parties I had to throw with all the leftovers from shoots and from buying produce from the grocers and farmers. Oh, and Go, Go, Grapes: a Fruit Chant is coming out May 22nd. Yippee!

Yeah, I was finally done with permutations. That’s what I thought on Dec 24th of last year when for the first time in two years I went to the Farmer’s Market without my camera. Ah! How relaxing just to buy vegetables. Uh oh. Saw some hickory nuts and fava beans and had an idea. An hour later, I was at it again. Soon after, it was under contract.

Permutations.  Here we go again!

Honoring Work

Nonfiction is about honoring and reflecting the truth in the world. It asks us to look with fresh eyes at what is around us, at the underpinnings of our lives whether that be in geology, geography, or history. Nonfiction is important and far reaching. Usually, I remember that. But not first thing this morning.

This morning I read an email by a fiction writer friend about an extraordinary fan letter she had received. Moved and amazed by the letter, I thought to myself: I bet those kinds of letters are elicited more often by fiction. Then I experienced the “twinge.” Yes, it was that mosquito-like, momentary, should-I-write-a-novel-instead pinch that plagues nonfiction writers.

This in my mind, I drove to the farmer’s market. A young woman at one of the farm stands stopped me. She had told me, months ago, how much she loved Rah, Rah, Radishes: a Vegetable Chant, and how special it was to her because she picks some of the vegetables that come to market.

Today she told me that her father, after heart attack and stroke, was in the hospital. He had a hard time remembering. But he enjoyed looking through Rah, Rah, Radishes, again and again. I asked if he was a farmer. No, she said, he just likes looking through the book. He doesn’t remember many things. But every time someone comes in the room, he shows them the book photos and he proudly tells them: This is what my daughter does.

I thanked her, teary-eyed, daughter-to-daughter, for sharing her story. Once again, nonfiction surprises. It seems like a good time, near Thanksgiving, to think about how words, photos, art can shine a light on unheralded essentials in our lives.

The Trips of a Lifetime

In 1999, when we were all worried that Y2K was going to wreck the world as we knew it, maybe even blow it up, my family went to the Galapagos. My husband, who had written a book called The Beak of the Finch, about scientists Rosemary and Peter Grant studying Darwin's finches in the Galapagos, was invited to go on two back-to-back one week trips (on Lindblad Expeditions) and give some talks. He was allowed to bring our family along. Our sons were then 14 and almost 11. We all went for two weeks--Christmas week into New Year's week. If the world blew up, we'd be on the equator, in the Galapagos. What a way to go.

It was a magical trip. Our older son, in true teenager style, said to his father while walking on a gorgeous beach New Year's day, 2000, "Well Dad, short of taking us to the moon, this was the most amazing thing you could have done for us."

Writers are mostly poor. I don't know if you realize that. Especially if one writer is not married to, say, an investment banker. We two independent writers brought up our sons often wondering if we were going to be able to keep the show going. Some days (what am I saying?, some months, some years), I would go to the grocery store and panic--how was I going to buy pasta, cereal, laundry detergent, and still pay the electric bill? And then came the Pulitzer Prize, with all its shine. And still not a lot of money. We worked very hard, both of us, and loved our jobs, but.... not a lot of money, not a budget for luxuries like expensive family trips. But then. The Galapagos. Every once in a while, we were thrown a plum, and that trip to the Galapagos was a whole bushel of plums every day for two weeks. That bushel of plums lasted for years afterwards--unlike real plums. Someone once said, spend your money on experiences because experiences last longer than things. Let me chime in and say: YES! Because in our case it was really true.

When Jon was asked again to go to the Galapagos and yes, he could bring the family, I didn't know how the boys--now young men--would react. Could they commit, a year in advance, to spending two weeks with their parents? Would they even want to? Jon barely got the sentence out of his mouth. They each said YES without thinking about it. The Galapagos is that amazing a place.

So we went this past summer, again for two weeks. An added bonus was that I was also asked to speak, about Charles and Emma. To tell that story while on a ship in the Galapagos was pure joy. And going back with our now-grown sons (25 and 22) was also pure joy. It was epic and monumental and perhaps the most beautiful thing in the world. For what the Galapagos is about, for me, is the essence of life. As you walk the paths of the islands, paths lovingly created, guarded, and protected by the Galapagos Park Service and the Guides, without whom you would not be able to visit, you are surrounded by nature in all its glory--and brutality, sometimes. The animals are not at all scared of humans, so you can walk right next to (and I mean RIGHT NEXT to) a Blue-footed Booby

Or a Red-Footed Booby and chick:

You have to be careful not step on an iguana

or a sea lion.

You can see, up close, from literally inches or feet away, the Waved Albatross's mating dance, a male-Frigate bird's red-sack display, a sea-lion pup nursing. You snorkel with sea lions and angel fish, sea turtles, sharks and eels and octopi, and your grown sons. Who watch out for you. Who help you scramble over boulders on land and make sure you are not far away if there is something beautiful to see in the water.

(I have no digital photos from the first trip. But younger son brought a copy of a photo taken back then of a sea lion kissing his knee. With the help of a guide, we found the exact spot where that photo was taken. Tears-mine-were shed.)

The trip was so special that when Hurricane Irene forced us to drive, the four of us, from Miami home to New York city, we didn't balk. We packed our stuff into the trunk, our long-legged sons into the back seat, and drove home. It took us two and a half days and we had. A. Great. Time. Really.

Recently there was a story in the paper, a story that my husband had researched back when the boys were 4 and 1, the first time he went to the islands (that time, not on a gorgeous ship, but on a rented fishing boat that he found out later had sunk the previous year). He did not use the research in The Beak partly because it was not yet finished and partly, I think, because it was so gory. The researcher Jon toured the Galapagos with that first time, David Anderson, has been studying Nazca Boobies

and their cycle of abuse on a beautiful island called Española. As you will see if you read about his study, abuse begets abuse in birds. Not a surprise, really. Scientists are now saying that abuse seems to beget abuse in humans as well. Also not a surprise. Happily, the converse seems also to be true. Love begets love, and good experiences lead, one hopes, to more good experiences.

Of course when we write books for children, we are hoping to do the same thing. We can't take the world's children with us to the Galapagos, or to meet an historic person, or even to personally hang out with living scientists, but we can try to bring those experiences to them through books. By writing them, and by reading them. (Read to a child today!)

I know not everyone can go to the Galapagos. I can't believe we were fortunate enough to be able to go twice (and in my husband's case, three times). But I do know that taking children on trips, and exposing them to nature--in all its beauty as well as red in tooth and claw--will give them a lifelong interest in and support of the natural world. On our trip there were grandparents taking grandchildren around the islands.

Grandchildren.

Our sons.

I'm just saying.

Photos courtesy Jonathan Weiner and Lock McKelvey.