Carolee Dean's Blog, page 9

Teaching Memoir Writing to Kids: An Interview with Author/Educator Lesley Roessing

It's the start of a new school year and teachers are looking for ways to provide authentic and engaging writing experiences for students. With that in mind, I'm circling back to the topic of memoir with an interview and Q&A with Leslie Roessing, M. Ed. Lesley is a featured author in my book, Story Frames for Teaching Literacy: Enhancing Student Learning Through the Power of Storytelling (Brookes Publishing, 2021), and wrote the chapter entitled, “Memoir: Writing Our Lives.” 

She also has a book on the subject called Bridging the Gap: Reading Critically and Writing Meaningfully to Get to the Core. In this exciting resource, she uses memoir and creative nonfiction with reluctant readers and writers to form bridges between reading and writing, fiction and nonfiction, and narrative and informative writing. Lesley has vast experience on the subject. She taught middle school for more than 20 years, served as Founding Director of the Coastal Savannah Writing Project, and was a Senior Lecturer at Georgia Southern University.
 
Carolee: In your chapter in Story Frames as well as in your book, Bridging the Gap, you talk about using memoir as a bridge between narrative and informative writing and even argument writing. What connections do you see between these very different genres, and how do you bridge that gap with students?

See Roessing's chapter entitled
"Memoir: Writing Our Lives."

 Lesley: When I teach or work with teachers, I advocate moving readers and writers from the familiar to the less familiar, moving from narrative to informative to argument in reading and writing. When we think of narrative writing, we think of fiction. Humans have always been storytellers (“Once upon a time…”). Young readers usually begin with reading stories and writing stories. And, therefore, that was how I began my teaching year—with reading and writing stories.
 
I found the jump to informational reading and writing presented too wide a gap. Students see that mode as completely different from the narrative mode that is more familiar, and many teachers teach fiction and nonfiction reading and narrative and informative writing in completely different ways.
 
I realized that memoir, as narrative nonfiction, contained elements of, and used strategies for, both narrative and informational and could be employed to bridge that gap. Memoir, as creative or narrative nonfiction, is that perfect bridge between the two modes. Students read information and facts about others through narrative structure as they write information and facts about themselves through narrative structure, meeting both State Standards in Literature and in Informational Texts and in Narrative Writing and in Informative/Explanatory Writing.
 
Memoir writing can also lead to more effective opinion and argument writing. Through writing memoir, writers discover and uncover their own passions and convictions, leading them to choose more effective argument topics; readers are introduced to the roots of the passions and convictions of others as they read memoirs.
 
Carolee:  You have observed that writing memoir helps students close the achievement gap because they are able to activate prior knowledge which improves success. You say that memoir essentially “levels the playing field.” How have you seen students transfer success with memoir writing to writing where they may not have as much background knowledge?
 
Lesley: Because memoir writing is personal and writers are sharing their stories, in all my classes and in classes where I facilitated a memoir writing unit, I have found that students want to do their best writing when writing memoirs. This was one unit where all these students participated and wrote (which is why I decided to write Bridging the Gap). Therefore, writing focus lessons have more meaning and students are more willing to employ lessons in their writing. Also, this is a unit where I encouraged students to take risks in their writing (with no chance of penalty for a “failure”), so they were more willing to try new strategies. This transferred to their writings in all modes for the remainder of the year and led to better writing.
 
It is true that writers have all the background knowledge needed to write memoir, but to make their memoirs better or to expand their memoir writing, they were taught to employ “research” strategies, such as experiential research (researching their memories and learning how to include what they experienced effectively in their writing). Even though memoir is writing about experiences as the memoirist remembers, there can be some interviewing people from the past for some details and writers learned research techniques. And last, memoirists were encouraged to utilize Google Earth and Maps to aid memory of places as well as artifacts and texts, such as pictures and news articles. In these ways, they are amassing research strategies they can employ in informative and argument writing and which can provide background knowledge.
 
Carolee: You use mentor texts as exemplars for good memoir writing. What are some of your favorite mentor texts to use with students?

