Steve Jenkins - Author/illustrator/scientist

Two big boxes of non-fiction books purchased with the Raise-a-Reader grant funds from the Times Colonist arrived this month.  The students were so excited to see the new books on the shelves - and I had a great time doing book talks!

One of the highlights was a large set of Steve Jenkins books. Jenkins builds on the curiosity of children to create books like "What Do You Do with a Tail Like This?",  "Never Smile at a Monkey" and collections of the "est" of everything - "Biggest, Strongest, Fastest" and "Hottest, Coldest, Highest, Deepest".  The books sold themselves at multi-age book talks.  In fact, one class sat with me so long asking for the next and then the next page in "Actual Size" that they almost missed their book exchange time. The bright, bold colours, layers and textures of Jenkins' incredible collages bring the images to life and pull your eye from one side of the page to the other. The texts are based on questions asked by his children over the years as well as Jenkins' own wonderings and capture the reader's interest immediately. The questions the books pose, and answer, are perfect examples of inquiry in action.  This slide show from Jenkins' website gives and overview of his book making process. Jenkins narrates his illlustrating process on this video - fascinating!  His site includes a gallery of artwork created by students inspired by his books - hmmmm, art project in the future? Check out our whole Steve Jenkins collection on the school library catalog (just type in 'jenkins, steve' and press enter).

Happy New Year!

 

The day after Labour Day always seems more like New Year's Day to me than January first.  It is a time of new beginnings - new classes, new teachers, new projects, new books.... 

 This year began with the wonderful job of offering teachers new books for their classrooms from the selections left over after our very successful summer reading program last June.  Thanks to our wonderful parents and the PAC members who hosted our Scholastic Book Fair last fall, we had enough money to purchase three books for every student to read over the summer and have a few left to contribute to classrooms this fall. Students will be happy to have Jack and Annie greet them from the Magic Tree House, Junie B. share new adventures, Encyclopedia Brown and Horrible Harry tell it like it is, as well as new novels for intermediate students and picture books for the early primaries. Ahhhh, the joy of a shiny new book for the new year!!

 As well, the books purchased during our Donation Book Sale are waiting on the counter for me to catalog.  They should be circulating by next week. Thanks again to all the generous families who purchased books for our library! 

Reviews of some of our new books will be posted here later this month.

The Delta is My Home

McLeod, T. & Willett, M. (2008). The Delta is My Home. Calgary, Alberta: Fitzhenry and Whiteside Co.
(Photographed by Tessa Macintosh)

This book is a collaborative effort by a grade 6 student (Tom Mcleod) and his teacher. Tom lives in Aklavik, Northwest Territories where he spends a lot of time on the land hunting and fishing with his family. The Delta is My Home tells about Tom's family and their life in Aklavik - his school, hunting trips, interviews with CBC radio, his Mom's wonderful bannock, and a big flood. Tom's father is a Renewable Resource Officer and Tom adds facts about wildlife behaviour and preservation to his stories.  Tom's stories are in one font while his teacher's comments are in another font. Through beautiful colour photographs of the landscape, wildlife and everyday life on each page and Tom's personal stories enhanced with added information from his teacher, this book really gives a sense of Tom's life in the north.

Intermediate, Teacher resource

World Book Encyclopedia 2012

Kobasa, P. (Ed.). (2012). The World Book Encylopedia.Chicago, IL.:World Book Inc.

