Facing Fear of the Dark with Heightened Senses

With his Zapato Power sneakers, Freddie Ramos can jump high, hear from far away, and run at top speed. But even a boy with superpowers can be afraid of the dark. When a big storm takes out the electricity at his apartment building and most of the city, Freddie is forced to face his fears. 

A special set of night goggles helps Freddie until he realizes that a friend needs them more than he does. At that point, Freddie relies on what he learned in science class about the five senses. If one sense is not working, you can use the other ones. In the climax of the story, Freddie uses a heightened sense of hearing to navigate in the dark and rescue an elderly neighbor.

Read Freddie Ramos Sees in the Dark with your students. Discuss their own fears and how they have handled them. Ask if they have ever used their sense of hearing or touch to find their way in the dark. Discuss how each of our five senses provides important information.

Writing Prompt: If you could invent a tool to help you face a fear, what would it be? What would this invention do? How would it work? Would you try to sell your invention? If so, how would you advertise it?      

Freddie Ramos Sees in the Dark is book #14 in the Zapato Power series. In each book, Freddie uses his superpowered sneakers to solve a mystery and help his neighbors. Check out the other titles in the series at Albert Whitman, the publisher’s website. 

BIO: Jacqueline Jules is the author of fifty books for young readers including the Zapato Power series, the Sofia Martinez series, My Name is Hamburger, The Porridge-Pot Goblin, Never Say a Mean Word Again, and Tag Your Dreams: Poems of Play and Persistence. The resources page of her website has many activities for educators and parents. Visit www.jacquelinejules.com 

How Do We Explain Difficult Topics?

Smoke at the Pentagon: Poems to Remember tells the story of September 11, 2001 in Arlington, Virginia through a tapestry of poems. Each narrative poem discusses the terrorist attack on the Pentagon from the perspective of a young person. The narrators all have their own story of that day and its aftermath.  

Seven-year-old Henry waits for his mother. Almost all the other children have been picked up early from elementary school. He’s confused and aware that the adults around him have been crying. Henry says, “Grown-ups talk to each other, but not to kids.”

Read Henry's poem and discuss: How should adults explain frightening news events? Should they be direct with kids or should they try to protect them? What can adults do or say to make kids feel safe when current events are disturbing?

Sixteen-year-old Calista is taken aback when the little boy she is babysitting tells her he saw a hole in the Pentagon. Calista doesn’t know how to explain to a three year old something she doesn’t really understand herself.

Writing Prompt: Imagine someone younger asks you about a frightening news event. Would you explain it? Or change the subject? Write a dialogue between Calista and Dylan about what happened at the Pentagon on September 11^th. Or if you prefer, write a dialogue between yourself and a younger sibling to explain a troubling news event.

For more activities and ideas for using Smoke at the Pentagon: Poems to Remember, please visit my website to download the full Teacher’s Guide.

BIO: Jacqueline Jules is the author of fifty books for young readers including the Zapato Power series, the Sofia Martinez series, My Name is Hamburger, The Porridge-Pot Goblin, Never Say a Mean Word Again, and Tag Your Dreams: Poems of Play and Persistence. The resources page of her website has many activities for educators and parents. Visit www.jacquelinejules.com 

Defeating Goblins with Teamwork

In The Porridge Pot Goblin, siblings Benny and Rose are frightened by an invisible goblin, only known by his pranks and his tracks. They fear the goblin is too big for them to stop. But working together, Benny and Rose learn they are much braver than they think.

After reading The Porridge Pot Goblin aloud, have the class discuss how teamwork saved the day for Benny and Rose. If Benny had refused to help, do they think Rose could have trapped the goblin on her own? Did Benny’s presence make Rose bolder? What role did Benny play in how they ultimately handled the goblin?

Ask students to share a time when they worked with another person to overcome a challenge. Could they have solved the problem on their own? What are the advantages of joining forces? Are there disadvantages?

Writing Prompt: Write your own goblin story. Imagine the presence of an invisible spirit in your home. How would it make itself known? What tricks would it play? Would you try to trap it or make friends? Would you work alone or with someone’s help?   

