I.N.K. book recommendations

Congratulations to our bloggers Deborah Heiligman(Charles and Emma: The Darwins' Leap of Faith) and Steve Jenkins (Down, Down, Down. A Journey to the Bottom of the Sea) for their selection as one of the eight titles chosen by the New York Times as the most Notable Children's Book of 2009!

Here are some recommendations for other excellent children's nonfiction. Tis the season to buy nonfiction!

From Marfe Ferguson Delano:

Fabulous Fishes, written and illustrated by Susan Stockdale. (2008, Peachtree Press, $15.95 hardcover) This charming picture book features simple rhyming text ("Shiny fish / spiny fish/ fish that hitch a ride") and bold, colorful pictures that introduce kids to all sorts of fishes. A spread at the back of the book gives more information about the fish included in the book.

Listen to the Wind: The Story of Dr. Greg & Three Cups of Tea, by Greg Mortenson and Susan L. Roth, illustrated by Susan L. Roth. (2009, Dial Books for Young Readers, $16.99) I enjoyed Mortenson's Three Cups of Tea, but I love the way Susan Roth retells this true story through the eyes of the Pakistani children. Her stunning paper-and-fabric collages take my breath away.

From Gretchen Woelfle:

Bad News for Outlaws: The Remarkable Life of Bass Reeves, Deputy U.S. Marshal sports the longest title and the most stunning cover I’ve seen this season. Gregory Christie’s monochromatic close-up headshot of Reeves is riveting. Christie continues with atmospheric endpapers and many full-page paintings which fit this monumental subject. Vaunda Micheaux Nelson’s colloquial text is also a perfect fit for a man who lived a most dramatic life. Slave, runaway slave, sharpshooter, and wily master of disguise, he became the first African American U.S. Deputy Marshal and served for thirty-two years. Nelson recounts several wily nonviolent captures by Reeves who brought more than 3000 outlaws, including his own son, to justice. The only quibble I have with this exciting story is the opening scene. Though Reeves killed only fourteen men out of 3000, Nelson opens with a thrilling but deadly confrontation with one of the fourteen victims. As an old peacenik, I would have preferred to see him outsmart rather than outshoot his man in the opening pages.

From Rosalyn Schanzer:

I first began my extensive collection of children’s books when I was a young illustrator and well before I began to write books on my own, so I used to select each book based solely upon the quality of the illustrations. One of my favorite early choices was the nonfiction book Ashanti to Zulu: African Traditions. This Caldecott Award Winner was first published in 1975, and the artwork looks every bit as good today as it did way back then. Written by Margaret Musgrove and stunningly illustrated by the indefatigable husband-and-wife duo, Leo and Diane Dillon, it’s a classic alphabet book that intrigues its readers by introducing them to 26 exotic African tribes. The Dillon’s elegant layouts and their gorgeous, richly colored, and well researched portrayals of the African people taught me how pivotal the illustrations in a book can be. As it turns out, the writing is charming too.

My second nonfiction choice is Tibet: Through the Red Box by Peter Sis. In this 1998 Caldecott Honor Book, Sis finds a mysterious red box, and upon opening the lid with a rusty little key, he discovers the diary his filmmaker father had written when he was lost in Tibet years before. Once again, it’s the magically symbolic artwork that draws readers into this exotic tale, sweeping readers back an forth in time on each otherworldly spread. The pictures I’ve included here are a pale shadow of the glorious ones in the book, so I invite you to have a real-world look for yourself.

From Tanya Stone: Bring Me Some Apples and I'll Make you a Pie: A Story Abut Edna Lewis by Robbin Gourley and Cycle of Rice, Cycle of Life: A Story of Sustainable Farming by Jan Reynolds. Jan's passion shines through on every page--as always.

From Susanna Reich: I'd like to recommend The Race to Save the Lord God Bird, by Phillip Hoose, a beautifully written, meticulously researched, and gripping book about the extinction of the ivory-billed woodpecker.

From Deborah Heiligman:

I would like to recommend the books of Wendy Pfeffer.Disclosure: she is a friend. We have been in a writers group together for more than a dozen years. But because we are in a group together I know how hard she works on her books, how much research she puts into making them accurate, and how much loving care and attention she puts into making the words sing. She has done many, many books. Some of my favorites are:A Log's LifeRobin Brickman (Illustrator)The Shortest Day: Celebrating the Winter SolsticeJesse Reisch (Illustrator)Wings by Wendy Pfeffer (with her husband Tom Pfeffer)

From Susan Goodman: I really like Steve Sheinkin's clear, fun, irreverent but accurate approach to history. Possible titles--King George: What Was His Problem? and Two Miserable Presidents: The Amazing, Terrible, and Totally True Story of the Civil War.

David Elliott's poetry reduces familiar animals to their essence and makes us think in On the Farm, illustrated beautifully by Holly Meade's woodcuts.