This reference set consists of 22 volumes, 21 with alphabetical entries and one index. The index includes a 32 page section on "Writing, Speaking and Research Skills" which includes directions for writing reports, book reports and research papers (including tips on editing), tips for public speaking, and a research section which focuses on getting to know the library and assessing the reliability of sources.  This section, while it has some good pointers, is very text heavy with black and white line drawing illustrations of students. The introduction to the set states many articles are written at different grade levels depending on the curriculum/age appropriateness of the topic (eg. mouse is written at a primary level while cell uses more advanced vocabulary) and some articles progress from simpler to more complex language as the entry progresses. World Book editors also assert that they use current research into how children read maps to guide their map design.  Each entry includes cross references within World Book, a list of related articles/books and headings within the text to guide reading. I tried to look up a "wonder" question we had in kindergarten - "Do polar bears hibernate?" - and found the answer after looking up bears, then following the 'related articles' suggestions to polar bears and finally to hibernation.  This required using three different volumes.  Polar bears don't hibernate, by the way.  While students often love the feeling of holding a big, thick, heavy book, these books use small, consistent font, small photos (often colour) and graphs, tables and diagrams in subdued colours which are not engaging for young readers (or adults for that matter). Having to pull out several volumes rather than click a mouse to follow links is also cumbersome. While the information has strong authority, being chosen by expert editors, the editors do make decisions about what content is important (23 pages for horses and 4 pages for bears). A print encyclopedia is one way to find accurate information (I did answer my 'wonder' question) but it is not as engaging or convenient as many contemporary non-fiction print or online options.

Intermediate, Young Adult, Teacher resource

(Although the editors argue World Book is for 'all ages', it is not accessible for primary students without adult help.)

Pearson School Atlas

Morrow, R. (2004). Pearson School Atlas. Toronto, Ont.: Pearson Education Canada.

 This is one of the few atlases in our library. Although it is dated, it does include Nunavut and still has many useful features. The graphics are colourful and include charts, graphs, photos, satellite photos, topographic maps and even road maps.  While this is a world atlas, there is a definite concentration on Canadian information making it useful for social studies curriculum. The variety of types of maps included also make it useful for teaching mapping and how to read various types of maps, graphs and diagrams.  Using it with the document camera would make a great group lesson. Information on geology, biomes, industry (including forestry) and some historical facts about the growth of Canada also have great curriculum connections. Some of the statistics are outdated, however, and a lesson in accessing current information on the web would be an appropriate compliment to this atlas.

Late Primary (with support), Intermediate, Teacher resource

Fallout

Tate, Niki. (2011). Fallout. Victoria, BC: Orca Books.

Teen suicide, a survivor, distant parents, slam poetry, someone who understands....  Nikki Tate's Fallout is a powerful and engaging story of a teen coping with her younger sister's suicide through writing and performing poetry.  We meet Tara one year after her sister's death.  She has left home and moved to another city where she works in a bookstore by day and meets with her slam poetry friends by night.  Every day is filled with memories - and poems. Prose descriptions of a slam poetry competition are interspersed with poems about a family dealing with suicide. Tara begins to open up to her new friends and find a few moments of relief and, eventually, someone who really understands. While the topic is complex, there is no prolonged analysis or discussion and the characters are not very developed. The story moves along quickly touching on many common teen concerns (parental expectations, teen sex, teen drinking, depression, walking home alone, balancing competition and friendship). This is not a 'deep' novel but with its sparse layout, large type and lots of white space it is a perfect high interest, low reading level (3.0)  for reluctant or struggling readers that will appeal to many other teens looking for a quick read.

Young Adult (Part of the Orca Soundings Series, also available as an e-book on Google Play)

National Geographic Kids

National Geographic Kids website Retrieved from http://kids.nationalgeographic.com/kids/

This free website has many resources for research as well as pleasure. We have been using it with Susan's class to research temperate rainforest animals and Louisa's class to learn about the arctic. The students enjoyed the site and found it easy to navigate. The animals and pets tab led to many resources they wanted to explore including animal facts, habitat maps and videos. While the animal selection for the arctic was limited, it did include the snowy owl which we didn't find on the World Book Kids site.  This led to a great discussion about using different resources when we research and how some are better for one project, but not so good for another. The many high quality nature videos (after all, what National Geographic is all about) are another great resource. The students loved the 'Quizz your Noodle' games (piggy backing on the trivia fascination that fuels Guinness World Record Books).  The Canada section is very limited, but does provide a good map. This is a user friendly, high interest resource that is great for introducing students to research.  It is also a great site for educational games and videos.

Primary/Intermediate/Teacher resource