Happy Writing!

Jacqueline Jules

TAG YOUR DREAMS!!

 

Tag Your Dreams: Poems of Play and Persistence celebrates being active, reaching goals, and learning limits. The poems employ figurative language devices such as alliteration, simile, metaphor, repetition, personification, and onomatopoeia. Each poem tells a story about a young person discovering skills, strengths, and dreams through activity. Team sports are included along with playground games, biking, sledding, swimming, hiking, and simply twirling in the rain.  

To help teachers use Tag YourDreams as a classroom resource, I have developed a teacher's guide with questions to discuss, ways to examine the poetry, and writing prompts. 

To give you a taste, please see the poem and questions below:

TAG YOUR DREAMS

Discuss!

What are your dreams for the future?

Examine the Poem!

Identify verbs which refer to the game of tag, e.g., chase, running, reaching.

Do dreams have strong legs? Is this personification— attributing human characteristics to something that is not human?

Write!

Write about your dreams. Does anything stand in your way? Are you confident you will succeed or are you afraid of failure?

The entire teacher’s guide can be found on my website. 

I am available for virtual visits with students. Please contact me through my website at www.jacquelinejules.com

 

Happy Reading!

 

UNSINKABLE!!

by Karen Leggett Abouraya

It hardly sounds like nonfiction: “From Russian Orphan to Paralympic Swimming World Champion,” but this is Jessica Long’s autobiography written with her sister Hannah. Born in Siberia with fibular hemimelia, Jessica had no ankles, heels or most of the bones in her lower legs. She was adopted by an American family in Baltimore, Maryland, and eventually had both legs amputated below the knee. There were six children in the Long family, including another little boy adopted from Russia. 

            From early childhood, Jessica was “determined to dominate at everything I did,” including climbing on top of the refrigerator! 

            “I made the daily choice to not let anything hold me back, especially my legs.”

            Initially, she excelled at gymnastics: “I walk on my knees. I’m just a little shorter.” By age 10, she discovered water and started beating girls with legs. “It’s all about technique and how you can work the water. Giving up was never an option.”

            Jessica swam her first Paralympic Games in Athens, Greece, in 2004. At the games in Beijing in 2008, she felt she had failed because she won “only” four gold medals, along with a silver and a bronze.  But then she added modeling and public speaking to her accomplishments and has now told her own story in a young adult autobiography.

            Jessica’s story is inspirational and often funny. “My high-heel legs, or ‘sexy legs,’ were created using my sister’s feet…they molded her feet at a four-inch arch and used those molds to make my prosthetic feet.” She showed off her new legs on Twitter!

            Jessica challenges herself in and out of the water, but her experiences will tantalize young writers as well.

            She has rituals before every race, including eating a banana, clapping her hands three times and shaking her arms out.

·       What do you do to calm or inspire yourself or give you good luck before a match, game or special event? Why do you think it helps?

Jessica was always willing to try something new.

·       What is something new you tried to do? How did you feel? What did you learn from the experience?

Jessica is rightly proud of her accomplishments.

·       Write about something in your life that gives you great pride – don’t worry about being boastful. This is your time to “show and tell” on a piece of paper!

Jessica likes posing for photo shoots and often did this with her siblings.  “Elle decided to use a picture of me on a couch, posing on my knees without my prosthetics…It was really cool to be part of something that showed how people with disabilities an do the same things as everyone else, including model.”  

·       Have students pair off and take flattering photos of each other. Write an “artist statement” about your photo, explaining why you chose a particular pose or background and what you want people to learn from the photo.

Finally, think about Jessica’s story overall and write your thoughts about what qualities and factors in her life enabled her to overcome great challenges and contribute to her success. Then think about what qualities and factors in your own life could help you be successful – and unsinkable.

https://childrensbookguild.org/index.php/karen-leggett-abouraya

What Does Your Character Want?

Guest Post by Claudia Mills

            One of the most powerful questions for launching a story is: what does my main character want? So simple and obvious - and yet even experienced authors can forget this.

