Picture Book Science: More Resources

If you enjoy the idea of incorporating children's literature with your science lessons, I'd like to draw your attention to a couple more resources: Picture-Perfect Science Lessons and More Picture Perfect Science Lessons, both written by Karen Ansberry and published by the National Science Teachers Association. 

These books provide complete lessons based on children's picture books, including ready-to-copy handouts for students. 

I would say the lessons are largely geared to elementary aged students, though things can be adjusted up or down to meet other groups' needs. 

They're really nice books, but seem to be a bit pricier than some, at least at the sources I've checked.  With a little bit of work you may be able to get them through your library, if you want to check them out before making the investment.  My local library system didn't possess either book, but they maintain an affiliation with some of the state universities, at least one of which did have the books in their collection.  It took a little more time and effort (on my librarian's part) than a regular book request, but with my librarian's help, I was able to get my hands on the books without laying out any money.  It's certainly worth striking up a conversation with your local librarian and seeing if it's a possibility for you.

Earth Day: The Lorax

The Lorax is a great story to share with your students around Earth Day (or any other time, for that matter).

There is a video available, but I'm partial to reading to my students (and they seem to enjoy it as well). 

Following the telling of the tale (or the watching of the DVD), have your students consider the following:

• What does a "Thneed" represent?
• List some "Thneeds" in our society today.
• Who does the "Once-ler" represent?
• How was the "Once-ler" irresponsible?
• What could the "Once-ler" have done to protect the natural resources while still manufacturing "Thneeds"?
• Did the "Once-ler" feel that he was part of the Truffula Land?  Explain.
• Can we separate ourselves from our natural environment?  Why or why not?
• The "Once-ler" excuses himself with "Well if I didn't do it, then someone else would."*  Is this a valid excuse?  Why or why not?
• Who does the "Lorax" represent?

*In the video version (at least in an older version, it looks like there's a newer edition, which I haven't seen, so I don't know if it's word-for-word the same or not). 

A Call for Ideas

I'm working on a series of posts relating books and science activities for coming weeks and months.

While I've been gathering titles for a while now, I'd love to get your input to extend my list.

I'm largely looking for titles of good quality picture books that have some theme or aspect that could be tied into a science lesson.  (For this project, I'm not looking for books that are overt in their science message, for example the Magic School Bus books.)

Please send me your titles, either as a comment on this post, or you can email adventures{dot}in{dot}science{at}gmail{dot}com with your thoughts.

If you have a science lesson in mind to go with the book, feel free to include that (if you're willing).

If you don't have a precise lesson in mind, but have a general idea of what could be done with your title, feel free to include that.

If you don't have any idea of what could be done with your book but just have a general feeling that the book lends itself to the possibility of a science lesson, pass it along.  I'm happy to try to match up books with activities.

At this point, I'm largely focused on picture books, but if you have some young adult novels in mind, you're welcome to pass them along and I'll work my way through them as well. 

I'm looking forward to hearing your suggestions and encountering some new books!

Snowflake Bentley

These are some great resources to pair with Sparkly Snowflakes. 

If you study weather and snow, or are just looking to do something seasonal, check out some of these resources.

Wilson Bentley was the first man to photograph individual snowflakes, in 1885.  He's the person who determined that no two snowflakes are exactly the same.  A fascinating man, indeed.

Start your research at the Official Website of Wilson A. Bentley.  You'll find a brief biography there, and some wonderful, printable images of his photographs. I printed out the collection and laminated them for my students to look at and admire. 

For a more thorough biography, and one to share with your students, check out Snowflake Bentley.  It's a picture book intended for children.  The biography is written as a story, with a lot of factual information in the margins - you can decide how much to share based on your students.


For your own knowledge, you may want to read The Snowflake Man: A Biography of Wilson A. Bentley.  I haven't read the whole book, but have read an excerpt.  You can probably get it through your library system. 

Two other books that look interesting are Snowflakes in Photographs and Snow Crystals. I'm not familiar with either book, but they are both collections of Bentley's images.  Again, it might be worth looking for these at the library before investing. 

Book: Odd Boy Out

This is a nice picture book biography of Albert Einstein. 

Most of Einstein's work is so upper-level that elementary and middle school students don't have reason to study this great mind.  That said, most of those students have at least some passing knowledge of Albert Einstein and many of them can rattle off E=mc2 (even if they have no idea what that means).  As a result, at some point during the year, you will likely find yourself hearing some mention of Einstein in your classroom. 

Instead of shrugging it off, why not share this story with your students.  It will give them a bit more of his story, and what a story it is.  The man whose man has become synonomous with genius wasn't always thought to be so bright.  He really didn't like school and people found him to be odd.  You might find some or your students can relate to Einstein's childhood - and it's a good reminder to all of us that you can't know a person by outward appearances. 

Basic Not Boring Workbooks

There comes a time when every teacher needs to use worksheets.  Some use them more readily than others, but everyone uses them some of the time.  

I like the worksheets found in the Basic Not Boring series.  They show a great variety of work (not the same sheet over and over again with different information plugged into it) and the fonts and sketches are more fun than basic text.  The work is intended for students in grades 6-8, and I have found it to be age and developmentally appropriate for my students.

Of course, it's unlikely that anything in these books is going to match your curriculum perfectly, since they aren't connected to a specific curriculum, but I've found them to be a good resource when I need something more.  

I have used:

Earth and Space Science

Life Science

 Physical Science

Human Body & Health

If you teach other subject areas, you can find books from the same series for math, history and language arts.

Book: Spectacular Science

Spectacular Science: A Book of Poemsis another great collection of poems for the science classroom.  This is a collection of poems by a variety of poets, the most well-known (to me) being Carl Sandburg.

They aren't quite as whimsical or humorous as those found in Science Verse, but still enjoyable.  And a good way to introduce a topic of study.  They also might help you reach a student more interested in literature than science.

Book: Super Science Concoctions

Super Science Concoctions: 50 Mysterious Mixtures for Fabulous Fun is a great collection of science activities and demonstrations. 

I picked up this book at the library one day, at random, to see what it had to offer.  I have to admit that I was quite impressed with the collection.  Several activities were familiar to me, but there were a lot of new ones. And I like the way in which the familiar ones were presented. 

If you include all the follow-up activities, there are well more than 50 things to do in this book.  In addition, it's really about more than mixtures (that part of the title had lowered my expectations).  It's largely about liquids, covering topics of solutions, phase changes, chemical changes, density, viscosity, surfact tension, polymers, etc. 

Each activity includes a section, "The Principle of the Thing", which does a really nice job of explaining the science behind the experiment in kid-friendly terms. 

Book: A Really Short History of Nearly Everything

http://science-mattersblog.blogspot.com/2010/06/books-short-history-of-nearly.html

I've previously espoused my love for Bill Bryson's A Short History of Nearly Everything.  This, A Really Short History of Nearly Everything, is the kid-friendly version of that book. 


This version uses text from the original (which I really like about it) and it adds lots of illustrations, many of them humorous, which fits right in with Bryson's writing style.  Of course the text is abridged to student-friendly length and content.  Each topic is given a two page spread, and like the original, you can open the book to any page you wish and dive right in. 

I think I would stick with the original for reading aloud to students, as the text flows better and provides more information  than in the Really Short version.  The text in A Really Short History of Nearly Everything is fragmented and interspersed amongst the pictures, which makes it difficult to read aloud (unless you're looking to share a single fact), but it's wonderful for students to pick up and page through on their own.