Nonfiction Monday: The Great Molasses Flood

The Great Molasses Flood: Boston 1919
written by Deborah Kops
2012 (Charlesbridge)
Source: Review copy provided by the publisher

Check out Nonfiction Monday at Wrapped in Foil

On January 15, 1919, a molasses truck at 529 Commercial Street exploded under pressure, killing 21 people. A 40-foot wave of molasses buckled the elevated railroad tracks, crushed buildings and inundated the neighborhood. 
- Commemorative plaque on Commercial Street in Boston

It was an unusually warm day in January 1919. Workers were eating lunch while housewives were hanging laundry and children were playing. Standing out among the buildings on Commercial Street was a tank that held over 2.3 million gallons of molasses. Owned by the U.S. Industrial Alcohol Company (USIA), this tank held the equivalent weight of 13,000 Fords. The molasses was going to be converted into rum. This needed to be done quickly as the 18th amendment was about to be ratified and Prohibition would rule the land. Laws banning alcoholic drinks would go into effect a year after ratification. In Chapter 1, you are introduced to many people who are going to be affected by the explosion of the tank. There is nothing abnormal about this day, but that is about to change. Between 12:30 and 12:40 p.m., the tank gave way and a wave of molasses came crashing down upon the buildings and other structures on the north end of Commercial Street. Deborah Kops presents the personal stories that make history come alive for children. You feel the heartache of nine year old Antonio DiStasio who, along with his older sister Maria and two friends, was trying to get a taste of the excess molasses that came from the tank. Antonio ended up losing his sister and one of his friends in this tragedy. Along with the personal stories, there is a mystery element to this narrative. How did the tank explode and how will acting judge Hugh Ogden rule in the civil case brought by the victims against USIA? You keep reading as the case unwinds because you want answers to these questions and that is what a good nonfiction read will accomplish. Two other features in The Great Molasses Flood enhance the reader's knowledge. Sepia toned photographs give you a sense of the setting and how the flood unfolded. Kops also added sections in several chapters to provide background knowledge for the reader. We learn about the anarchist movement of the early 20th century which could be connected to the issues of terrorism that are prevalent today. Other topics include women's suffrage and historical figures of the day.

The Great Molasses Flood would make for an interesting contrast to the Titanic tragedy of 1912. How were these two tragedies similar? Do we have similar tragedies today that are caused by human error? This is a fascinating account that will enliven your instruction of early 20th century history.

You should see this terrific fermentation activity at Growing With Science that is linked to the review at Wrapped in Foil.

Pig Pig Meets the Lion

Pig Pig Meets the Lion
written and illustrated by David McPhail
2012 (Charlesbridge)
Source: Review copy provided by the publisher

In a beginning series of wordless pages, a lion makes a late night escape over the zoo wall. He journeys out of town and climbs up a tree and into Pig Pig's bedroom. When Pig Pig wakes up, he has a rather large cat replacing a smaller cat on his bed. Instead of being the lion's breakfast, Pig Pig has found a running buddy. Down the steps, through the kitchen, and over the big chair go Pig Pig and the lion. Pig Pig's mother tells him about a lion escaping from the zoo, but is unaware that this lion is in her house. Pig Pig asks about keeping the lion that he has found, but his mother doesn't understand that this question is not hypothetical. When the family is eating breakfast, the lion snuggles under the table and munches on the house cat's food. A knock on the door brings a change of direction for the lion.

I love books that can be read in a short amount of time, but can be used in a variety of lessons. The obvious lesson with Pig Pig Meets the Lion is one featuring prepositions. David McPhail highlights the prepositions in bold print. Where was this book when I was in middle school? You could easily use this at several age levels to teach prepositions. I also plan on taking Pig Pig to school tomorrow to help me teach students how to use dialogue in their personal narratives. Lessons on friendship and sequence could also be taught. The open ending to this book begs for young students to write about what happens next to the lion. Pig Pig Meets the Lion is a delightful read, but as teachers, we also purchase books with an eye on how they can help us teach children and this book is a bargain.