Barry Denenberg's Lincoln Shot: A President's Life Remembered--what a great idea. I wish I had it!

From Anna Lewis:

Fantastic NF books to inspire creativity this holiday season:Touch the Art: Catch Picasso's Rooster (Board book)By Julie Appel (Author), Amy Guglielmo (Author)Sterling November 2009Best book yet in the series. Includes my fav, Franz Marc!365 Things to Draw and Paint (Art Ideas)By Fiona WattUsborne Publishing Ltd October 2009.

This book would have kept me busy the entire Winter Break. Full of ideas to inspire hours of drawing fun because kids always moan, "But, I don't knowwhat to draw."What's the Big Idea?: Inventions that Changed Life on Earth ForeverMaple Tree Press November 2009Helaine Becker (Author), Steve Attoe (Illustrator)New, fun book that shows kids that their ideas can change the world.

Fun NF books to combine with building sets:LINCOLN LOGS Building Manual: Graphic Instructions for 37 World-FamousDesigns Sterling December 2007TINKERTOY Building Manual: Graphic Instructions for 37 World-Famous DesignsSterling December 2007Dylan Dawson (Author) Robert Steimle (Illustrator)

From Vicki Cobb: I've become a big fan of Nic Bishop. He is a gifted and obviously VERY PATIENT wildlife photographer who brings his considerablt gifts to dramatic and beautiful portraits of Spiders (Scholastic, 2007) and Marsupials (Scholastic, 2009). Speaking of animal books, I was also very impressed with Face to Face with Penguins by Yva Momatiuk and John Eastcott (National Geographic 2009). Again, the beautiful photographs can't help but make you fall in love with these amazing creatures and worry about their surviving a future of global warming. That message will not be lost on its readers.

From David Schwartz: The Librarian Who Measured the Earth by Kathryn Lasky, ill. by Kevin HawkesWho would think that the deeply mathematical tale of Eratosthenes could be so captivating and charming, even for math phobes? And while we’re at it, we learn about schools and libraries in Ancient Greece. Splendid!

A Million Dots by Andrew Clements, ill. by Mike ReedThe idea of seeing a million of something fascinates many children (and this reviewer/author since childhood) and here is your chance! But it’s much more than a gridwork of dots. There are facts galore tied in with the numbers and fun, fun, fun on every colorful page.

Personal History

My dad will be 90 years old on December 8. To celebrate, we’re having a big party this Sunday, commemorating the milestone with excellent food, good cheer, and even a surprise or two. My brother, a one-time stand-up comedian, will be master of ceremonies at the festivities. Not surprisingly, my contribution will be providing the historical context.

A few years ago, for my parents’ 50^th anniversary, I created mini-magazines with pictures, short articles, and even a few puzzles about their life together—no doubt a reflection of my many years as an editor of Scholastic’s classroom magazines. This time, having just completed the back matter for an upcoming book, I decided to apply one of the go-to standards of nonfiction back matter to my dad’s life—the timeline.

Since I wanted this timeline to make a visual statement as well as an emotional one, I started by searching for software that would enable me both to organize events and import pictures. I found a few different programs, designed for business presentation purposes but adaptable for personal use. I took the plunge and bought one, then started working on the content. It turns out that despite knowing my dad for 55 years, I could not pinpoint as many defining moments and turning points as I thought. So I doggedly pursued the details of his life as I had those of Annie Oakley and Nellie Bly before him, poring over scrapbooks and photo albums and turning every visit to my parents’ home into an oral history session.

I learned volumes. For instance, my dad, who helped found one of the biggest accounting firms in New Jersey, got his start in business at age seven, when his older brother “forced” him to sell copies of Collier’s magazine for five cents door-to-door. He turned 13 in the midst of the Great Depression, so he celebrated his Bar Mitzvah with a party at home; he said his best gift was a $2½ gold piece. (Who even knew there was such a thing?) In the 1950s, both of my parents campaigned for Adlai Stevenson; they’ve got a letter signed by Stevenson thanking them for their support and a souvenir ticket to one of his rallies. Later in the decade, my dad continued his commitment to civic affairs by serving on the Citizens Advisory Zoning Committee in our town and the Citizens Planning Association for the area.

When I write biographies, I start with a subject who had an impact on society and use every available resource to try and learn more about who that person was. Working on my dad’s timeline, I went in the opposite direction. For most of my life, I’ve seen my dad from the context of our family, from my particular perspective as his older child, his only daughter. But looking at his accomplishments all mapped out on a colorful timeline helped me get a clear sense of his place in the world beyond our front door. What a great learning experience. What a great man.

How Do Teachers Use Our Books?

