Seymour Simon's Blog, page 32

Nice T-Shirt

Last week, when I visited Middle Gate Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, one of the first graders made a special shirt. Look at the drawings - these are jokes from my book SILLY ZOO ANIMAL JOKES AND RIDDLES. I love it! And when I turned him around, the back of his shirt was a list of my books! Thank you, Stephen, for creating this wonderful fan shirt - you made my day! And thanks to Stephen’s teacher, Michelle Roudenis, forsending these photo.

Writing Wednesday: Tsunami Surprise

Welcome to Writing Wednesday! Every week there is a new opportunity to publish your own creative writing on the Seymour Science blog. This week, we are asking you to read a science news story about a long-lost soccer ball, and then answer a question about that story. The Facts: It is a good thing that Misaki Murakami’s name was on his soccer ball. He thought it was lost in last year’s tsunami in Japan, but it was returned to him after it washed up on an island in Alaska last weekend.15-year-old Misaki Murakami was home when the tsunami struck Japan in March 2011, and he grabbed his pet dog and ran to safety on higher ground. His family lost everything, including their house, and have been living in temporary housing ever since. Misaki and his family members have been looking for their belongings, but the soccer ball is the first thing that has been found. His name and the name of his school were written on the ball with a Sharpie because this was not just any old soccer ball. It was a goodbye gift from his teacher and classmates when he had to change schools seven years ago. He has kept it next to his bed ever since. Your Assignment: Once you have read and understood the story above, answer this question. Why was it so surprising that Misaki got his soccer ball back, and why was it important to him? Click "comments" below to write your answer. Photo: NOAA - Jiji Press / AFP Educators: Today’s Writing Wednesday is designed to use in support of CCSS Anchor Standard W.8: Recall information from experiences or gather information from provided sources to answer a question.

Cool Photo: All-White Killer Whale

Scientists studying Orcas in the seas off eastern Russia have spotted an all-white killer whale, and have named him "Iceberg." Baby white orcas have been spotted in the past, including in Iceberg’s pod, but no one has ever seen one that grew to adulthood. Iceberg was photographed while he was swimming with 12 members of his pod off Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula. "In many ways, Iceberg is a symbol of all that is pure, wild and extraordinarily exciting about what is out there in the ocean waiting to be discovered," said Erich Hoyt, co-director of the Far East Russia Orca Project. "The challenge is to keep the ocean healthy so that such surprises are always possible."Photo: E. Lazareva/FEROP via AFP

Earth Day Promises: The Winners

Happy Earth Day, everyone! Your Earth Day Promises are wonderful. Anyone who reads your writing for the past 22 days on this blog is sure to feel good about the prospects for our environment, and the future of our planet!The winners were randomly chosen by a true random number generator on the websitewww.random.org. First we listed all the entries in order of when they were received. Then we used the random number generator to pick the winners from among the hundreds of entries. The "individual student" winner was actually a pair of students who wrote, so they will each win a personally autographed copy of my book EARTH: OUR PLANET IN SPACE. Those winners are Baylee Y. and Austin P., from Mrs. Stewart’s class at Midway Elementary in Holt, Michigan. Baylee and Austin wrote: Survival of Polar Bears is threatened by the melting of the Arctic ice because polar bears eat a lot of food and the more the ice melts the less food Polar bears have to eat. Global Warming has been around since 1995 so you should care now, not later. Global Warming doesn’t only affect animals, it also affects humans. Polar bears are threatened by Global Warming. The second prize goes to the student who uploaded a photograph of his poster, called "Promise Island." This student is a homeschooler from Ohio named Will B., and Will will receive a personally autographed copy of my book BUTTERFLIES. He wrote: I promise to recycle with my dad. I promise to not run the water when I brush my teeth. And I promise to sleep my computer when I am not using it to save electricity. Thank you. And finally, I asked classes to write and tell me their Earth Day Promises, and I was so pleased to receive many great entries! The randomly selected winning class entry was one of Mrs. Houck’s second grade library classes at JB Blayton School in Williamsburg, Virginia. When Mrs. Studdard’s class was in the library, they came up with this list: ~ using water bottles that can be reused instead of plastic water bottles. ~ picking up trash that we see outside. ~ plant a tree to help clean up our atmosphere. These are excellent promises, and for making them, Mrs. Studdard’s class has won a free Skype session. I can’t wait to "meet" you all over Skype! We had a number of schools whose students entered often, and one school, in particular, posted many more entries than any other. We decided to add one more winner, to recognize the participation by all the students from Mrs. Maggio’s Library Classes at James Fallon School in Wayne, New Jersey. Ryan A. was the randomly chosen winner from this class, and he will also win a personally autographed copy of EARTH: OUR PLANET IN SPACE. Ryan wrote:This Earth Day I promise to re-use paper and recycle plastic bottles. Thank you, again, to everyone who wrote in with your Earth Day Promises. You have made Earth Day 2012 very special, indeed.Take a moment to reflect on Earth Day today, and what it means to you. If you have a few minutes, go back to April 1 on my blog, and read all the student "promises" which were posted as comments on the stories between April 1 and today. I guarantee you that you will be inspired by the hundreds of commitments to protect and honor our home planet.

