Cross-Curricular

STEM Tuesday– Checking Your Health — Book List

By STEM Tuesday on August 7, 2018 / Common Core & NGSS, Cross-Curricular, Health, STEM Tuesday

History is filled with interesting tales of mysterious illnesses. These books feature the stories of the science and discovery behind medical mysteries and also some new medical threats facing the world today. These books intrigue readers who love mysteries, science, and healthcare.

Bubonic Panic: When Plague Invaded America by Gail Jarrow

Many think of the plague as a disease that killed many people in Europe, but it also came to America. A man died of the bubonic plague in America in 1900. This book tells the story of America’s first plague epidemic. Pair this book with the historical novel Chasing Secrets: A Deadly Surprise in a City of Lies by Newbery Medalist Gennifer Choldenko, a medical mystery abut the plague.

Pandemic: How Climate, the Environment, and Superbugs Increase the Risk by Connie Goldsmith

Goldsmith’s new title shows the links between climate, the environment, and disease. Are we creating unnecessary risk with unsustainable environmental practices? A timely and important look at the possibility of a world-wide health crisis.

Ebola: Fears and Facts by Patricia Newman

From 1975 to 2013 this deadly disease killed about 1,500 people. If that wasn’t bad enough the numbers jumped to six times that number in 2014. Read about this disease and the heroic people who helped stop its spread. Particularly relevant in the wake of the newest outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Science Comics Series — Plagues: The Microscopic Battlefield by Falynn Koch and The Brain: Ultimate Thinking Machine by Tory Woolcott and Alex Graudins

This graphic novel/comic series is perfect for reluctant readers and budding scientists. These titles contain a fictional premise wrapped around scientific facts.

Red Madness: How a Medical Mystery Changed What We Eat by Gail Jarrow

Readers will discover a little known epidemic that struck the United States in the early 20th century and how preventative measures changed the way we eat. Includes 100 archival photos, scientific investigations, and the real-life stories of victims of this mysterious illness.

Human Body Theater by Maris Wicks

This fun, informative graphic novel about the human body is perfect for young biology students. A master of ceremonies leads readers through a theatrical revue of each system within the body. Clever!

Florence Nightingale: The Courageous Life of the Legendary Nurse by Catherine Reef

This biography tells the story of a compassionate, remarkable nurse, whose modern methods of nursing became the standards of today. Did you know she also defied the Victorian mores of her time?

American Plague: The True and Terrifying Story of the Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1793 by Jim Murphy

This award-winning title invites readers to discover the epidemic that spread through Philadelphia. Pair it with Laurie Halse Anderson’s historical fiction Fever 1793.

Invincible Microbe: Tuberculosis and the Never Ending Search for a Cure by Jim Murphy and Alison Blank, plus Breakthrough: How Three People Saved “Blue Babies” and Changed Medicine Forever by Jim Murphy

These two titles give readers a look into how dedicated doctors and scientists have impacted life for millions of people.

STEM Tuesday book lists prepared by:

Nancy Castaldo has written books about our planet for over 20 years including her 2016 title, THE STORY OF SEEDS: From Mendel’s Garden to Your Plate, and How There’s More of Less To Eat Around The World, which earned the Green Earth Book Award and other honors. Nancy’s research has taken her all over the world from the Galapagos to Russia. She enjoys sharing her adventures, research, and writing tips. She strives to inform, inspire, and educate her readers. Nancy also serves as the Regional Advisor of the Eastern NY SCBWI region. Her 2018 title is BACK FROM THE BRINK: Saving Animals from Extinction. www.nancycastaldo.com

Patricia Newman writes middle-grade nonfiction that inspires kids to seek connections between science, literacy, and the environment. The recipient of a Sibert Honor Award for Sea Otter Heroes and the Green Earth Book Award for Plastic, Ahoy!, her books have received starred reviews, been honored as Junior Library Guild Selections, and included on Bank Street College’s Best Books lists. During author visits, she demonstrates how her writing skills give a voice to our beleaguered environment. Visit her at www.patriciamnewman.com.

STEM Tuesday — Deep Space and Beyond — Writing Craft & Resources

By STEM Tuesday on July 24, 2018 / Common Core & NGSS, Cross-Curricular, Space, STEM Tuesday

Interesting Intros

If you are like me, by the time you’ve read the first page or two, you’ve already decided if you’ll finish a book. The beginning, the intro, the hook, those are crucial to a reading experience.

blank page, book, textbook, university, wisdom, writing So crucial, in fact, that when a nonfiction author writes a book proposal (an overview, outline, comparable books, audience information, author platform, etc.) the writing sample that accompanies the proposal almost always includes the introduction. Editors don’t ask to see the chapter that will require the utmost skill in handling technical information – in the space books featured this month that could include trajectories, subsystems, eight letter acronyms, and numbers too large for the human brain to grasp. They don’t ask to see the conclusion chapter – the one that is likely to require the greatest artistic ability to tie up the loose ends of in-depth concepts, inspire the reader, and launch them into further inquiry. No, editors want to see the introduction. The one that requires both art and craft, wound together skillfully enough to hook a young reader.