 Lesley: My favorite mentor texts vary with the writing format I am teaching—poetry, prose, graphics, and audio memoirs, but, for memoir in general, I love Patricia Polacco’s memoir picture books and Cynthia Rylant’s picture books and her poetry book. In my book on memoir reading and writing, Bridging the Gap: Reading Critically and Writing Meaningfully to Get to the Core, I include mentor texts in each chapter. I have updated some of the oral or audio memoirs that I included. I love Jerry Seinfield’s Halloween which is available on YouTube and also was published as a picture book. Another favorite for older students is Carmen Agra Deedy's TED Talk "Spinning a Story of Mama" which I had the opportunity to see her present in person.
 
In April 2020 I wrote a guest blog for YA Wednesday, “Memoirs for Reading and Writing,” that reviewed full-length Upper Elementary, Middle Grades, and Young Adult memoirs but also included collections of short memoirs appropriate for different ages: http://www.drbickmoresyawednesday.com...
 
Carolee: Do you have any final tips for teachers who want to use memoir writing with struggling students?
 
Lesley: My best tip for teachers working with struggling or reluctant writers is to spend more time on brainstorming and prewriting. In Bridging the Gap I provide brainstorming forms for all the writings because the more brainstorming ideas and prewriting strategies (such as organizing ideas, adding details, using the senses, etc) writers employ, and the more time spent on prewriting, the easier, and better, the writing. Donald M. Murray wrote that “few teachers have ever allowed adequate time for prewriting, that essential stage in the writing process which precedes a completed first draft.” (“Write Before Writing” College Composition and Communication, Vol. 29, No. 4 (Dec., 1978), pp. 375-381, National Council of Teachers of English.
 
Carolee: Thank you so much for being with us today and for your invaluable insights.
 
Be sure to check out Lesley’s chapter in Story Frames for Teaching Literacy as well as her most recent book, Talking Texts: A Teacher’s Guide to Book Clubs Across the Curriculum.

To explore the contrast between memoir and autobiography, see my blog post from earlier in April about Memoir Vs. Autobiography: All Our Stories Matter. For a list of books written by children’s authors about their personal life experiences, go to the end of my teacher’s guide on
Activities for Using Watercress with Older Students. The guide includes several writing activities linked to the Common Core for grades 3-8 based on autobiographical stories.

To revisit posts from other Story Frames authors, go to:

Amy Miller and Superhero Stories

The Family Story: Interview with Parent Advocate Mary Jo O'Neill.

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It's My Whole Life - Q&A with Author Susan Wider

I'm excited to announce a wonderful new young adult biography just released this month by debut author, Susan Wider, It's My Whole Life: Charlotte Salomon: An Artist in Hiding During World War 2.  It's the true story of a young Jewish artist who created a series of over a thousand paintings to document her experiences while she was hiding from the Nazis. It has been compared to The Diary of Anne Frank in pictures. 
This summer my blog has focused on Tips for Connecting Books for Summer Fun, but as I look back through my list, I realize that I left of exploring art through visiting museums and learning new skills like painting, drawing, or learning an instrument. That's all right. Susan's book has given me inspiration for my next summer series in 2023.

In the meantime, Susan was gracious enough to answer some questions about her book.

Carolee: In your author’s note you mention that you first became aware of Charlotte when another artist, Maira Kalman, shared in an interview about how Charlotte influenced her work? How has Charlotte influenced your work?
 
Susan: When the Nazi invasion of the south of France became inevitable, Charlotte described her need to “vanish for a while from the human plane and make every sacrifice in order to create.” With Charlotte’s words in my head, I find it easier to close out the world—as politely as possible—and disappear into my writing
 
Carolee: What inspired you to write a book about her?
 
Susan: When I realized that there were no books about Charlotte for young readers—apart from one Italian graphic novel-style biography—I wanted to write about her for teen readers. Charlotte deals with an avalanche of difficulties, from psychological abuse to family suicides to racism to genocide to living as a refugee, all issues that many teens face today.
 
Carolee: Your original manuscript for this book included three artists. Who were the other two? 
 