My Earth Day Promise

Another Earth Day is almost here! This Sunday, April 22, we will celebrate Earth Day and take a moment to reflect on the elegant beauty of our planet. And we will think about how to protect it for future generations. My wife, Liz Nealon, and I do many things year round to help reduce our impact on the environment around us. We recycle, we plant trees to help cleanse the air, grow our own vegetables so that we can "eat local" as often as possible and eat meatless meals a couple of times a week. We use fluorescent light bulbs and drive a car that reduces our carbon emissions. These are all good choices that most people can make not just on Earth Day, but every day. But I think I can do more. So, my Earth Day promise is not only to love our home planet, but also to keep writing, visiting schools, talking with students and doing everything I can to inspire my readers to take action on behalf of our planet, Earth. Because, as a reader named Jackie wrote on my blog last year, "it takes one step at a time and if we start now the Earth will get better sooner. If we don’t start….who will?"This is your last chance to enter Seymour Simon’s YOUR EARTH DAY PROMISES contest. Prizes include personally autographed books and a free classroom Skype session with Seymour. Click here for details about how to enter. Tomorrow, Saturday, is the last day!

4th Graders Make a Seymour Biography

Check out this wonderful video biography (click "Play" below) made by the fourth graders at Middle Gate School, where I visited last week. I love the fact that every page is unique, handmade, and signed. Thanks so much, everybody, for your great work. I really loved our visit together, and I hope you did, too. Please stay in touch with me here on the blog and let me know what you are reading and thinking about.Be part of Seymour Simon’s celebration of Earth Day 2012 by commenting on blog stories like this one, and telling Seymour about YOUR Earth Day Promises! How are you going to make a difference for the Earth? What will you do to make it be Earth Day / every day? Each time you leave a comment between today and April 22, you will be entered into a drawing to win a free, personally autographed book from Seymour Simon. You must enter by midnight Saturday night, April 21, so get started by clicking "comments" below, and tell us about Your Earth Day Promises!

What Seymour Simon Taught Us…..

The second graders at Middle Gate School in Newtown, Connecticut made a wonderful powerpoint in which they contributed all the things they learned during my visit last week. I know that this was really a lot of work, and I love it! Check out the video below to see their wonderful report.Be part of Seymour Simon’s celebration of Earth Day 2012 by commenting on blog stories like this one, and telling Seymour about YOUR Earth Day Promises! How are you going to make a difference for the Earth? What will you do to make it be Earth Day / every day? Each time you leave a comment between today and April 22, you will be entered into a drawing to win a free, personally autographed book from Seymour Simon. You must enter by midnight Saturday night, April 21, so get started by clicking "comments" below, and tell us about Your Earth Day Promises!

Cool Video: GREEN

It is Cool Video Thursday, and in honor of Earth Day we are showing the video of GREEN, the new book from my friend and fellow author, Laura Vaccaro Seeger. In this book Laura, who is a Caldecott and Geisel Honor Book author, wonders: How many kinds of green are there? She answers her own question with a celebration of all the greens around us, including the lush green of a forest on a late spring day, the fresh, juicy green of a just-cut lime, the incandescent green of a firefly, and the vivid aquamarine of a tropical sea. This is a picture book, but it is most definitely NOT just for little kids. It celebrates the beauty of our planet in so many innovative and surprising moments, I feel sure that anyone of any age would enjoy it. Press play below to see a video preview of this beautifully illustrated book, GREEN.

Writing Wednesday: The Coldest Place on Earth

Good morning, and welcome to Writing Wednesday, where every week there is a new opportunity to publish your creative writing on the Seymour Science blog. This week, in honor of Earth Day, we are giving you a sneak preview of Seymour Simon’s upcoming book, SEYMOUR SIMON’S EXTREME EARTH RECORDS! After you read this excerpt, we’re going to ask you to do your own descriptive writing, and imagine what it would be like if you could visit the Coldest Place on Earth!From SEYMOUR SIMON’S EXTREME EARTH RECORDS: When you step off the plane onto the rocky ice, you will immediately struggle with challenges that will last anywhere from one to eight weeks, as you acclimate yourself to the coldest place on Earth, Vostok Research Station in Antarctica. Vostok Station is a lonely, windblown outpost 621 miles (1,000 kilometers) from the South Pole. It holds the record for the lowest recorded temperature on Earth, -128.6ºF (-89.2ºC), recorded in July 1983. Twice a year, tractor-train (a train of tractor trucks) expeditions take as long as a month to crawl dangerously over the cracked, icy landscape carrying food and supplies to about a dozen Russian, American, and French scientists who live there during the winter conducting a variety of experiments.Your assignment: Read the excerpt above from Seymour Simon’s new book, and think about what it would be like to be at the Vostok Research Station. How would you feel? What would you see around you? Or hear all around you? Write at least three sentences that use your own words to describe a visit to the Coldest Place on Earth When you are finished writing, click on the yellow "Comments" at the bottom of this post to enter your writing! Note to Educators: Today’s Writing Wednesday exercise is designed to use in support of CCSS Writing Anchor Standard #9: Draw evidence from literary or informational texts to support analysis, reflection, and research.

Cool Photo: Sea Butterfly

When we celebrate Earth Day, we are also recognizing the beauty of the plants and animals that share our planet with us. This tiny creature (less than 3 inches/80 mm long) is known as the Sea Butterfly (Clione). It was photographed swimming in Alaska’s Beaufort Sea, underneath the Arctic ice. Isn’t it magnificent?Students often ask me how I get all my photographs of big, dangerous animals.Sometimes, it is just as tricky to get a photo of a tiny, harmless animal like this one. The photographer who shot this was a scientist exploring life in the ocean deep, and she (wearing a wet suit to keep her warm) was also swimming in the frigid waters underneath the Arctic ice pack ice. Brrrrrrrrrrr! Photo: Elisabeth Calvert/NOAATake a digital photo showing an Earth treasure around your school or home that makes you appreciate our planet. Click on Send Us Photos/Video (in the yellow bar at the top of every page) and follow the instructions to upload it to the website. We will publish your Earth Day photos and videos on Seymour’s blog, and each person or class that uploads a photo will be entered into the drawing to win a personally autographed book from Seymour Simon!