So, how do successful writers begin? Let’s take a look at the choices made by Mary Kay Carson, Elizabeth Rusch, and Catherine Thimmesh in Mission to Pluto: The First Visit to an Ice Dwarf and the Kuiper Belt, Impact: Asteroids and the Science of Saving the World, and Team Moon: How 400,000 People Landed Apollo 11 on the Moon.

Setting the Mood

The first spread of Mission to Pluto is filled with a photo, a room packed with adults waving American flags and cheering. The text is all about setting the scene. Author Mary Kay Carson could have chosen just about any detail:

the phones clicking pictures
the type of stick the flags were attached to
the hair styles of the individuals

But instead she picked details that accentuated her subject matter:

a nine-sided mission patch
a robotic spacecraft
a dwarf planet

She selected characters such as Bill Nye, the Science Guy, whose inclusion emphasized the magnitude of the occasion. And, she chose a quote (“Now we’re finally going to find out what really…”) that focused a spotlight on the mood in the room – a mood of anticipation. Thanks to the author’s skill, the text oozes that mood and lures me into flipping that page.

Building Anticipation

When you open Impact, you’ll be gazing deep into the starry sky. Like Carson, Rusch puts us right into a scene. From the text, we get concrete information like the date and location (a Russian city) but we get much more. People are “bundled up tightly;” they “crunched their way through the snow.” When I read “At 9:20 a.m.” – not “That morning” or “Sometime that day” – my readering radar goes off because that specificity is a clue that something is about to happen.

In the next bit, the words: “a strange bright point” followed by mysterious smoky trails tell us just enough to imply impending action. Not yet willing to give away the action, Rusch then artfully turns our attention to a class of fourth graders. Who’s the intended audience of this book? Fourth graders. Brilliant. Only then, when the scene is set, the anticipation built, and the relatable characters introduced, only then does the author unleash the action. “Duck and cover!” Eager to know what happens to these kids, we flip the page.

Using the Unexpected

Team Moon begins with a full-page, labeled image of the flight path of Apollo 11. Because the path is not nearly as straight forward as I had anticipated, my finger immediately starts tracing the white and then the blue lines and purple arrows. That image is coupled with a simple intro “The Dream . . . ” and a teaser “And the Challenge . . .” which has me charging forward to learn more.

The next page is not at all what I had expected, either. There is no traditional introductory sentence, no watered down overview of the lesson we are about to receive, no generalizations what-so-ever. Instead there is an unexpected photograph (black and white, a crowd of men huddled around a tv set), lots of specific verbs (dominate, transmit, clicked), and language that gushes with enthusiasm (flat-out miracle, wonder of wonders, flush with anticipation).

Applying These Lessons

Close reading of these introductions has me reflecting on my own writing. Could I make use of more specific verbs? How can I build the anticipation? Which of the many characters in a science story will be the best hook for my target audience? I’m grateful for mentor texts such as these.

—

By Heather L. Montgomery

Heather L. Montgomery writes for kids who are WILD about animals. She reads and writes while high in a tree, standing in a stream, or perched on a mountaintop boulder. www.HeatherLMontgomery.com

O.O.L.F.

The Out Of Left Field files this month focus on nonfiction kidlit resources. Readers and teachers, if you have any interesting resources to share, please leave them in a comment below.

https://www.nonfictionminute.org/ The Nonfiction minute offers a searchable archive of 400-word essays written and read by nonfiction kidlit authors. Each is accompanied by lesson suggestions.

https://www.melissa-stewart.com/sciclubhouse/teachhome/teach_home.html Nonfiction author Melissa Stewart offers fabulous nonfiction reading resources, nonfiction writing resources, revision timelines and more. Don’t miss her blog!

https://www.geekwrapped.com/science-books-for-kids 100 great science books for kids!

STEM Tuesday — Deep Space and Beyond — In the Classroom

By STEM Tuesday on July 17, 2018 / Common Core & NGSS, Cross-Curricular, Curriculum Tie-in, For Librarians, For Parents, Space, STEM Tuesday

Let’s launch into nonfiction literacy with this month’s theme, Deep Space and Beyond!