          

            As I was writing my most recent book, Nixie Ness, Cooking Star, set in an after-school cooking camp, at first I focused only on Nixie’s predicament. Now that her mother has a job outside the home, Nixie has to attend an after-school program, which means she’ll no longer be spending afternoons at home with her best friend, Grace, which means Grace will be spending afternoons instead with Nixie’s nemesis, Elyse. But what should happen next? I was stuck until I asked the crucial question: what does Nixie want? Well, she wants her life to be the way it used to be. But this is such a vague and hopeless desire. The story came into focus for me when I gave a different answer: Nixie feels she is losing her best friend, and she wants to get her best friend back again.

            Once we know what our character wants, the plot is driven by what she does to get it. If her first attempt succeeds, we have a very short and skimpy story. But if her first attempt fails, and her second attempt fails, and even her third attempt fails, her ultimate success is much more satisfying.

            If your students are stuck for a story idea, encourage them to think of what a character might want. They might start by thinking about what they want. A bike? A dog? A sleepover with a friend? A special family vacation?

            Then lead them in brainstorming how someone could try to get this thing. With brainstorming, even preposterous ideas are welcome. Remember it’s good if the first ideas end up failing! One of Nixie’s failed friendship-saving ideas is to get fame and fortune by starring in the cooking-camp video. Another is to bribe her friend with yummy camp-baked treats. A third is to pretend to be sick at camp in order to guilt her mother into quitting her job.

            For young writers, simple wants, simple strategies, and simple failures can work best.

            Your character wants a bike.  How could he get a bike?

1.     Find a job and save up money to buy one.

2.     Win one in a contest.

3.     Get a friend to trade his bike for something he wants even more.

Then, the really fun part: How could each of these ideas go wrong? Failure can be one of the most comical things to write about – and one of the saddest. And then the success that follows is sweeter still.

Nixie ends up keeping her best friend, but in the process she realizes Grace can still be her friend even if Grace is now friends with Elyse, too. It’s fine if a story ends with a character coming to a new understanding of what she wants.

But knowing what your character wants is where a story begins.

Claudia Mills is the author of almost 60 books for young readers, including most recently the Franklin School Friends series from Farrar, Straus & Giroux, and her new After-School Superstars series from Holiday House.  In addition to writing books, she has been a college professor in the philosophy department at the University of Colorado at Boulder and in the graduate programs in children’s literature at Hollins University in Roanoke. Visit Claudia at www.claudiamillsauthor.com.

Speak Up! Listen Up!

guest post by Kathy MacMillan

What does it mean to raise your voice? It can be a lot more than screaming or shouting– it also means defending yourself or a cause you believe in. 

The women profiled in She Spoke: 14 Women Who Raised Their Voices and Changed the World, written by Kathy MacMillan and Manuela Bernardi and illustrated by Kathrin Honesta (Familius Press, 2019), faced all kinds of hardships, obstacles, and even violence – but they didn’t let those things stop them from speaking up. The book features activists Dolores Huerta, Suzan Shown Harjo, Leymah Gbowee, scientists Dr. Temple Grandin and Dr. Jane Goodall, Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, trailblazers Shirley Chisholm, Abby Wambach, and more. The built-in sound card allows readers to hear the inspiring words of these groundbreaking women at the touch of a button.

The unique audio format of She Spoke makes it an engaging resource for the classroom, but it can be used beyond Women’s History Month! Here are some suggestions:

-After sharing each profile and audio clip, use the accompanying discussion questions to prompt your students to connect the lessons learned to their own lives. The discussion questions could be used as writing prompts or a launchpad for group discussion.

-Discuss how hearing the voices of the women impacts you. How is hearing the person’s original voice different from just hearing someone else read the words?

-Explore more quotes from these women and other trailblazers at our She Spoke board on Pinterest:

-For a more in-depth project, have students write their own profiles in the style of She Spoke. Start by having them find a quote that exemplifies what their subject stood for. (Please see some great research resources we have compiled.) Once they have selected a quote, they can write a brief profile that shows how that quote exemplifies their subject’s life. This exercise is an excellent way to practice thesis statements and supporting evidence. You could incorporate an artistic element by having students create a portrait of their subject to accompany their writing.

