Posts Tagged Giveaways

Announcing STEM Tuesday’s Annual CoSTEM Contest!!

By on August 29, 2019   /   STEM Tuesday  

 

 

Greetings STEM Tuesday fans!! I know you’re all thinking…  this isn’t a Tuesday. You’re right.

We were SO EXCITED about our

TWO YEAR ANNIVERSARY CONTEST,

that we had to take over a  Thursday post to announce it.

 

What do you get when you cross a costume contest with STEM Tuesday?

The SECOND Annual October CoSTEM contest!

Muwahahaha (Cue eerie, ghostly music)

 

As a way to celebrate TWO whole years of STEM Tuesday blogs, we thought we would do a mash-up of literacy and STEM costumes. So drag out your favorite books, take a good look at the theme, then create an amazing, one-of-a-kind, spectacular costume.

Contest Rules:

  • This contest is open to all school-aged students, ages 5 and up. 
  • Submit a jpeg of yourself or  your class dressed as your favorite STEM book.
  • Be sure to let us know the title and the author of the book. 
  • The book must be for readers ages 8 and up. 
  • All submissions are due by midnight EST November 8th, 2019. (no exceptions!) 
  • Submissions MUST come from an adult who will grants us permission to post this image on the Mixed Up Files website. 
  • All images will be judged by the STEM Tuesday team. We will be looking for creativity, subject (how close you are to the theme of the book), and authentic (how exact is the STEM theme displayed)
  • Winners will be posted on the STEM Tuesday blog on November 14th, 2019.
  • Send your images to the following email:  stemmuf@gmail.com

 

Need suggestions for how do create a CoSTEM? Take a look at some of our examples below:

 

                                                           

This book about a black hole                      Inspired this costume of a black hole

 

 

                                   

inspired these two girls to make a plastic costume

this book about plastic

 

Are you starting to see a pattern?  Good!

I suppose you want to know about the prizes. Well, here they are:

1st Place —  Receives 5 autographed STEM Books + $25 Barnes & Noble Gift card

2nd Place — Receives 3 autographed STEM Books + $15 Barnes & Noble Gift card

3rd Place—   Receives 2 autographed STEM Books +$10 Barnes & Noble Gift card

 

Here are just a few of the books you could win:

 

HUGE thanks to the following authors for donating copies of their books!

Carla Mooney,  Janet Slingerland, Sue Heavenrich, Kirsten W. Larson, Dianne White, Susan M. Latta, Laurie Wallmark,

Julia Garstecki, and Jennifer Swanson 

Click on their names to check out other amazing STEM books they write!

 

 

Have questions about the contest? Direct them to the same email as above:  stemmuf@gmail.com

We hope you will ALL participate!  Help us to  celebrate a STEM- Literacy MASH-UP, CoSTEM style!!

 

 

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STEM Tuesday — Pets — Interview with Author Jodi Wheeler-Toppen

By on August 27, 2019   /   Common Core & NGSS, Pets, STEM Tuesday  

Welcome to STEM Tuesday: Author Interview & Book Giveaway, a repeating feature for the fourth Tuesday of every month. Go Science-Tech-Engineering-Math!

Today we’re interviewing Jodi Wheeler-Toppen about her just-released book CAT SCIENCE UNLEASHED: Fun Activities to Do with Your Feline Friends. School Library Journal says: “This book will be a delight to children who love cats and want to learn more about them using hands-on experiments.”

Mary Kay Carson: Tell us a bit about Cat Science Unleashed.

Jodi Wheeler-Toppen: Cat Science Unleashed is a book of science-based activities to do with your cat. The activities are fun–make your cat a toy that also tests her sniff-skills, find out how well your cat knows her territory, test her hearing and her night-vision, for example. They’ll show you cool things about your cat’s anatomy, physiology, psychology, etc. A lot of the activities also help you learn about the peculiarities of your special kitty–there’s a personality test, for example, where you can see how your cat compares to thousands of cats from around the world.

MKC: Developing cat-based activities must have been challenging!

Jodi: I wrote this book as a pairing to go with Dog Science Unleashed, which I also wrote. And I can tell you, the cat book was more of a challenge! For the dog book, my friends would drop their dogs at my house for the day and I would try activities with them (because I wanted to see how they worked with a variety of pups). But cats are so attached to their territories–it would terrify most cats to be dropped off at a strange house with a stranger. So I had to go to them and coax them out from under the bed or on top of the refrigerator or whatnot and try to engage them in my activities. It often worked best if I got the cat’s favorite person to try the activities while I watched.

Jodi Wheeler-Toppen is a former high school science teacher, with a Ph.D. in science education. She’s passionate about presenting science as exciting, suspenseful, and understandable. The author of more than a dozen science books for children and teachers, she also has a series on teaching strategies and activities from the National Science Teachers Association Press. Visit her at onceuponasciencebook.com

I got in trouble with one of my friends. I tested her three kittens for their paw preference by placing butter in a jar and watching how they got it out. She says that now, every morning when she makes toast, one-two-three little faces pop up over the countertop demanding butter! Sometimes an experiment would go great with one cat and then I’d never get it to work again. There was this fun one where I cut out detailed silhouettes of an angry cat and a peaceful cat and taped them to the wall. One pair of kitties gave great responses, arching their backs at the angry cat and rubbing against the peaceful one. But then I could never get another cat to respond, so I didn’t put it in the book.