Nonfiction Monday: Bats! Furry Fliers of the Night (iPad app)

Bats! Furry Fliers of the Night (iPad book app)
written by Mary Kay Carson
2012 (Bookerella and Story Worldwide)
Source: Review copy provided by the publisher

Check out Nonfiction Monday at Capstone Connect

When I was young and hanging out in a department store, I saw a television that was displaying a game called Pong. I was instantly mesmerized. The dot went back and forth on the screen and you could control the paddles with a joystick. We could play games on television and life would never be the same. Several decades later, I'm writing about nonfiction books and that same sense of youthful awe has hit me again. Bats! Furry Fliers of the Night is a 3-D book app that is unlike anything I have seen before for a nonfiction book. The first page takes you into the dark forest and you hear the rapid flapping of bat wings. Consecutive close-ups bring a bat front and center so you can see the outline of its fingers. Click on a bright light and you get a diagram of the bat's body and this is just the first chapter. There are six other chapters which cover topics like echolocation, varieties of bats, bat colonies, and other bat facts. There are so many effects that will engage readers. The depth created by the 3-D effect is terrific. When the camera moves, you see the world from the point of view of the bat. It is this movement and the close-ups that separate Bats! from what we have seen before in nonfiction book apps. You read the text on the left and then you get pictures that really bring home the information. This is most evident when you read chapter 4 which shows how bats use sound to find their way in the night. An outline of a bat, like an x-ray, flies over a grid and bounces sound off of different objects. The reader gets a good sense of how the process of echolocation works. Perhaps the best effect is when you finish the book. Readers can manipulate the iPad and steer the bat over the forest as a reward for finishing reading.

The text in Bats! is at about a late second or third grade level. This makes it perfect for struggling readers in higher grade levels. They could read this book and think it's really cool. When you have this level of visual effects, students will want to read it over and over again which promotes fluency. I think Bats! would also be a great tool for practicing summarizing. The chapters are the right size for learning how to use this strategy. If you use an iPad in your classroom or with your own child, it is definitely the price of admission to enter this world of Bats!.

STEM Friday: Step Inside!

Step Inside!
written by Catherine Ham
2012 (Early Light)
Source: Review copy provided by the publisher

Check out STEM Friday at Simply Science





Which home would you use
If you had to choose?


A hole in a tree
Or one deep in the ground?
A reef in the sea?
Or a tall termite mound?

Step Inside! is a poetic look at animal habitats. Over twenty different homes are featured. Inside each poem is a plethora of information. For example, students will learn that trapdoor spiders live inside a burrow and spin webs not to catch animals, but instead use the silk to build a hinge that opens the door. The door is hidden by bits of plant and soil. The spider pops out of the door like a jack-in-the-box and captures its surprised prey. This poem contains vocabulary (burrow, crafty, hinge) that can be connected to other areas. You can ask questions like "What other animals might live in a burrow?" or "Where have you seen a hinge before?". I like the variety of species featured in Step Inside! as well. You get animals from fresh and salt water. There are animals that live in trees and those that dig their homes in the ground. Animals as large as an elephant and as small as a wasp are presented. This provides the opportunity for students to categorize the information, which is a vital skill for young scientists. This is also a strength of Ham's sister book, Open Wide!.

As we approach the Common Core standards era, with its emphasis on nonfiction text, teachers need books that can be used for cross curricular purposes. Books like Step Inside! that combine poetry and science will be important resources.

Left, Right, Emma!

Left, Right, Emma!
written and illustrated by Stuart J. Murphy
2012 (Charlesbridge)
Source: Review copy provided by the publisher

Knowing your left from your right is pretty big accomplishment for a young child. When I worked in kindergarten, I would tell students to look at the back of their hands and the hand that made an "L" shape was their left hand. This seemed an effective method, but I could have used Left, Right, Emma! as an added resource. In the story, Emma loves to march around her house. She's usually followed by her dog Pickle (Note to future authors: If you want reviewers to like your book, include a dog named Pickle. It works for me.). Her preschool class is going to form a marching band for Grandparents Day, so naturally Emma would volunteer to be the leader, but she doesn't raise her hand. Emma is unsure since she is not confident in her knowledge of left and right. Fortunately, her teacher, Miss Cathy, is a knowing soul and she asks Emma to join her in leading two lines. With Emma on her right, Miss Cathy has the class march around the playground. Emma is still not completely sure, so her teacher ties a red string around Emma's wrist and this visual makes all the difference. Emma leads the band and Grandparents Day is a great success.

I've never read a book about this particular cognitive skill, so right away I'm happy to have this resource for a preschool or kindergarten class. I can pull a small group and read this book to students who may be having problems distinguishing between their left and right. Stuart J. Murphy purposefully loads this book with visual cues which makes it great for young learners. I also like the kinesthetic possibilities presented by Left, Right, Emma!. I can easily imagine preschoolers marching around the playground after reading this book. It would be worth the time to check out Murphy's other books in his I See I Learn series.

Nonfiction Monday: A Warmer World

A Warmer World
written by Caroline Arnold; illustrated by Jamie Hogan
2012 (Charlesbridge)
Source: Review copy provided by the publisher

Check out Nonfiction Monday at Wendie's Wanderings

In A Warmer World, Caroline Arnold gives a straightforward presentation of the effects of climate change on the natural world. She starts with the case of the golden toad in Costa Rica. Arnold explains that drier weather brought on by climate change caused puddles to disappear quickly and leave the golden toad eggs without water. The golden toad was gone within two years and has not been seen since. The next section talks about how the Earth's climate has changed in the last century. I love how the author lays out the difference between climate and weather:

Climate is the average weather in a particular place measured over time. Weather is the state of the atmosphere around us at a particular place and time. In other words, climate is what you expect (for example, a wet spring) and weather is what you get (for example, a thunderstorm).