I’ve been wondering how we authors can help teachers use our books. This, of course, requires that we learn more about what teachers actually do with our books in the classroom. So I created a questionnaire and Cheryl Harness gave it to Susan Hutchens, a teacher friend at Mountain View Elementary in Windsor, CO who went to the trouble of filling it out. The results are below. My questions are in boldface. Susan prefaces her responses as follows:

I'm a special education teacher for grades 3-5. I primarily work with 4th and 5th graders, teaching reading, writing and math in "core replacement" groups. Explanation: all of our 4th graders have reading at the same time, so the group I have is getting "core replacement" in my room at the same time their peers are being taught reading in the general education classroom. Same with math, writing and 5th grade reading. My school also has a literacy teacher (for students who are doing a bit better than mine academically) and a Title 1 reading teacher.

What kind of reading assignments do you give kids? In class, we all read the same story/book together. Sometimes, I'll let the kids read silently to themselves or in pairs, but this is usually not very effective because of their lack of reading skills.

How important do you feel it is for every kid in your class to read the same assignment on a topic? For my kiddos, this is very important. This way, I can be assured they are reading correctly, and we have wonderful discussions to ensure comprehension of the material. Most of my kids are way better verbally!

Do you feel you MUST teach from the textbook? Unfortunately, yes. If so, why? District requirement. But, I supplement a lot in my classroom by reading non-fiction books at the beginning of each reading class (the kids love books by Cheryl Harness!) and also by pulling in additional non-fiction books to support stories we're reading. (ie: 5th graders are reading a story about cowboys that mention Nat Love, an African American cowboy. He wrote a book about his experiences and I found it online. I copied it and shared selections of it with the kids - they loved it!)


Have you ever gone to the library and looked for books on the content you have to teach? Honestly - I usually hit half.com or ebay first. I like to purchase books with my own money, then I'll have them for the next years! I have quite a collection of books in my classroom and like to have them "at my fingertips" to pull for kids!

Have you ever used a trade (library) book on a subject covered by your textbook instead? Yes. If so, why? Usually because the story provided in the book I'm required to use doesn't go "in depth" enough about the subject. Also, I like to show my students that each and every book about a subject can offer different/additional information! For instance - my students are stunned to know that I personally own more than 50 books about Lewis and Clark.

How closely do you coordinate what you are teaching with your school librarian? Honestly, not much. Our school library is pretty limited, although our new librarian this year has consulted with me to order more non-fiction books at a reading level my kids could handle! Yay!Does she pull books for you? I know she would if I asked.

Does she come to you or do you go to her? We've done a bit of both this year.

Do you find ways to have kids read different books on a topic and share their experiences in class projects and discussions? Yes. If so, what are your strategies? My students are given a "book bag" each week with a small book in it to read at home. I try to coordinate these books with what we are reading in class. It's fun to watch them make the connection!

How proficient do you feel in your knowledge of children's nonfiction literature in the subjects you have to teach? Pretty good. But, I must admit, my association with Cheryl Harness has really provided me with so much more knowledge about good non-fiction for students! She's kind of "adopted" my students during the past few years, and is always willing to answer their questions (they love that a real author writes to them!) and mine as well. She's pointed me to many books, websites, etc., to help expand my kids' knowledge.

Would you find professional development by authors in this area useful? I think that would be great! I love to learn new things, especially when I can pass information along to my students and make learning more fun for them! In my position as a special education teacher - I don't think it's enough to just teach a child to read. My students may always struggle with reading, so I feel it's important to instill a LOVE of reading in them! If they're interested, engaged and excited about reading - then they will read! I've learned that non-fiction is the best way to get my students excited - more so than talking animals and fantasy.

Thank you, Susan! If you would like to respond to my questionnaire, you can find it here. Email it to me as Word attachment and I’ll post results next month.

By the way, Ink Think Tank, LLC, our new company that has come out of the blog, is getting ready to offer exactly this kind of professional development to teachers via videoconferencing. Stay tuned.

Alert the Media! It’s the Amazing Mischbucha Mirror

I admit it. I rudely interrupted my mom’s turkey dinner by being born on Thanksgiving during our family’s first ever Thanksgiving Goodstein Family Reunion. So many other babies followed this debut that our family has ballooned exponentially, and these days, between 90 and 130 Goodsteins from all over the world show up in one place every Thanksgiving to tell each other our best stories, take each other’s pictures, eat some food, preferably fattening, look at pictures of our own selves, eat again, play every conceivable kind of live music, perform bogus magic tricks in costume, eat dessert, and present plays and puppet shows and displays of acrobatic prowess. This is no great surprise, actually, considering that we’re descended from a long line of artists, musicians, actors, dancers, and shameless hams.

