Search by Topic

STEM Tuesday
  • STEM Tuesday-- Plants--  Writing Tips & Resources
    STEM Tuesday– Plants– Writing Tips & Resources
    July 15, 2025 by
    Writing Exercise: Making Facts Sticky! For this non-fiction exercise, pick a plant to gather information about. Write down at least five things you already know about the plant, especially the most basic, common things. Got it? Great! Now it’s time to make those facts memorable......
    Read more
  • STEM Tuesday-- Plants-- In the Classroom
    STEM Tuesday– Plants– In the Classroom
    July 8, 2025 by
      Most plants obtain their energy by converting sunlight into food, which makes them a target for hungry animals. But not all plants are defenseless. Some plants fight back, and a few even become a threat to those trying to eat them. These books explore many interesting plants and the strategies and adaptations they use to survive. They make a great starting point for nature explorations, classroom discussions, and activities!   Killer Carnivorous Plants by Nathan Aaseng  Plants gather energy from the sun and turn it into leaves, flowers, fruit. Animals, who can’t produce their own food, eat the plants. But what happens when you turn the food chain upside down? When the plants are the hunters and animals the hunted? In this book you’ll meet sticky traps, trigger traps, and pits of death. There’s also a handy survival manual for carnivorous plants.   Classroom Activity – Build a Carnivorous...
    Read more
  • STEM Tuesday-- Plants-- Book List
    STEM Tuesday– Plants– Book List
    July 1, 2025 by
    Rooted to the ground, plants are pretty much stuck in place. Most of them get their energy from turning sunlight into food – which makes them a target for hungry animals. But some plants fight back, and some turn the food web completely on its head. These books might inspire you to think about plants in a different light. Rooted to the ground, plants have to find nutrition, fend off predators, and survive whatever conditions the environment throws at them. From water lily leaves that could serve as rafts to a flower that smells like a rotting corpse, meet the plants that thrive by using brilliant and bizarre adaptations. Beware the killer plants – the leaves that sting, the jaws that trap. This book, not for the faint-of-heart, is the perfect read for kids who want to know about the bird-catching plant, vampire vines, and corpse flowers. For older readers,...
    Read more
  • Notes of Hope when the world is too much
    Notes of Hope when the world is too much
    June 28, 2025 by
    When it seems like the world is just too much for our kids, when we witness hurt, fear, loneliness, a middle schooler’s loss of family or friends, it’s time to spread some hope. This is exactly how Libby, who comes from a long line of bullies, fights her reputation after finding a stone painted with the words Create the world of your dreams, in Flight of the Puffin by Ann Braden. In searching for ways to create that world, Libby, a lonely and art driven middle schooler, sets off a chain reaction of notes of hope when she writes You are awesome on an index card and leaves it outside for someone else who might need a bolster to find. My own decision to create Notes of Hope with my students came as a project at Mount Mary University to coincide a visit from Diana Chao, originator of Letters to...
    Read more

Contributors

Photo of Christine Taylor Butler

Christine Taylor Butler

Christine Taylor-Butler has been a prolific consumer of public
libraries from an early age. A consummate tinkerer it was deemed
advisable she study engineering at MIT for job security. Years later she made a break for the corporate door and delved into children’s literature hoping to write stories about talking animals when a sneaky editor at Scholastic conned her into writing non-fiction for children.…

Photo of Callie Dean

Callie Dean

Callie Dean is a musician, writer, educator, and program evaluator. She teaches applied research at Eastern University and is passionate about the role of the arts in effecting community transformation. She lives in Shreveport, La., with her husband and two sons.  She is the director of CYBER.ORG, a STEM education organization with a national network of more than 25,000 K-12 teachers.…

Photo of Andi Diehn

Andi Diehn

Andi Diehn grew up near the ocean chatting with horseshoe crabs and now lives in the mountains surrounded by dogs, cats, lizards, chickens, ducks, moose, deer, and bobcats, some of which help themselves to whatever she manages to grow in the garden. You are most likely to find her reading a book, talking about books, writing a book, or discussing politics with her sons.…

Photo of Mike Hays

Mike Hays

Mike Hays is from Kansas and is a tried and true flatlander by birth. He would most assuredly be obsessed with a statue of mysterious origins, especially if he could buy said statue on the cheap. He has worked as a molecular microbiologist for over 25 years, has coached high school sports, and writes middle-grade books.…