About the Authors:

Kathy MacMillan is a nationally certified American Sign Language interpreter,

writer, teacher, librarian, and storyteller. She is the author of the Little Hands Signing board book series (Familius), the young adult novels Sword and Verse and Dagger and Coin (HarperTeen), and nine books for parents, librarians, and educators, including Little Hands and Big Hands: Children and Adults Signing Together (Huron Street Press). She lives near Baltimore, Maryland, USA. Find her online at KathyMacMillan.com

Manuela Bernardi is a film and TV writer based in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where she was born and raised. She has collaborated on award-winning feature films and has written on shows for TV Globo, TBS, GNT, Multishow, and the History Channel. Her screenplay for the short film The Healing Tree won USC's Peter Stark Special Project grant and went on to be selected for Cannes’ Short Film Corner. With a BA in journalism from PUC-Rio, Manuela got her MFA in writing for screen and television from USC in Los Angeles, which she attended on a Fulbright/CAPES scholarship.

 

The Roots of Rap

by Karen Leggett Abouraya

There is probably a tapper in your home or class: the boy or girl who is constantly tapping, often unconsciously, with pencil or thumbs or toes.  Rhythm pulses through their bodies like strikes of lightening  - like spoken word poetry – like rap – like the poetry of Carole Boston Weatherford’s new book, The Roots of Rap: 16 Bars on the 4 Pillars of Hip-Hop.

Hip-hop, explains Weatherford, “is a form of youth expression that originated in New York City in the late 1970s and included four pillars: graffiti, break dancing, rapping/MCing, and DJing/scratching/turntablism.” Rap, “the spoken or chanted rhyming lyrics performed to a beat.”

With illustrations by Frank Morrison that jump and jam on every page, The Roots of Rap celebrates the loud, boisterous original culture of hip-hop, giving young people an opportunity to write and contemplate in ways they might not have thought were acceptable in a classroom.

Look at Weatherford’s list of “Hip Hop Who’s Who.”

·       Which musicians do you know and like?

·       Pick two musicians and compare and contrast their music.

·       Create a hip-hop name for yourself and explain it.

Of course read the book out loud. Very loud.

·       What graffiti message would you like to paint on a wall? (Is there a classroom bulletin board for all the student messages?)

·       How do Morrison’s illustrations amplify and strengthen the text?

·       Why makes rap and hip-hop poetry so powerful – and lasting?

Of course you can plan a classroom hip-hop party, with plenty of music and everyone writing a poem that they are proud to stand up and say or sing.

“From Atlanta to Zanzibar, youth spit freestyle freedom sounds.

Hip-hop is a language that’s spoken the whole world ‘round.”

And please celebrate Carole Boston Weatherford as the 2019 Children’s Book Guild Nonfiction Award winner on May 11 in Washington, D.C.

Traveling Back in Time

guest post by Deborah Kalb

What would it be like to travel back in time and meet the early presidents and their families? That’s what the fifth graders in George Washington & the Magic Hat and its sequel, John Adams & the Magic Bobblehead, get to do.

Sam and Ava are regular 21^st century kids, living across the street from each other in Bethesda, Maryland, dealing with issues a lot of kids face. Sam and his former best friend, Andrew, aren’t speaking to each other any more. Ava, in a newly blended family, can’t stand her stepbrother, J.P.

And then, thanks to a crotchety hat, in Sam’s case, and a talking bobblehead, in Ava’s, they are transported into a completely different time.

Students can focus on the historical figures--George Washington, John and Abigail Adams, and more. What do they know about the Founding Fathers and Mothers? Is there one that they’re particularly interested in and why? What do they think these historical figures would make of today’s world if the time travel were reversed?

And then there are the contemporary issues. How do the students identify with Sam? With Ava? How do the students try to resolve the issues that bother them?