I’ve heard stories about our colorful family history all my life, but I’ve also read more amazing tales than you can shake a stick at because they’re written down in the Mischbucha Mirror. So what’s that (and how do you pronounce it anyway)? It’s a wonderful annual family newsletter that was first started by an 11 year old boy in 1981. Since everyone gets to send in his or her own contributions, it has gotten bigger and fancier and glossier and more colorful ever since. It’s handed out at each reunion in all its glory, and in its pages are a thousand tales. Here’s a tiny sampling. As the blogger, I get to start with my own part of the family:

One story told how my grandfather and a lot of other young men were abducted by the Cossack army during WW I, and they had to march on foot all the way from Poland to Manchuria eating only dry bread and sausages. My grandfather soon became a legend because he could ride on horseback at full speed while standing on his hands. The men had to ford all the rivers naked with their clothes and rifles on top of their heads and everyone got frostbite on their feet and their toenails fell off.

2002 cover reflects folk art crayon
drawing and a note from my Polish grandmother

Another story told about a ship that sunk on its way to America and explained exactly how our feisty blond matriarch fought to stay with her own new husband in one of the few lifeboats.

In a story about Ellis Island, a relative with a long unpronounceable name wanted to get a short new American name, but hadn’t decided what it was to be. So he wrote “to be” on the list, and that’s how his last name became “Tobe.”

A Holocaust survivor wrote a riveting description of her years in Auschwitz as a young teenager. She told how she considered the number on her arm to be not a mark of shame, but a badge of honor when she was one of the few prisoners to make it through the war alive.

One highly memorable cousin showed us photos of his ornate tattoos and explained how he was jailed as a teenager for painting graffiti on New York subway trains. He is now a glowing superstar/ fine artist whose one-man shows of graffiti art appear in the finest galleries in Europe.

2007 cover shows 3 tired cousins in the 1960's

There are pages and pages of lavishly illustrated stories from small children, one 6-page cartoon series from a college student, photographs galore dating back to the 1800's, and plenty of poetry pages illustrated in crayon with Polish folk art by my own ancient grandmother. A renowned violin maker cousin told us the difference between an early and a late Stradivarius. Another wonderful story was laid out by a former WW II navigator who safely guided his pilots from Africa to a tiny airport in Brazil by flying across the Atlantic Ocean through three thunderstorms without a radio. They landed with only 6 minutes of fuel left. I've even compiled a number of very adventurous stories about my father’s own family. I used them to help write a book called Escaping to America: A True Story, which among other things explains how the family was almost captured by soldiers when they escaped from war-torn Poland in a hay wagon in 1921.

Why am I telling you all of this? Because every family on the planet has stories just like ours, including you. Happy or sad, devastating or embarrassing, bizarre or hilarious or mundane, they’re the best stories you can ever imagine because they relate to you personally. (And please note that they are all nonfiction!) So I hereby propose on this week-after-Thanksgiving that each of you readers of every age take a firm grip on your next golden opportunity whilst you still can and write your family’s best stories down one at a time. Interview your older and younger relatives too by making them tell you everything you wanted to know but were afraid to ask. Raid ancient letters, funny emails, old photos, older drawings made by little kids, and even tacky souvenirs from some vacation spot and include them along with the rest. Be sure to add the dates! And remember that even stories from this week will work just as well. Have a blast and please let us know what you find.

1996 page written and illustrated
by my young daughter Kim

Pride and a Little Prejudice

A couple of years ago I took a break from writing nonfiction children's books and spent several months editing them instead. I had been hired to fill in for my own editor while she was on maternity leave. This temporary dream job gave me the opportunity to work with--and learn from--some wonderful authors, including fellow Inklings Sue Macy, Deborah Heiligman, and Roz Schanzer.

I've recently received copies of two of the books I worked on during that time, and I'm almost as proud of them as if I had written them myself. I can't resist showing them off. The Erie Canal by Martha E. Kendall (National Geographic, 2008) tells the fascinating story of one of America's greatest feats of technology. Two hundred years ago, many people--including Thomas Jefferson--thought it was impossible to build a canal across mountains and through wilderness. But as Kendall writes, "DeWitt Clinton, governor of New York State,

proved them wrong. In 1825, he celebrated the completion of the Eighth Wonder of the World. It was called the Erie Canal, and it changed America forever. This manmade waterway, 363 miles long...made travel easier, cheaper, and faster than ever before between the American East and West. It is hard for us to imagine that transportation on the canal at four miles per hour could be considered 'high speed,' but in the 1820s, that pace seemed very fast indeed. Two hundred years ago, the canal...was a miracle of technology."

**Shameless bragging alert--feel free to skip to the next paragraph.** For those of you still with me, I'm delighted to report that The Erie Canal was one of two National Geographic titles among the four 2009 Jefferson Cup Award Honors bestowed by the Virginia Library Association. The other was my own Helen's Eyes: A Photobiography of Annie Sullivan.