Susan: As I was researching Charlotte’s story, I came across two other creative young women—among many hundreds of thousands—whose lives and talents were severely disrupted by World War II. In the initial manuscript I braided the stories of Charlotte Salomon, Helga Weiss, and Zdena Berger because their creative output was influenced by pre-concentration camp years (Charlotte); time inside a concentration camp (Helga); and post-war reflection on surviving four camps (Zdena).
Carolee: Those are three very interesting perspectives. How did you decide to focus on Charlotte? 
Susan: When my agent sent that manuscript to various publishers, they all felt that each woman deserved her own book. Back to the drawing board and my agent suggested I start with Charlotte.
 
 Carolee: What is one thing you hope young readers take away from Charlotte’s story?
 
Susan: In spite of everything she was up against—Grandfather, her stepmother, a family history of suicide, Adolf Hitler—Charlotte was able to find her voice in art and writing “with the feeling I had something I would be able to say to humanity.” I hope she inspires young readers to search for their own forms of self-expression, even in dark times.
Carolee: I was certainly inspired by her story when I read it. Art is what gave beauty and purpose to her life during a time that could have otherwise been unbearable. Thanks so much for sharing her story!

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STEM to STEAM: The Collaboration Between Art and Science

In June we explored the connection between cooking and science with the book Science Experiments You Can Eat. Then in early August, we looked at the link between science and fairy tales with the book, Fairy Tale Science: Explore 25 Classic Tales Through Hands-On Experiments. This week we are going a little deeper into the connection between art and science.

I have personal experience on this topic. After completing my bachelor's degree in music therapy, one of the first clients I worked with was a man with a traumatic brain injury who had lost the ability to speak but could still sing. It was my first real introduction into the complexities and wonders of the human brain.

Since achieving my master's degree in communicative disorders and becoming a speech-language pathologist, I have often created songs to help my students remember concepts that they found challenging. 

Einstein played the violin for inspiration. I keep him close to my work desk for a little inspiration of my own. Einstein once said, “If I were not a physicist, I would probably be a musician. I often think in music. I live my daydreams in music. I see my life in terms of music." He also said, "Imagination is more important than knowledge."

The world is filled with people who work as doctors, inventors, or scientists who could have just as easily become professional artists. Dow Phumiruk, is the illustrator of Counting on Katherine and a host of other children's books. She is also a doctor. Her understanding of science informs many of her illustrations.

We have all experienced how beautiful places affect our mood, but they also affect our mind and body. My daughter is currently studying interior design and recently shared with me how specialized decorators use Evidence-Based Design to help create healthcare settings that reduce infections as well as stress for both patients and staff. These creative spaces also promote healing.

In 2010, The Rhode Island School of Design - RISD began advocating for the addition of creativity into STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) education, effectively turning it into STEAM. Since then they have engaged in several exciting projects such as helping to create a better space simulation suit with funding from HIGH SEAS and a NASA Rhode Island Space Grant. Apparel design students are also helping NASA create clothing for a 2025 30-day mission to the moon called Artemis. The RISD Co-Works Research Lab provides tutoring, coursework, technology, and other resources for students and faculty from a variety of disciplines to promote interdisciplinary innovation.

Throughout the month of September, Lerner Books is offering free videos and lesson plans for STEM/STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics). Find out how to sign up HERE. They have a lengthy list of books covering STEM topics. They also have an informative blog post on the topic of STEM to STEAM: Why Arts Belong in the Sciences where they highlight several well-known scientists that were also accomplished musicians and/or used the arts for inspiration. 

Another Tip for Summer Fun is to learn an instrument or visit creative spaces like art museums. On that note, watch for my interview coming up soon with author, Susan Wider, about her debut middle-grade novel, It’s My Whole Life: Charlotte Salomon - An Artist in Hiding During World War II.

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Exploring Science Through Fairy Tales

 A few weeks ago, Kristen Wilkinson wrote a post about Science Experiments for the Kitchen. On that same theme of discovering science in unexpected places, this week I'm reviewing Fairy Tale Science: Explore 25 Classic Tales Through Hands-On Experiments written by Sarah Albee and illustrated by Bill Robinson.

We've been talking a lot this summer about connecting books to summer fun, mostly by exploring hands-on activities like cooking, gardening, creating inventions, and visiting animal habitats and national parks, but it's also a time to rest, relax, watch movies and revisit Disney videos like Mulan and Tangled (aka: Rapunzel). These movies help kids internalize the structure of stories, but they do much more than that. 