If they had a magic hat or a magic bobblehead, which time period would they like to visit, and why? Is there a particular person they’d like to get to know? 

Any of these questions can prompt a discussion or writing assignment that will get students thinking about history or today’s issues or a combination of both.

Here are links to George Washington’s home, Mount Vernon, in Northern Virginia, and to the Adams National Historic Park in Quincy, Massachusetts.

   

Deborah Kalb is a freelance writer and editor. She spent two decades working as a journalist in Washington, D.C., for news organizations including Gannett News Service, Congressional Quarterly, U.S. News & World Report, and The Hill, mostly covering Congress and politics. Her book blog, Book Q&As with Deborah Kalb, which she started in 2012, features hundreds of interviews she has conducted with a wide variety of authors. She is the author of the new children’s book The President and Me: John Adams and the Magic Bobblehead (Schiffer, 2018), the second in a series — after The President and Me: George Washington and the Magic Hat (Schiffer, 2016) Visit http://www.deborahkalb.com/

Book Gardens

Guest Post by Rashin Kheiriyeh

“Nestled in the branches of a tree,

Arlo opened his book and breathed in.

“Beginnings were always the best part.

They smelled as if anything were possible.”

I illustrated The Book Tree, written by Paul Czajak – a wonderful story about a boy who sits on the branches of a tree to read. When one of his books falls on the Mayor’s head, the Mayor decides to tear up every book in town – with disastrous consequences for teachers and their students, chefs and their restaurants, actors and their theatres and of course, libraries.

But then there was a miracle: “a sprout springing from where the page had been buried. It began to open its leaves. It reached for Arlo’s words, begging for more.” Pretty soon, Arlo was imagining and writing stories about giants and swans and fire-breathing beasts.

“People grew hungry for reading again. Some wrote their own stories and became book gardeners themselves.”

Even the Mayor finally shared the wonder of books.

My illustrations feature oil paint, ink and collages. I used natural materials to bring  depth and contrast to my drawings, like using real feathers, pieces of wood, fabrics and metals to make the collages more tangible.

People of the town have different skin tones with blue hair or mustaches. They look funny and whimsical.  The book tree itself is been printed with golden ink to give it a magical shine. The books that actually grow on the tree branches are in different languages.

The Book Tree can inspire student writing and even turn a whole school into book gardeners – limited only by your imagination.

Here are a few ideas to get started:

1 –  Have students draw a book tree full of their favorite books.

2 –  The teacher can draw a tree and each student draw or attach his/her favorite book to it.

3 – Draw the Mayor and Arlo as friends, reading a book together – or have students write a paragraph about what books the Mayor and Arlo enjoyed reading together. Perhaps they could even write a story together.

4 – Look at the illustrations in the book and find places where materials other than paint and paper have been used.  Make your own collage with lots of different materials.

The motto of publisher Barefoot Books is to “step inside a story.”  What stories would your students like to step inside?  The Book Tree celebrates the themes Barefoot Books seeks to highlight: “encourage independence of spirit, enthusiasm for learning and respect for the world’s diversity.”

 www.rashinart.com

An Amazing Classroom Resource!

by Jacqueline Jules

Where can a teacher easily find interesting pieces to share in the classroom? Look no further than Issue 8 of Balloons Lit. Journal.

This magazine for upper elementary and middle school students is an amazing resource of poetry, fiction, and art. What’s more, it includes contributions from all over the world and features student work alongside professional adults. Poems are attractively presented in full page layouts sure to inspire the imagination. I am thrilled that one of my poems,  “Egret” appears on page 41.

I wrote “Egret” while I was out on a brisk walk near a body of water and this beautifully immobile creature stopped me in my tracks. Ask your students to describe an animal or plant so enchanting they couldn’t help but pause for a moment to gaze. Better yet, take your students outside and ask them to stand silently for five minutes, watching the natural world. What did they see, hear, smell? How did they feel? Can they make an effort to pay attention to the grass, the trees, the clouds, the insects, and everything else which flutters unnoticed when we hurry too much? Mindfulness can enrich one’s life as well as one’s writing.   