The second book I'm excited about sharing is Margaret Whitman Blair's Liberty or Death: The Surprising Story of Runaway Slaves Who Sided with the British During the American Revolution. Scheduled for release in January 2010, Liberty or Death is the little-known story of the American Revolution as told from the perspectives of the African-American slaves who fought on the side of the British Royal Army in exchange for a promise of freedom. Blair notes in her epilogue, "It is often said that history is written by the winners. Americans won their rebellion against British rule--and are proud of recalling the struggle to become an independent nation. But what of the thousands of people who were brutally dragged from their homes and families in Africa to America? To the slaves, the Patriots' cries to live free from British tyranny must have rung hollow indeed." When I worked on this book it was still in the manuscript stage and it fascinated me. Now that I see it all grown up into a beautifully illustrated book, I find the important story it tells even more compelling. Blair deserves to be proud of this one. I know that I am.

Play in the Classroom

Last weekend, I was asked to speak at the Games in Education Forum, part of the Chicago Toy and Game Fair at Navy Pier. My presentation was called Play and Creativity in the Classroom. The air in the room and the showroom below was filled with fun, excitement, and energy, so, in a way, I felt like I was preaching to the choir.

Play is a hot topic these days. Some fantastic books on the subject are:

Einstein Never Used Flashcards   How our children really learn and why they need to play more and memorize less
by Kathy Hirsh-Pasek Ph.D., Roberta Michnick Golinkoff  Ph.D.
Rodale/St. Martin's Press 2003

Play  How It Shapes the Brain, Opens the Imagination, and Invigorates the Soul
by Stuart Brown M.D.
Penguin Group 2009

In Defense of Childhood  Protecting Kids' Inner Wildness
by Chris Mercoliano
Beacon Press 2007

The Case for Make Believe  Saving Play in a Commercialized World
by Susan Linn
The New Press 2008







The easy route in talking about play would have been to stand in front of the group and read several passages from these books, but I did have an outline:

1. History of Toys (Blocks, Dolls, Wright brothers, etc)
   
2. Toys in American History (Pioneer toys, Native American toys, Immigration, etc)
3. Toys in Other Cultures (Balls, Jacks, Marbles, Bilboquet, Tangrams, String, Hopscotch, etc)
4. Toys in Math (Dominoes, Dice, Building, Tangrams, Qubits, Zillio, Wrap-up, Games, etc)
5. Other Areas for Play & Toys (Recycling, Art Projects, Puppets, Bingo, etc)
6. Creativity
7. Hands-On Activities

Peppered through the presentation were online and down-loadable lesson plans.
The Hands-On Portion included donated product from:

• Play-doh: included lesson plan ideas I created 
  
• Qubits: Educators loved playing and building with shapes
  
• Jukem Football Card Game: Game developed by a dad to help his sons with Math

Several other products were set up on other tables, but I was touched by the teacher who was so grateful for the plastic tangrams she could take back to her class. The cardboard shapes that she had created were worn and dog-eared and she had no resources to purchase new ones.

A few of the books that I referenced were:

Kids Around the World Play
by Arlette N. Braman
John Wiley and Sons  2002

Children at Play: An American History
by Howard P. Chudacoff
New York University Press  2007






My nine-year-old's fourth grade class is doing a nonfiction book unit. After checking out his school library and the local public library, he came home empty-handed from his search for a nonfiction book. Mind you, this child is the opposite of a reluctant reader so I was very surprised. After checking out my collection, he picked one of my favorite books.

Toys! Amazing Stories Behind Some Great Inventions
by Don L. Wulffson
Henry Holt and Co.   2000

We've had a great time talking about the history behind some of the classic toys. In fact, I bought him some Silly Putty and that's the only toy he's played with for the last two weeks.

Remember that this Black Friday, during the toy buying scramble --- Silly Putty = $1.99 and hours, days, weeks of fun!

And, remember Toys and Games for the Classroom, too!

A Bit of a Rant

Last weekend I spoke at the 2009 California School Library Association Conference, with its theme of Embrace the Serendipity of Learning. I love librarians. One of them, speaking to a group of writers, said that we are their heroes. Well, the feeling is mutual. Especially these days.

The conference exhibit hall was about as densely populated as our Mojave Desert, with vast walls of curtains trying to disguise the fact. Folks strolling the floor were likewise of a desert town density. Presentations were scheduled simultaneously and I held my breath to see if I would attract more than the one person who introduced me. I spoke on – what else for an INK blogger? – The Serendipity of Reading and Writing Nonfiction, and when I got a crowd of about twelve, I felt grateful indeed. The session I attended after mine had only four in the audience, but the speaker was just as enthusiastic and engaging as if he were addressing four hundred.

Seriously though, the state of school libraries in California is abysmal and getting worse. As you probably know, the Golden State is no more. Now there’s only budget deficits and criminal cuts in services in them thar hills. So what does that mean for school libraries? California, once an innovative leader in public education, now stands 51^st in the nation for school librarian ratios. That’s quite an achievement in a country with 50 states. Two years ago our ratio was 1 school librarian for 5,124 students. Yes, that’s 1:5174. Today it’s much much worse.