MKC: How would you describe the approach you took to writing this book?

Jodi: I tried to work backwards from the science to the activities. So I looked for science ideas that were super cool or seemed important if you were going to understand your kitty. Then I thought, what is the craziest way we could look at this? What could you do with your cat that would be really fun or funny or would make Princess Fluffy super happy? I want it to be fun, for kids and their cats. I also want people to come away amazed at their purrfect pets!

MKC: Why do you choose to write STEM books?

Jodi: I was a high school science teacher and I am still very involved in STEM education through writing and staff development. Life circumstances made it difficult for me to stay in the classroom, so writing is a way I can still teach. Plus, it’s so much fun to take a topic and think about what’s really cool, what would people really get a kick out of about this, and focus there. So much more fun than having to always stick to the education standards!

 

Win a FREE copy of Cat Science Unleashed!

Enter the giveaway by leaving a comment below. The randomly-chosen winner will be contacted via email and asked to provide a mailing address (within the U.S. only) to receive the book.

Good luck!

Your host is Mary Kay Carson, author of The Tornado Scientist, Alexander Graham Bell for Kids, Mission to Pluto, Weird Animals, and other nonfiction books for kids. @marykaycarson

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STEM Tuesday– Tiny Worlds (Microscopic/Nanotech)- Interview with Author Nicola Davies

By on July 30, 2019   /   Common Core & NGSS, STEM Tuesday, Tiny Worlds/Microscopic/Nanotech  

Welcome to STEM Tuesday: Author Interview & Book Giveaway, a repeating feature for the fourth Tuesday of every month. Go Science-Tech-Engineering-Math!

Today we’re interviewing Nicola Davies about her book TINY CREATURES: The World of Microbes. School Library Journal calls it a “look at these minuscule organisms and the effect they can have on everything from our bodies to the soil to the clouds in the sky.”

Mary Kay Carson: How did you come to write Tiny Creatures?

Nicola: There are so many things in children’s lives that are related to microbes from always being told to ‘cover your mouth when you sneeze,’ ‘wash your hands before dinner,’ and having to be vaccinated, to favourite foods like cheese and yoghourt. Microbes are everywhere, an incredibly important part of all our lives, so it made sense that even the smallest children should know about them. Also, I loved the idea of invisible, magical worlds when I was little and in microbes we have one all around us, all the time!

MKC: You dug up lots of fascinating facts about microbes during your research! What especially surprised you?

Nicola: As a biology student long ago I was fascinated by the forms of microscopic plants, such as diatoms and unicellular animals like euglena and amoeba. Since then the technology of micro photography has advanced and there are even more beautiful photographs of these astounding mini life forms; looking at those was a real delight.

Nicola Davies is an award-winning author and a zoologist whose seemingly boundless enthusiasm for studying animals of all kinds has led her around the world. Fortunately for young readers, she is just as excited about sharing her interests through picture books. When not swimming with whales, sharks, or sea lions, traveling game reserves in Kenya, or off on other scientific expeditions, Nicola Davies gives writing workshops for students, writes books, and once she made a chair. She lives in Wales. www.nicola-davies.com

But I think the most amazing statistic I learned was the contribution to the oxygen in the air we breathe made by marine diatoms. One in every five breaths that you take is essentially provided by these beautiful, microscopic little plants. It was yet another example of how all life on earth is connected in a complex network, a network which supports us all and which we damage at our peril.

MKC: Do you have a STEM background?

Nicola: My life’s passion is zoology, although admittedly usually I am concerned with multicellular organisms. I did a Natural Sciences degree at Cambridge and did post grad study on bats and whales.

MKC: How would you describe the approach you took on this book? 

Nicola: Simple and accessible. I knew it wasn’t necessary or possible to put the whole of microbiology into a picture book, but I wanted to provide readers — both children AND their parents — with a seedbed of knowledge that would let them understand some of the basic things they may encounter in everyday life. I also wanted to inspire a sense of wonder and also of humbleness- we think our sense tell us everything we need to know but there is so much that we don’t see. It’s important to remember that real knowledge and understanding come first from admitting that you don’t know everything! My job as STEM picture book author is to make sure that at the end of the book, my readers understand a little and want to understand a lot more. My books aim to be a gateway into a world of lifelong learning and dialogue with the world.

 

Win a FREE copy of Tiny Creatures!

Enter the giveaway by leaving a comment below. The randomly-chosen winner will be contacted via email and asked to provide a mailing address (within the U.S. only) to receive the book.

Good luck!

Your host is Mary Kay Carson, author of The Tornado Scientist, Alexander Graham Bell for Kids, Mission to Pluto, Weird Animals, and other nonfiction books for kids. @marykaycarson

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