Hello from my desert home, Utah, and welcome to STEM Tuesday. I’m Stephanie. I took this photo several years ago at Snow Canyon State Park in Saint George and it really encapsulates what I love about life sciences. Nature gives us these unexpected—but beautiful—moments. This is the desert!
A tree growing in a crevice at Snow Canyon in Saint George, Utah. Photo credit: Stephanie Jackson
Before I get into writing tips and resources, I wanted to highlight some recent and forthcoming nonfiction desert books:
- First up, Weird, Wild, Amazing! Desert by Tim Flannery, published in 2022. Written by an Australian scientist in his unique blend of strange factoids and clear explanations, this book is a must-read for desert explorers ages 7-10.
- Second, for children 8-10, Deserts in Danger (A True Book: The Earth at Risk) by Cody Crane, publishing September 3, 2024 with Children’s Press / Scholastic Trade Publishing. This title highlights the impacts of climate change.
- Next, you may enjoy A Day in the Life of the Desert by Roxie Munro, publishing on September 17, 2024 with Holiday House. Although it’s being marketed as a picture book, it’s nonfiction, and the text is accordingly verbose. It’s packed full of desert facts, and as the subtitle says, “6 Desert Habitats, 108 Species, and How to Save Them.”
- Fourth is Desert Tree Finder (2nd Edition) by botanist May Theilgaard Watts, publishing on October 8, 2024 with AdventureKEEN. As field guides go, this is as practical and as beginner-friendly as they come, covering the American southwest.
- And lastly, a visual smorgasboard in the form of this 320-page coffee table book, Deserts: The world’s most fascinating places by photographer Philippe Bourseiller, publishing on November 26, 2024 with teNeues. Truly exquisite images.
Writing Tips and Resources
Okay, so writing and deserts. Immediately I think of ecopoetry which, simply defined, is poetry about nature. (If you’re interested in exploring the genre further, check out The Ecopoetry Anthology.)
For beginning writers, there are multiple entry points. By no means are these the only ways to write ecopoetry; however, I’ll discuss three possible approaches, chosen specifically for upper elementary kids.
- The form method. Because the blank page can be so intimidating, choosing a template for a poem narrows the options considerably, and many writers find it frees the mind to write toward a specific “recipe” of syllables. For example, haiku. A simple 5-7-5 pattern helps produce work like this:from the pocks and cracks
in vermilion rock: a
tree flourishes, free - The photograph method. Technically called ekphrasis, poems like this work to distill an ineffable image—intrinsically worth 1,000 words—into a linguistic dopplegänger of the original art. You may have noticed that my haiku was an ekphrastic poem based on my own photograph. Even if you’re not a photographer, you can find royalty-free images from websites like Pexels to work from. (And maybe check out that coffee table book!)
- The appreciation method. Writers begin with a topic and, through discovery writing, develop a message, or at least a vibe. An example would be an ode, which is like a toast, usually addressing a noun. (But then again, Ross Gay wrote an ode to sleeping in his clothes, so there are exceptions to everything in art.) Topics appropriate for desert-based poems might include desert animals like kangaroo rats or armadillos. I’d love to read a poem entitled “Ode to a Kangaroo Rat,” wouldn’t you? It’s so oddly specific, I’d have to see what it was about. Even the most poetry-averse writer could take facts and appreciate them, turning them into a poem with stylistic creativity.
And a note about poetry, especially… please teach it with joy. If there’s anything that I’ve learned about art, it’s that there’s no wrong way to do it, except with misery.
Whether you’re an educator, homeschooler, librarian, or writer, I wish you all the best with your desert unit studies. If you enjoyed today’s post, please jump on over to my blog to read about my favorite desert-themed picture books!
Best,
Stephanie Jackson
A nature-loving creative, Stephanie Jackson writes poems, articles, picture books, and middle-grade novels. Her nonfiction has been published in Cricket magazine and her poems have been published in various literary journals including Touchstones, where she’s been a contributing poetry editor. Professional affiliations include the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI), The Authors Guild, the American Night Writers Association (ANWA), and the Women’s Fiction Writers Association (WFWA). She expects to graduate from Utah Valley University in Spring 2025 with her undergraduate English degree, emphasis in creative writing. She interacts with the kidlit community on Twitter as @canoesandcosmos, and you can read more at StephanieWritesforKids.com.