Space is the star of the show this month. From asteroids to zero gravity, there are human interest and general STEM themes interwoven with this theme. Have a blast as you explore the Solar System and beyond!

Try a Trio.

Emphasize the human heart of science as you compare and contrast the stories in a trio of books: Team Moon (Catherine Thimmesh), Mission to Pluto (Mary Kay Carson), and Voyager’s Greatest Hits (Alexandra Siy). Focus on the motivations, challenges, worries, and risks involved in reaching for big, ambitious goals that advance scientific and technological frontiers. Students can consider which missions they find most interesting; which one they think they would most like to have been involved in; and where else they think humanity should explore. They might also write about what they see as the advantages and disadvantages of human explorations compared to robotic ones.

Make an Impact.

Elizabeth Rusch’s IMPACT! Asteroids and the Science of Saving the World focuses on professional scientists’ efforts to understand asteroids and their, er, impacts, both past and potential, on Earth. Then Rusch invites readers to get involved in citizen, or amateur, asteroid science. (After reading this book, who wouldn’t want to join the fun?) Page 64 offers resources to help engage your group, or just one motivated kid, in efforts to track asteroids, discover one, or even save the world from an asteroid! Rusch provides tips for meteorite collecting, but it might be easier to collect tiny micrometeorites. Their incredibly long adventures through space can end on rooftops and in downspout debris. They’re ready for pick-up by the well-informed, slightly lucky, prepared amateur with a magnet. Check out Popular Science’s DIY article for details. (Be sure to get all the appropriate permissions and scout only in safe areas when collecting!)

Practice Your Scales.

Readers zipping through Dr. E’s Super Stellar Solar System (Bethany Ehlmann with STEM Tuesday’s Jennifer Swanson) might appreciate the mind-boggling size of the solar system after they make and revise solar system models to various scales. Get started with a scale and relevant data for a football field-sized model, found on page 18. Before heading out to the gridiron, however, help students map out the model.

Begin by sketching the football field on cm-grid graph paper and locating the planets’ orbits on it. (Each cm represents one foot on the field and 5 million miles in real space.) At this scale, students will find the field is too small for all orbits; students will need to adjust the scale so all planets can fit. New map in hand, head outside. Students can position themselves at the scaled planetary distances from the Sun.

Reading on, as students find that the solar system extends farther than the planetary orbits, they can track distance data for all Solar System features mentioned in the book. At the scale students used before, where in the community beyond the field would these features have to be placed?

For more depth, consider the scale of the objects and other models.

Is the model of the Sun (an orange) the right size for this scale?
If not, what would be?
What are the strengths and limitations of various 3D and illustrated visual models of the solar system that students have encountered?

Explore Metaphors with Black Holes.

Metaphors and imagery help scientists flesh out ideas for themselves. Piggy-backing new ideas onto ones we already grasp is also important in science communication, especially when it comes to fascinating but abstract, challenging concepts related to black holes.

Keep a class log of the metaphors, analogies, and other comparisons used by scientists and the authors—including Sara Latta, author of Black Holes: the Weird Science of the Most Mysterious Objects in the Universe and me, author of A Black Hole is NOT a Hole. You’ll find some, for example, on page 35 of Black Holes, where Latta quotes Neil deGrasse Tyson describing galactic (and black hole) cannibalism : “…the big galaxies get bigger; the little ones get eaten”. By contrast my book begins by challenging such anthropomorphism (“monstermorphism”?); soon, starting on page 8, the text compares a black hole to a whirlpool.

What other examples can readers find of scientists or writers using metaphorical language to describe black holes and related ideas?
In what ways does each metaphor work as a model and in what ways does it break down? What metaphors do students come across in other science contexts?
Based on their own world experience, what metaphors can students develop for the science concepts they are learning?

Make It Your Mission. Just as it took 400,000 people—Team Moon–to launch humanity to the moon, it takes a big Team STEM Tuesday to launch kids into getting the most of their STEM and STEM reading experiences. We would love to hear from you.

What books on this month’s list do you want to bring to your young readers?
Which of this month’s suggestions intrigue you most?
What other ideas, thoughts, and questions around using space books with your young learners do you have?

STEM author Carolyn Cinami DeCristofano writes books for kids about space and other topics. Her lively author programs bring engaging science and writing experiences to readers. As co-founder of Blue Heron STEM Education, she provides teacher professional development and creates curriculum resources for classrooms and other contexts.

Cross-Curricular

STEM Tuesday– Checking Your Health — Book List

Like this: