If Common Core is about encouraging inquiry, the people we should be consulting are trained librarians: the masters of guided, deep inquiry. Susan Raben at Lyon is a master librarian and clear communicator: she should be teaching thousands of educators nationwide about inquiry. Rachel Davidson, at Henking, is a new tech guru who taught me tons about QR codes and how to get kids creating content and truly interacting with the web, not just imbibing it mindlessly. Hey, administrators nationwide…need help with common core? Go look for the experienced, trained librarians you’ve been undervaluing and laying off. (Thankfully, not these two, whose administrators know they rock.) Librarians are the ones who know how to get kids thinking more deeply about text and content! And these were just two librarians/inquiry masters i met last week while doing school visits in Glenview, IL. This week I’m in schools again; who knows who I might meet.

When I saw Steve Jenkins’ art for our new book, Eat Like a Bear (Sept 10, 2013, Holt), I was amazed. The  bears’ bodies were so furry-looking. I emailed Steve about it. He told me their bodies were made of amate, Mexican bark paper. Bark paper? You know me and my love o’ plants. I had to find out more.  Turns out that this paper is made from fig and mulberry trees by craftspeople in a few small villages in the mountains of Mexico. It has a really deep history. The Mayan and Aztec people held it sacred. The craft almost died out but survived in one Otomi village in Mexico. Oh, there’s so much more to the story, I almost wish I could write a book about it. Hmm…!  Take a look at this article on the web and you’ll see why I fell under the spell of this complex bark paper story: Amate Art of Mexico

AAAS Science NetLinks has put up an excellent K-2 lesson on food chains that uses Vulture View and Trout Are Made of Trees. It links with Project 2061 Benchmark 5 The Living Environment; and National Science Standard C, Life Science.  The National Science Teachers Association website has a section called  NSTA RECOMMENDS which points out good resources for science teaching. Here Come the Humpbacks was just added with a full review.

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If you want to know who I am and what I do, NAEYC’s Young Children magazine November 2012 issues has what’s probably my best interview yet: www.naeyc.org/yc/files/yc/file/201211/MeetTheAuthor.pdf

Last Fall I spoke at the national conference of NAEYC, in the Meet the Authors session, which featured Mem Fox and James Dean, creator/illustrator of Pete the Cat.  Yes, I know, MEM FOX! Wow, her voice is enthralling.

James Dean creator of Pete the Cat, Mem Fox (center) telling something funny to April Pulley Sayre

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Choosing snack to munch while going over proofs for Fall 2013 book illustrated by Steve Jenkins. Yup, blueberries!

There was a TED talk recently about vultures.  I think educators might be interested in seeing it for their own background research. It’s only a little over six minutes long.  You’ll want to look it over first before deciding whether it is appropriate for your elementary school students. The humor at the beginning would probably raise more sidetracking questions than it would actual vulture inquiry. So take a look and perhaps start two minutes twenty seconds in (2:20). Because the rest of it is good stuff for older elementary, middle school, and high school. There are quite a few carcasses involved and it is frank in environmental threats to vultures worldwide.

Want to know what to plant to help native pollinators in your area? Check out the free guides on the website of  the Pollinator Partnership. Wish I’d seen this before my book Touch A Butterfly: Wildlife Gardening For Kids went to press because I would have loved to list it and these folks are doing such important work. Touch a Butterfly: Wildlife Gardening With Kids will be available in bookstores April 23, 2013 and can also be ordered from www.roostbooks.com. They’re the publishers of the I LOVE DIRT book from a few years ago. It’s geared for families, educators, and interested kids in upper elementary grades, as well. It’s my 25 years of knowledge about seeing the landscape through the eyes of animals and gardening with their needs in mind. Probably my most personal work.

Eat Like a Bear, my book illustrated by Steve Jenkins comes out in late 2012. But I’m already gathering like a bear for winter. The bears in that book are brown bears (grizzlies) but perhaps your classrooms want to study black bears. Here’s a great place to start. My cousin suggested that I might learn from this fellow and it seems he might do presentations in New England so perhaps some schools/organizations might want to work with him.

Ben Kilham presentations

He’s written books and has been featured in television programs. See here.

Science Books and Films’ November 2012 issue has an article by Terrence E. Young, Jr that celebrates  science picture books: “November is Science Picture Book Month.”   Vulture View and Stars Beneath Your Bed are mentioned and there’s a page at the end with a paragraph quote about my view of science picture books. Also, a new article on my writing process is in Bruce Black’s wordswimmer blog.