One of my favorite quotes is from the epigraph of Neil Gaiman's book, Coraline. He paraphrased it from G.K. Chesterton. "Fairy tales are more than true: not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten." 

I have this quote hanging in my house. Fairy tales teach us that although there are many things in this world to fear, we can overcome them with courage, bravery, and truth. Stories like Mulan can even give us a slice of history. The story comes from a poem from the sixth century about a girl who takes her father's place to join the Khan's army. Though no one knows for sure if Hua Mulan was a real person, it is well-documented that there were warrior women in China, Central Asia, and Greece around the time that the story takes place. 

In Fairy Tale Science, author, Sarah Albee, provides a brief summary and background information about each fairy tale and then makes a scientific connection. For Mulan, Albee discusses archery and provides a simple method to determine if it is more effective to close one eye or keep both eyes open when aiming at a target. Relax, you don't have to purchase an actual bow and arrow for this experiment. Two pencils, a paper cup, and some coins are all you need to teach your child about depth perception and stereopsis. By the way, the book is full of practical ways to learn academic vocabulary as well as science concepts and there is a fantastic glossary of terms at the back.

Can hair actually support a handsome young man's body weight? Watch Tangled or read Rapunzel and then find out how the protein chains in hair create tensile strength that is even more durable than the same amount of cast iron. Learn about parallel load-bearing and why braiding increases the strength of the strands. You won't actually be lifting a handsome prince in this experiment, just some pennies or marbles, but the concept is the same.

After watching Cinderella, you may want to experiment with whether or not a pumpkin is more aerodynamic than a zucchini or a cucumber. Then you can broaden your perspective even more by comparing the movie to one of the many versions of the story from another culture such as Adelita: A Mexican Cinderella Story by Tomie dePaola or The Rough-Face Girl written by Rafe Martin and illustrated by David Shannon. That final suggestion comes from my book, Story Frames for Teaching Literacy: Enhancing Student Learning Through the Power of Storytelling. 

The point is that Fairy Tales are a fun way to expand your world knowledge. Even spending a day binge-watching movies can lead to meaningful learning experiences. 

A Visit to the Poe Museum in Words and Pictures

We've been talking a lot this summer about authentic reading experiences and linking books to summer fun. See my PDF on that topic. You may have spent the last few weeks exploring the zoo or visiting a national park or creating science experiments out of fun recipes. You've likely been taking photos of family, friends, exotic places, and kitchen creations. 

But what are you going to do with all of those photos besides posting them on social media?

Pictures tell a story, the story of our lives. So, why not spend some downtime with your kids this summer reliving those wonderful memories and creating a photo album before summer rolls into fall, this year rolls into next year, and those pictures are forgotten. 

Creating captions for photos provides a meaningful and authentic writing opportunity for kids. You can do this the old-school way by taping photos into an album with captions underneath, or you can create a photo album online through Shutterfly, Walgreens, or even Costco.  Start a file on one of those sites and add to it little by little. By the end of the year, you will have a wonderful project that can be shared with friends and family.

I will use my recent trip to the Poe Museum as an example. I recently took a trip to Richmond with my husband and daughter where I had a chance to visit the Edgar Allen Poe Museum there. 

There are many ways to create captions for photos. The most basic approach is to simply use the location and date to create a noun phrase. Next, try taking the same information and adding a preposition to create a prepositional phrase or a verb to create a gerund phrase. Then add a subject to create an independent clause/simple sentence. Add another clause to create a compound sentence. If you want to get fancy, add a dependent clause for a compound-complex sentence.

This activity provides an authentic writing experience with real-world rewards. It also creates teachable moments to talk with kids about the difference between a phrase, a clause, a sentence, and even a paragraph. See my examples below:

Noun Phrase: The Poe Museum, Richmond, VA, Summer 2022

Prepositional Phrase : At the Poe Museum in Richmond.

Gerund Phrase: Visiting the Poe Museum in Richmond.

Simple Sentence: Carolee visited the Poe Museum in Richmond.