At the conference I, of course, only met those librarians who still have jobs and the wherewithal to attend a conference. One librarian I met works at ten different elementary schools – half a day per week in each one. Three hours per school per week. Another works only three days a week and covers six schools. Her district won’t pay her mileage, so she spends a whole day at each school – twice a month. Acquisitions budgets have evaporated. Yet all were eeager to see my flyer on the INK Think Tank database.

Some downsized librarians are classroom teachers now. One described her Catch-22. If she, as a teacher, provides the enrichment that she offered as a librarian, it will justify her district’s argument that they don’t need a school librarian after all. The San Diego Unified School District, one of the largest in the country, is considering closing all school libraries and using them as storage rooms.

As we authors and librarians met in southern California, students at the ten campuses of the University of California around the state were out in force protesting a 32% increase in tuition next year. As a veteran of the Free Speech Movement at UC Berkeley, I say “Right on!”

I also say, “HOW DARE WE?!”

How dare we shortchange our children and their education like this -- impoverishing the programs at the elementary and secondary levels and ensuring that cash-strapped college students are left out of the top tier of our state university system? All in the service of no new taxes.

Back at the conference it was heartening, as always, to surround oneself with people who love books, and understand that children’s authors do important work. And what is more fun than standing in front of the friendliest of audiences and talking about yourself and your books for an hour? But still, I couldn’t help but sense a ghostly presence in the nearly-empty exhibit hall and meeting rooms – the ghosts of all those librarians that should have been there.

Camila Alire, President of the American Library Association, addressed us one evening and implored us to lobby for change. Not just by emailing our lawmakers, but by talking to our friends, our relatives, our neighbors, parents in the schools – to tell them what’s wrong and try to get them to care.

In the end, we all know the nature of life is impermanence, that nothing stays the same, that things get worse and then they get better and then they get worse and then…. We’ve all enjoyed the kiss of serendipity. (I turned to writing children’s books when I was laid off from my dream job.)

Just let that kiss come soon.

With an Assist from Kathleen

I spent the last two weeks observing and eventually participating in a middle school social studies classroom. I worried, well in advance of course, that I wouldn’t know what was going on. I knew that I had to teach my own lesson at the end and I already felt inadequately prepared and clearly lacking in the requisite knowledge base. I grumbled at the thought of reading chapters of the dry textbook just to catch up.

Much to my surprise, there was no textbook in sight in the sixth grade social studies classroom. Mr. G. used videos, websites, handouts, and graphic organizers for his unit study on the Bill of Rights. The students got into small groups and each discussed a Supreme Court case which focused on a specific issue protected by the 4th or 5th amendment. Later in the week, students compared how their rights were different in school and out in the real world. Introduction of concept, comparisons, discussion—just as it should be. No one was asking for a textbook.

Even though I was never a boy scout, I always like to feel prepared. So I thought about the best way to bone up on my rights. Luckily I remembered Kathleen Krull’s book, A Kid’s Guide to America’s Bill of Rights. Curfews, Censorship and the 100-pound Giant. I had read it before but I reread it again over dinner during the first week. Concise, funny, and packed full of information, it was exactly what I needed.

So I couldn’t resist. I had to share. I brought the book in to show Mr. G and suggested it would be a great read for some of his students who wanted to know more. It turns out Mr. G. himself wanted to know more. He was enthusiastic and asked to borrow it; he said he’d read it during his free period. He taught the same class six times a day. I was skeptical that he’d really give up his free period to read more about the same topic. Indeed he did and he said he found some great stuff to incorporate into his lessons.

My lesson turned out to be on the basic setup of a courtroom. Easy peasy for this law school graduate. No review required. But, still, if anyone knows a good book on the subject, I’d like to read it. Because once you try to explain something to someone else, you naturally want to learn more yourself. And then to pass it on.

Metric Musings

G’day from Down Under! I’m in Australia for a week’s worth of school visits starting tomorrow, and some extra time devoted exploring and research. I just saw my first kangaroo in the wild!

Aside from marsupials, the Sydney Opera House, meat pies, didgeridoos and other pleasures of Oz, I’m thinking about the metric system, or Système Internationale (SI), as it is properly known. In my presentations at schools, I refer to measurements many times. Last week while presenting at the wonderful Springfield Ball Charter School in Springfield, IL, I asked my host to make a note every time I said something like, “Light travels 186,000 miles per second” or “I’m about 6 feet tall” or “If you ate ice cream at a rate of one ounce per minute…” I wanted to know all the times I use measuring units in the American way.

Armed with his notes, I can now use conversion factors and change those archaic American measurements to sensible metric ones for my Aussie audiences. But do I want to? Does it make sense to convert a measurement to its equivalent in another system? As far as I can tell, the answer is, “Sometimes.”