In later sections, Arnold addresses how climate change causes animals to migrate to places that were previously cooler. This can create more competition for resources. The melting of polar regions and rising sea levels are also presented as problems caused by global warming. More than once, the author explains that the earth has warmed before, but that it is the rate of warming at this time that concerns scientists.

I really like how the text is written in this book. Each one page piece is full of information, but not so that it is overwhelming for a strong second or third grade reader. There are not very many books on climate change for younger readers, but I also think this will be a welcome resource for a wide range of grade levels. Middle school students could use this book just as easily as a third grader. I also think there is a golden opportunity for discussion with A Warmer World. If you do a little research, you will find those who  differ with some of the conclusions drawn by the author in this book. With nonfiction, one of the skills we would like to teach our students is to read and weigh the evidence. If you can find an opposing opinion that is well reasoned, I think it would be good to present it and work with students to develop their own opinion about the effects of climate change.

STEM Friday: Open Wide!

Open Wide!
written by Catherine Ham
2012 (Early Light Books)
Source: Review copy provided by the publisher

Check out STEM Friday at Wrapped in Foil

The obvious place to start when thinking about animal mouths is how the mouth is used to capture prey. Open Wide! provides plenty of examples of this feature. The ferocious jaws of an eel, the hook mouth of the penguin, and the pointy front teeth of the big cats are just some of the meal munching openings that you will see, but there is much more in this book. You have animals that use their mouths to cool off. Crocodiles can't sweat so their only way of cooling off in the heat is to open their mouths. This is where you understand the strength of Open Wide! You get interesting animal facts inside each poem. It's like my childhood where Mom would buy me a box of cereal and there was a cool toy inside. I would call these toys "Free Insides". The animal facts in Open Wide! are like free insides to me. One of the coolest "free insides" is learning about the poisonous slobber of the komodo dragon. The brightly colored tentacles of the file clam are another fascinating find in this book. In the back matter, you will see ten other animal mouths where you can make comparisons with the animals in the main part of the book.

Open Wide! would be a good book to use for teaching children how to categorize items. You can sort these animal mouths into beaks and non-beaks or sort according to the type of teeth or whether the animal is land-based or sea-based. Another thought is to pull this book out during Dental Health Week and talk about why teeth are so important and how we need to take care of them.

The Snow Leopard Dream

The Snow Leopard Dream
written in collaboration with Rokhshana Girls' School Students, Afghanistan; illustrated by Buth Sonrin and Roeun Sokhum
2011 (Dot-to-Dot Books)
Source: Review copy provided by the publisher

The Snow Leopard Dream is a unique collaboration with the story generated by a writing competition led by the nonprofit Help the Afghan Children (HTAC). Twelve Afghan girls created this story about the endangered snow leopard. In the story, a girl in a small Afghan village asks her father about the snow leopard that lives at the top of a steep mountain. He tells her not to worry about the leopard and to get some rest. She drifts off to sleep and dreams that she and her father have traveled up the mountain. They are lacking food, so he leaves her at the tent as he goes off to find food. Later, the girl hears a loud snap and follows the sound up the mountain. The snow leopard has been caught in a trap and is freed by the girl. After being freed, the leopard leaves the girl and she begins to descend down the ledge. She is trapped by a pack of wolves and receives help from a surprising source.

This book is the result of a initiative by Dot-to-Dot to develop the creativity of children to help the cause of endangered animals (Endangered Species, Empowered Communities). In the back matter, you get information about snow leopards, Afghanistan, the girls' school, and HTAC. I think this story can send a message to children that books can change lives. The Snow Leopard Dream would be a good text to read before writing stories that you want to publish for display.  Children can see that other kids have published their stories. You also get a story in a setting that our students have heard about (Afghanistan), but have little knowledge. Graphic organizers could be used to compare the two cultures. A percentage of the profits from this book will go to Help the Afghan Children and for the conservation of snow leopards.