Compound Sentence: Carolee visited the Poe Museum in Richmond and she bought two books and an Edgar Allen Doll.

Compound-Complex Sentence: Carolee visited the Poe Museum in Richmond and she bought two books and an Edgar Allen Doll when she was finished with her tour.

I could go on to write paragraphs and more about the Poe Museum, but that might be too much for the family photo album. It could make an interesting FaceBook post or blog article though.

I was intrigued by all of the memorabilia and information about Poe's life. One of the most interesting displays was about his death.  Edgar Allen Poe died under very mysterious circumstances at the age of 40. It was voting day, and he was found delirious in a gutter, wearing another man's clothes. He was taken to the hospital where he spent the next four days making incoherent references to someone named Reynolds. He died without being able to tell anyone what had happened to him. Poe may have been a victim of "cooping," where victims were beaten, dressed in disguise, and forced to vote for a certain candidate repeatedly by using different names. And some worry about voter fraud now! But that was only one of the theories. A display at the museum listed a total of 26 possible death theories including Rabies and Meningitis.

In addition to horror and poetry, Poe wrote science fiction and invented the first detective stories - The Murders in the Rue Morgue, The Mystery of Marie Roget, and The Purloined Letter. He introduced ideas like the least likely suspect and false clues and inspired writers like Stephen King, Neil Gaiman, and Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes, as well as movie director, Alfred Hitchcock. 
There it is, a recap of my visit to the Poe Museum in words and pictures. It won't all make it into the family photo album, but it's a good example of how a visit to a museum and a few photos can inspire everything from a few words to paragraphs and even books.
Poe has definitely inspired my writing. I did a spoof on his poem, "The Raven," for my verse novel,  Forget Me Not . The poem is called, "The Dead Rapper Rap" and it features Tupac as a substitute teacher. Ravens figure prominently in the book and the cover designer even made the girl's hair on the front of the book look a bit like raven wings. Did I mention that my middle name is Lenore? My mother was a big fan of "The Raven."

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Science Experiments For the Kitchen - Cook and Learn by Kristen Wilkinson

Did you start a garden this summer or visit your local farmer’s market? If so, keep the learning about plants going with Science Experiments You Can Eat, written by Vicki Cobb and illustrated by Tad Carpenter. Now that you’ve grown all those lovely vegetables in your garden, you can bring them into the kitchen for some science experiments. You can run an experiment to explore how plants take in water and how water moves up the stem of a plant. You can even investigate the chemical reactions that happen with chlorophyll and cellulose when you cook plants. 
 
Make a delicious lemon fizz and watch the reaction as gas is formed. Use the red cabbage indicator from an earlier experiment to determine if the lemon fizz is an acid or a base. Learn about stabilized emulsions by making your own mayonnaise. Keep your fresh baked cookies crisp by determining which type of sweetener (granulated sugar versus honey) is more hydroscopic than the other. Hydroscopic means “wet cooking” by the way. This book is great for cooks of all ages (with supervision) and adults will even learn a thing or two.
 
The experiments in this book are easy to follow and accompanied by helpful background information on the concept you are investigating. And, as the title promises, you can eat each experiment after you are finished learning!
 
I have learned through my work at the Environmental Learning Center that kids are natural scientists; they are curious and love to learn about the world around them. You can encourage this curiosity at home through science experiments like these. Maybe the next time your child has one of their unending “why” questions, you’ll be able to help them design an experiment to find the answer on their own!

Kristen Wilkinson is the Program Director for the Colorado State University Environmental Learning Center, an environmental education outreach center in Northern Colorado for children and adults.Download the FREE PDF on Tips for Connecting Books to Summer Fun. Watch for more book titles and tips coming weekly through the summer. Sign up for the newsletter HERE to keep up with articles and you will receive the free writing template for Travel Trouble.

Authentic Reading and Writing Opportunities for Summer to Build Background Knowledge

Summer is a time to put aside the constraints of the classroom, let loose, and have some fun, but that doesn't mean kids stop learning. In fact, summer is a great time to build background knowledge by exploring kids' special interests and activities through books.