I believe it makes perfect sense to say that the speed of light is 300,000 km per second and that the earth is 150,000 million kilometers from the Sun. (It’s pronounce KILO-meters, by the way — not kill-O-meters.) But should I convert when I am talking about my book on proportion, If You Hopped Like a Frog, and I say that I’m about six feet tall, and if I my tongue were as long proportionally as a chameleon’s (half as long as its body), my tongue would be three feet long? In other words, should I tell the Australian children that I am 183 cm tall, so my chameleon tongue would be about 91.5 cm? Or… to use the title example, in the States I tell my audience that a 4’6” child able to hop like a frog (meaning 20 times his or her length/height) would be able to jump 90 feet. Here in Australia, should I say that a 137 cm child able to perform a frog’s feat would thus hop 27.4 meters?

Of course not. Exact conversion often makes for complicated, daunting mathematics.

Yet I see this sort of thing in books all the time. “He walked about 25 miles (32.18 km) a day”. . . “Add two cups (473 ml) of flour” . . . “A St. Bernard can tip the scales at 200 lbs (91 kg).” If you didn’t know better, you’d think all American measurements are nice round numbers while metric measurements are ugly and unwieldy. But the fact is that whoever provided the original numbers approximated to nice, round ones. Calculate a conversion and it gets ugly. (Of course if we wrote it in the reciprocal it would be just as ugly. For instance, we could say, “A St. Bernard can tip the scales at 90 kg (198.42 lbs.)” and readers would blanche at the thought of weighing the dog in pounds!)

The best thing, I think, is not to convert, but to think metric from the start. Tomorrow, I won’t say I’m 183 cm tall. I’ll say I’m about 180 cm tall so my tongue (if I had one that was as long, proportionally, as a chameleon’s) would be 90 cm long. And so on.

The practice of converting units has kept the U.S. from switching to the metric system and joining the world. There is no question that it is the better system because, like our number system, it is based on 10. Once you get a basic familiarity with the units, which would take about three hours if you actually used them instead of converting them into more familiar units, you’d see how much easier they are to use. (Need proof? Quick: What’s 5’8” plus 7’ 9”? What’s the weight of 8 books if each weighs 3 lbs. 9 ounces? How much water should you use if you triple a recipe calling for 1¾ cups? In the metric system these would be simple problems. What’s 173 cm plus 236 centimeters? 409 centimeters. What’s 8 times 1.7 kg? 13.6 kg. What’s 3 X 0.4 liters? 1.2 liters. Easy.)

So the problem is not the metric system itself. The problem is how it’s taught — or, more precisely, how we are taught to convert units instead of thinking metric. I view it as language acquisition. Does anyone learn a foreign language by translating every word and sentence? No, foreign languages are learned by immersion. Measuring systems are way easier to learn than languages. Just dive in. On your trip to Paris or Tokyo or Nairobi or Guadalajara or just anywhere else outside the USA, don’t convert. In Millions to Measure, my book on measuring, I wrote, “Find out how tall you are in centimeters, how much you weigh (your mass, actually) in kilograms, how much milk your family drinks in liters, the distance to your school in kilometers, the temperature every day in degrees Celsius, and so on. Once you start measuring and thinking this way, you’ll soon learn the metric system. You’ll be measuring like a word citizen.”

A month ago I was invited to a sixth grade class in St. Louis to talk about my biography of the artist Romare Bearden. I hadn’t looked at this book for a couple of years and when I reread it, I was struck by the beautiful job the designer did of emphasizing the artist’s collages by using blocks of colorful backgrounds. Bearden, himself, actually began with blocks of color paper to make his innovative collages. The design, which played off Bearden’s style, helped to unify and enhance word and image.
Although I planned to show slides, I wanted to present the material to the students without recapping the whole book. After all, the teacher had read it before my visit and there were several copies in the classroom. I decided it would be more fun to ask questions and draw them into a discussion right away. I began with a quote by Bearden.
“I think the artist has to be something like a whale, swimming with his mouth wide open, absorbing everything until he has what he really needs.”
Then I asked, “What do you think Romare Bearden meant by this quote? Why does a whale swim with his mouth open?”
“If you were a whale swimming with your mouth wide open through your daily life, what would you be taking in? Could you use any of it as an inspiration for writing or making art? What would you use?”
One student said his life was so boring, if he were a whale, he’d spit everything back. Another talked about swimming to school that day through waves of falling leaves. And so began a dialogue about using the common, everyday aspects of one’s life as material for art. Certainly some of Bearden’s most compelling collages portray his memories of childhood – family and friends going about the ordinary pleasures, as well as the difficulties, of their days. His work is a visual autobiography that traces his childhood in a small town in North Carolina, to his years in Pittsburg living with grandparents, to his adult life in Harlem and the Caribbean. Bearden’s artworks celebrate his African-American culture, which was especially relevant for this group of inner-city kids.
In his collages, Bearden experimented with a variety of materials, from photographs, magazine images, newspaper, paint, fabric, foil, string, pins to colored paper and more. He drew and added color with pencil, charcoal, ink, oil, watercolor, acrylic, or spray paint. After he put down blocks of colored paper, he pasted layers on top, arranging and rearranging until he felt satisfied. Reminds me of revising my writing –arranging and rearranging until I get it right.
A few weeks later the teacher invited me back to share the artwork the class created after my presentation. The walls were lined with collages by these young artists, who used family photographs, photos of buildings and scenes in their neighborhood, newspaper cuttings, construction and tissue paper, tin foil, magic markers, glue sticks and scissors. Under each of their collages, they had written first person accounts of the experience relating to the image. A creative teacher. A responsive group of students. I felt like the whale swimming through their world with my mouth wide open, taking it all in.