Nonfiction Monday: Prairie Storms

Prairie Storms
written by Darcy Pattison; illustrated by Kathleen Rietz
(2011) Sylvan Dell
Source: Orange County Public Library

Check out Nonfiction Monday at Shelf-Employed

I just finished reading Skylark, the sequel to Sarah, Plain and Tall, with one of the reading groups in my class. The weather on the prairie is an important feature of the plot in this story and I wish I had taken time to read Prairie Storms as we were reading the novel. My students would have learned that it can be quite dry on the prairie and that information would have helped their understanding of the main issue in Skylark. Prairie Storms is a month-by-month account of the prairie climate, with weather and its effect on animal habitats described in a vivid paragraph narrative. Accompanying each monthly chronicle is a two page watercolor illustration that is realistic and engaging. I really like the language Darcy Pattison uses to illuminate the climate for a particular month. Look at this example for August:

Still no rain. Clouds gather, but in this heat wave, the air just crackles with dry lightning. Flash! Flash! Flash! In the dry sandy soil, the earless lizard shimmies and disappears beneath the surface. 

Pattison takes great care in choosing animated adjectives and verbs to make the narrative sparkle. This book would be a good choice for modeling how to make nonfiction writing shine. After reading Prairie Storms, students could create their own monthly booklets to describe the weather and habitats in their area. You could divide students into partners and assign each group a month. Other lesson ideas (52 page pdf!) and related websites are available on the Sylvan Dell website. The back matter for this book is also available on the Prairie Storms website.

Other reviews:
Simply Science
Archimedes Notebook (includes interview)

Decimal Flash Games

Decimal Squares
created by Albert Bradley Bennett, Jr.

I stumbled upon these flash games yesterday as I was preparing to work with a math review group. We played Decimal Darts and had a great time.
Players have to estimate the mixed number that will guide the dart to pop one of three balloons. It's a challenging game which keeps students interested. I used it as a reward between solving written problems with the review groups. I have a SmartBoard, but you can easily use this on a student computer in class as well. Cool stuff!

STEM Friday: A Leaf Can Be...

A Leaf Can Be...
written by Laura Purdie Salas; illustrated by Violeta Dabija
2012 (Millbrook Press)
Source: Review copy provided by the publisher

Check out STEM Friday at Laurie Thompson 
Check out Poetry Friday at Wild Rose Reader

A leaf can be a ...
Soft cradle; Water ladle
Sun taker; Food maker

Lovely: Having a beauty that appeals to the heart or mind as well as to the eye. (Dictionary.com)

A Leaf Can Be... is lovely. The appeal to the heart for me is the number of connections I made while reading this book of leafy verse. I remember raking leaves with my grandmother and the woods that I played in as a child. The leaf booklet I made with wax paper in 5th grade and the beauty of the western North Carolina mountains in fall. Appealing to my mind were all the uses of a leaf Laura Purdie Salas manages to put into this book. Versatile is not the first word I think of when I hear leaf, but they can serve so many purposes. A lesson on theme using this book could be taught with the idea that leaves are essential to life.  I would think about doing a before, during, and after reading circle map with young readers. I would write this question above the circle: "What can you do with a leaf?". You can have students suggest ideas for the map as a whole class and with turn-and-talk partners. There are also vocabulary lessons to be had with words like concealer and welter. Many of the two word phrases could also be introductions to science lessons on topics like photosynthesis or camouflage. The appeal to the eye is the sumptuous artwork by Violeta Dabija. I'm not terribly eloquent when describing illustrations, so all I can say is that I love these pictures. The combinations of blue and green are wonderful.

A Leaf Can Be... could also serve as a fun shared reading experience with younger readers. They will enjoy reading this book several times. It wouldn't be difficult to create a reader's theater script out of the text and have students draw leaves on bulletin board paper to serve as a backdrop for your performance. I would add A Leaf Can Be... to my science and poetry collections.

Sea of Dreams

Sea of Dreams
illustrated by Dennis Nolan
2011 (Roaring Brook Press)
Source: Orange County Public Library

In this wordless fantasy, a young girl is creating a sand castle. She leaves the castle at the end of the day, but as dusk nears its end, a light comes on in a turret. A tiny community of people leave the castle just as the tide comes rolling through. Encountering an enormous wave, a small child falls off the boat. Fortunately, mermaids come to the rescue and the child is returned to his boat. As dawn breaks, the people in the boat see an island, dominated by a large rock, in the distance. The group disembarks and finds shelter in a cave. Meanwhile, the young girl arrives back on her beach to create another castle.

With an inventive wordless book, there are a lot of possibilities to tie in writing. Sea of Dreams would allow a class to create a sentence for each page or to create a sequel book. Good wordless books also create plenty of opportunities for prediction. When I flip through the pages, it is too easy to think of David Wiesner's Flotsam. If you read ten reviews of this book, I bet at least half reference Flotsam in the review. Still, it would be interesting to read these books back to back and see how students compare the two. I would also ask students to discuss the title and guess why Dennis Nolan chose this title. Sea of Dreams is a wordless feast for young readers.

Other reviews:
proseandkahn