START WITH A BOOK

Reading Rockets has put together a wonderful, free resource called Start With a Book. It includes three parts:

1. Choose a Topic to Explore - Reading Rockets provides a list of 24 different topics including Birds and Animals, Inventions and Inventors, Cooking and Food, Geography and Travel, and Nature: Our Green World. Many of these topics are also related to my Free PDF on Tips for Connecting Books with Summer Fun.

2. Find Great Kids Books - Under each topic, Reading Rockets provides links to several children's book titles, but that's not all. They also make suggestions for writing activities like Keeping a Nature Journal, Let's Write a Recipe, Building Stories where kids design a house, and Robots and Work where kids brainstorm an invention of a robot and write about it.

3. Keep the Adventure Going - Reading Rockets provides websites, podcasts, and more connected with each topic so kids can continue to build background knowledge.

READWORKS

Would you prefer short non-fiction articles for older students on a greater variety of subjects? Does your child have difficulty reading on their own? If so, you may want to check out ReadWorks. It is a free resource for educators and parents that provides short reading passages along with vocabulary activities and comprehension questions, on a variety of topics including STEM, social studies, poetry, and literary fiction. They include a recording of each reading passage to support struggling readers. To sign up for ReadWorks and learn more about what they offer, go to their website at https://www.readworks.org/.  Articles are listed by grade level and length.

Through ReadWorks, kids can learn about geysers before visiting Yellowstone, read about a farmer's market in New York City before spending a day at their local venue, or investigate an animal that stirs their interest after a trip to the local zoo. These are all ways to build authentic reading experiences and background knowledge while capitalizing on a child's natural curiosity.

So have fun with those summer activities, but make those activities even more interesting by connecting them with something fun to read!

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My Pandemic Garden and the Wisdom of Thinking Small

Does anybody else have a pandemic garden that looks like this... empty... nothing growing in it because now we are all out traveling and having grand adventures? I got so deeply into gardening during the pandemic that we tore out all the grass that was previously growing here. I even invested in a composter. See it in the corner in the picture below? I think the same gunk is in it from a year ago. I'm a little afraid to open it, to be honest. Thank goodness my husband knows me well enough to have suggested (rather strongly) that I start my agricultural project on the side of the house that no one can see. Right now it's just empty space. In a few weeks, there will be weeds to deal with. That's what happens when you take out the grass and leave nothing but dirt and bark mulch.

Gardening is one of the topics in my summer series on Tips for Connecting Books with Summer Fun. Getting kids involved in gardening is a good way to expand their background knowledge in science. Even my grown kids got involved in this garden. My son helped me tear out the grass and my daughter watered and weeded. Now they are both off to new adventures in graduate school, which is part of the reason my garden looks so empty.
Recently, I came across Grow All You Can Eat in 3 Square Feet: Inventive Ideas for Growing Food in a Small Space by DK Publishing. Many people live in apartments or may rent a house and don't have permission to dig up the grass to plant vegetables. Even if you have a large yard, there can be good reasons for starting a garden in a small space. During the pandemic, many people in my neighborhood started planting gardens. I wasn't the only one, but now many of their gardens look like mine. I forgot about the wisdom of thinking small and starting with something not only manageable in the short term but sustainable for the long term. I wish I had come across this book then.

Grow All You Can Eat provides colorful photographs and step-by-step directions for things you would expect like container gardens and window boxes, but there are also tips on planting vegetables in a reusable shopping bag and building a fence trellis out of old bicycle wheels. There are many tips that are useful even if you have more space such as how to extend the growing season, making use of the space between plants with intercropping, and planting slow crops with fast-growing crops.
If you would rather try a community garden, check out the post earlier in May about Books on Community Gardening and Pollination.
To be honest, I will most likely spend this summer enjoying the fruits of other gardeners' labor at my local farmer's market.

Download the FREE PDF on Tips for Connecting Books to Summer Fun. Watch for more book titles and tips coming weekly through the summer. Sign up for the newsletter HERE to keep up with articles and you will receive the free writing template for Travel Trouble.

Children's Books for Better Speech and Hearing Month

Sharing books about main characters with disabilities promotes awareness and acceptance. The three books I will be discussing today also happen to have connections to my summer series on Tips for Connecting Books to Summer Fun. They are all fiction titles, but one is about gardening (albeit in dystopian Australia). One is about wild birds, and another ends with a concert in the park.