Broad Connections in Literature: Pairing Nonfiction with Fiction

Tomorrow morning, bright and early, I will hop on a plane bound for Philly to attend one of my favorite conferences of the year—NCTE (National Council for Teachers of English). There are many fun events on the schedule, from the ALAN Breakfast to the Children’s Luncheon and all things in between, but first up will be a panel presentation on making interdisciplinary connections for readers by pairing nonfiction with fiction, and vice versa.

With Teri Lesesne presiding as moderator extraordinaire, four authors will discuss how to make the most of our books in the classroom. One of the exciting things for me as a reader is to lose myself in a time or place that is new to me. And the more connections I can make to that time or place—or topic—the more vivid my understanding becomes. Here’s a sneak preview of our panelist pairings.

For the scientists among you, try having kids read Loree Griffin Burns’s Tracking Trash while exploring 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (Jules Verne), Flush (Carl Hiaasen), and The Highest Tide (Jim Lynch) to help kids come to grips with conservation issues. To make broader connections between historical fiction and real life events, Jenny Moss pairs her historical fiction novel, Winnie’s War, with nonfiction titles such as The History of Everyday Life by Elaine Landau and Epidemic! The 1918 Influenza Pandemic by Stephanie True Peters.

Kate Messner will share her new middle-grade novel, The Brilliant Fall of Gianna Z., which introduces readers to botany and the poetry of Robert Frost, as well as touches on themes of organization of time management and how that affects kids. Some of Kate’s pairings for The Brilliant Fall of Gianna Z. include Poetry for Young People: Robert Frost, Identifying Trees by Michael Williams, and The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens by Sean Covey.

And in Almost Astronauts, the historical context of what life was like for women in the 50s and 60s grows ever more broad if we make literature pairings that deepen the ideas being introduced. So, if you have a reader who likes learning about women trying to be astronauts when they were not yet allowed, or is intrigued by themes of discrimination, or just wants to get their hands on more material about space and aviation, try also giving them novels like Flygirl by Sherri L. Smith, White Sands, Red Menace by Ellen Klages, Cosmic by Frank Cottrell Boyce, or Promise me the Moon by Joyce Annette Barnes.

And if you’re in Philly tomorrow, please come by for unabridged version of our talk!

Abe Lincoln's Address

Seven score and six years ago (if I've got the arithmetic right), the terminally worried and sleep-deprived 16th U.S. President had traveled on the clattering cars north from Washington, D. C. up to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. Up until the previous summer, when all manner of evil racketing nightmare and nobility was visited upon the place over the course of three impossibly hot and dreadful days in July 1863, few people had ever heard of that sleepy little college town. More than three months later, the ground thereabouts was still spongy with all of the blood shed there. All these years later, Gettysburg, PA, is and will ever be the high-water mark of the Confederacy, the farthest Robt. E. Lee was ever to lead his raggedy Army of Virginia. A place known for suffering and roaming spectral spirits of young men ripped out of their lives before their natural times. And a place where Abraham Lincoln gave a little speech at the dedication for the new national cemetery. [Lame old joke: What's the Gettysburg Address? Where Abe Lincoln used to live.] Today's the anniversary of that grievous, auspicious ceremony on November 19, 1863.

I spent today [the 18th, as I write] talking to four groups of young citizens - young Pennsylvanians, as a matter of fact, - about the business of writing and illustrating history and I've spent the last few minutes wishing that I'd reminded them of this solemn anniversary tomorrow [today, as you read]. At least I thought to tell the 6th & 7th graders that the passing on of our stories is one clear definition of civilization and that the telling isn't merely up to us authors. It's up to us all. What IS up to us authors of historical nonfiction and our colleagues in the classrooms is making sure that the stories, civilization's torches, are lit up bright, clear, and true. Think of it as a way of making sure that the 'government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.'