Photo of Sue Heavenrich

Sue Heavenrich

Sue Heavenrich is an award-winning author, blogger, and bug-watcher. A long line of ants marching across the kitchen counter inspired her first article for kids. When not writing, she’s either in the garden or tromping through the woods. Her books for middle-grade readers include Funky Fungi: 30 Activities for Exploring Molds, Mushrooms, Lichens, and More and Diet for a Changing Climate.…

Photo of Stephanie Jackson

Stephanie Jackson

Stephanie Jackson’s poems and prose have been published in Cricket magazine and various literary journals including Touchstones, where she’s been a contributing poetry editor. A nature-loving creative, she writes picture books, middle-grade novels, and more. Professional memberships include the Authors Guild, the American Night Writers Association, the Society of Children’s Writers and Illustrators, and the Women’s Fiction Writers Association.…

Photo of Karen Latchana Kenney

Karen Latchana Kenney

Karen Latchana Kenney loves to write books about animals, and looks for them wherever she goes—from leafcutter ants trailing through the Amazon rain forest in Guyana, where she was born, to puffins in cliff-side burrows on the Irish island of Skellig Michael. She especially enjoys creating books about nature, biodiversity, conservation, and groundbreaking scientific discoveries—but also writes about civil rights, astronomy, historical moments, and many other topics.…

Photo of Margo Lemieux

Margo Lemieux

A recently retired professor of art, Margo is devoted to seeing that the A stays in STEAM. Science & technology need the heart that comes with art. It was lack of heart that led to the ecological crisis we have today. The process of creativity is closely related to that of scientific inquiry.

She is a  published picture book writer and illustrator, editor, poet, and amateur ukulele player.…

Photo of Lydia Lukidis

Lydia Lukidis

Lydia Lukidis is the author of 48 trade and educational books, as well as 31 e-Books. Her latest STEM book, THE BROKEN BEES’ NEST (Kane Press, 2019), was nominated for a CYBILS Award, and her forthcoming STEM book, DEEP, DEEP, DOWN: The Secret Underwater Poetry of the Mariana Trench will be published by Capstone in 2023.…

Photo of Maria Marshall

Maria Marshall

Maria is a children’s author, blogger, and poet passionate about making nature and reading fun for children. She was a round 2 judge for the 2018 & 2017 Cybils Awards. And a judge for the #50PreciousWords competition since its inception. Two of her poems are published in The Best Of Today’s Little Ditty 2016 and 2014-2015 anthologies.…

Photo of Carla Mooney

Carla Mooney

Carla Mooney loves to explore the world around us and discover the details about how it works. An award-winning author of numerous nonfiction science books for kids and teens, she hopes to spark a healthy curiosity and love of science in today’s young people. She lives in Pennsylvania with her husband, three kids, and dog. When not writing, she can often be spotted at a hockey rink for one of her kids’ games.…

Photo of Shruthi Rao

Shruthi Rao

Shruthi was that kid who actually enjoyed writing essays in school! She wrote her first novel when she was eleven. It was an Enid Blyton rip-off. It was terrible (so she says). She didn’t write stories for a long time after that. Instead, Shruthi got a Master’s degree in Energy Engineering from one of the top schools of India, and worked in the IT industry for four years.…

Photo of Janet Slingerland

Janet Slingerland

Janet Slingerland grew up studying animals and conducting science experiments before pursuing a degree in electrical engineering. She spent 15 years writing code for things like submarines, phones, and airplanes before deciding to share her passion for knowledge and STEM with others. Janet now has more than 20 published books for readers in grades K through 12, including Explore Atoms and Molecules!…

Photo of Susan Summers

Susan Summers

Susan started her career as a zookeeper and enjoyed working with polar bears, wolves, and owls – to name just a few of her favorite animals. Interest in science and nature firmly took hold and she followed that career by becoming a wildlife biologist. In this engaging field, she was able to participate in research on a variety of wildlife, including bears, bats, and fabulous birds!…

Photo of Jennifer Swanson

Jennifer Swanson

Jennifer Swanson dreams of one day running away to the Museum of Science and Industry- then maybe she could look at all the exhibits and try out all the gadgets without competing for them with her kids. An author of thirty nonfiction science books for grades 3-6, Jennifer’s goal is to show kids that Science Rocks!…