A good place to find some of the best books featuring characters with disabilities is on the American Library Association (ALA) website page for the Schneider Family Book Award. The purpose of the award is to honor an author or illustrator for a book that, "...embodies an artistic expression of the disability experience for child and adolescent audiences." Every January, the ALA announces winners in the age categories of 0-8, 9-13, and 14-18. Some of the highlights for the recent 2022 awards are below.

The winner in the young children's category was My City Speaks. Photographer Darren Lebeuf and paper artist Ashley Barron have created a visually engaging tale of a girl with a visual impairment and her father as they travel to familiar spots in their city (including a community garden) and finally arrive at a concert stage in the park where she plays the violin.

The winner in the middle-grade category was A Bird Will Soar, by Alison Green Meyers. It is written from the perspective of Axel, a boy on the autism spectrum who loves birds but often finds family confusing. He makes sense of the people around him by comparing them to birds. The insight into Axel's inner thoughts and feelings is part of what makes this book so remarkable. When a storm destroys an eagle's nest, Axel must help a struggling eaglet to heal. The story is filled with poems and lots of interesting bird facts. 

The winner in the teen category was Words in my Hands, written and illustrated by Asphyxia and published by Annick Press. It is an illustrated novel told in a combination of text, paint, collage, and sketch about a girl who is deaf and is living in a slightly futuristic world in Australia filled with food insecurity, political upheaval, and environmental turmoil. It is dystopian but at the same time frighteningly realistic. Ultimately it is a story of resilience and hope as Piper, the main character, strives to create a sustainable garden and find her "voice." Asphyxia, the author/illustrator, is deaf and has included a "Dear Reader" note at the end of the book that shares ideas for how the hearing can be more sensitive and inclusive of people with hearing challenges.

For books about gardening for younger readers, see the books in last week's blog post about Books on Community Gardening and Pollination.

Since May is Better Speech and Hearing Month, you may want to check out the book list I created last November about Children's Books Featuring Main Characters with Speech, Language, Learning, and Hearing Challenges. Because many kids with speech and language challenges also struggle with reading, you may also want to share stories from my list of Children's Books Featuring Main Characters with Dyslexia. Don't forget the list I shared in April for Autism Awareness Month. 

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Books on Community Gardening and Pollination to Inspire Young Readers by Kristen Wilkinson

Miguel’s Community Garden, written by JaNay Brown-Wood and illustrated by Samara Hardy, is a beautiful, interactive story. The author guides readers to help Miguel find his sunflowers by comparing plant characteristics, such as leaf shape and petal color, which are illustrated in plenty of detail to allow readers to investigate the garden. The diverse cast of characters shows that everyone is welcome at the community garden. The colorful, detailed illustrations will keep kids’ attention while the story guides parents to discuss the different plants they see from spinach to mushrooms. You don’t need to be a plant expert to help Miguel find his sunflowers in time for the garden party! 
The Reason for a Flower: A Book About Flowers, Pollen, and Seeds, written and illustrated by Ruth Heller, explains the process of pollination in fanciful verse. Read these two books together with your 6-9 year old child to show how pollination produces many of the foods present in Miguel’s Community Garden. Explore your own kitchen to find foods that are the result of pollination such as tomatoes, apples or rice. If you have a garden or can visit one, go looking for pollinators like bees and butterflies, and see if you can watch them at work. Make note of which flowers they visit. Then come back in a few weeks to see if a fruit is growing from the pollinated flowers. Exploring the natural world with your child can be as simple as looking for insects outside your front door. At the Environmental Learning Center, we emphasize that any time spent outdoors is valuable. Kids don’t need a grand adventure to the wilderness; they just need to explore in their neighborhood with a caring adult.  

Kristen Wilkinson is the Program Director for the Colorado State University Environmental Learning Center, an environmental education outreach center in Northern Colorado for children and adults.Download the FREE PDF on Tips for Connecting Books to Summer Fun. Watch for more book titles and tips coming weekly through the summer. Sign up for the newsletter HERE to keep up with articles and you will receive the free writing template for Travel Trouble.