Listening to an author read their own work can be a meaningful experience for students. Balloons Lit. Journal also offers audio clips on selected pieces. Scroll down the page where Issue 8 appears and you will see an audio section and an opportunity to hear me read my poem, “Egret” as well as three other poets in this issue.  

I highly recommend sharing 14 year old Braxton Schieler’s voice reading his work, “Someday I’ll Be—An Autobiography.” Braxton writes about his life from the age of three till an imagined old age, describing emotional transitions with clarity and insight. Hearing a student read his own personal narrative aloud should jump start many a reluctant pen in your classroom.

Other pieces in Balloons Lit. Issue 8, such as the poems, “I Think My Teacher is a Witch” and  “Pillow Problems” could be great models for humorous writing.

Finally the artwork in Balloons Lit. Issue 8 is stunning. Available in PDF form on the website, images could be projected to present the ekphrastic challenge of providing a written response to and/or description of artwork.

Don’t miss this amazing resource for the classroom! Check out Issue 8 of Balloons Lit. Journal today!

www.jacquelinejules.com

Capturing Black and White America

by Karen Leggett Abouraya

“The youngest of fifteen, Parks arrives stillborn

And is nearly left for dead until a dip

In ice water shocks his tiny heart to beat.

The baby is named for the man who saved his life, Dr. Gordon.”

Gordon Parks would grow up to become a professional photographer, cataloging American life on film for the Farm Security Administration, Office of War Information, Standard Oil, Ebony, Vogue, Fortune and Life.

His early work (1940-50) is the focus of an exhibition at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. from November 4, 2018 until February 18, 2019. He is also the subject of Carole Boston Weatherford’s biography, Gordon Parks: How the Photographer Captured Black and White America.

For Gordon Parks, photography was the tool he used to expose “the unfairness of segregation,” and the African American struggle against racism. “He not only documented but also served as an advocate for the Civil Rights Movement.”  

Parks photographs often featured everyday Americans in their daily lives, including cleaning woman Ella Watson – a photo that became known as American Gothic. “In one iconic photo,” writes Weatherford, “Parks conveyed both the African American struggle against racism and the contradiction between segregation and freedom.”

“Standing before

the flag of freedom,

cleaning lady Ella Watson

holds the tools of her trade

and the hopes of her grandchildren.” 

·       Ella Watson lived in Washington, D.C. in the 1940s.

·       What do you think she hoped for her grandchildren? For students whose grandparents are living, have them find out their hopes for their grandchildren. Write about it or share those hopes with the class.  Students can also imagine what they might hope for their own children.

·       Ask students to write about three things in their own daily lives that they would photograph – and why they selected these people, events or places. 

·       Perhaps a few single use cameras could be purchased to enable students to photograph a story about their school that could be published online, in the school newspaper or in a local community newspaper. (This would be an opportunity for students to learn about obtaining the rights  to print photographs of other people.)

Parks was not only a photographer. He wrote a novel, directed a film and wrote poetry and music as well.

·       If you wanted to change people’s minds about an issue in society, what do you think would be the best medium and why? 

  

Gordon Parks is one of many famous Americans profiled by Carole Boston Weatherford. She is the 2019 Children’s Book Guild Nonfiction Award winner  and will speak in Washington at the award celebration on May 11, 2019.  Make plans to come and hear what she has to say – students welcome!

HAPPY NEW YEAR! HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Guest Post by Susan L. Roth

Many Americans welcome the new year with parties, fireworks, feasts and champagne at midnight. And what do we do the morning after? We make lists of New Year’s resolutions. Do we keep them? Well, we try.

New Year’s Day is our once-a-year-day for a clean slate, yet another chance to do better and be better. On New Year’s Day everyone is full of good intentions.

New Year's Eve in NYC, Illustration Susan L. Roth

Diets and exercise usually top the list, but really, lists can go on and on and on: Read more good books, work harder, work longer, be more polite, stop being impatient. No more bad words, go to sleep earlier, get up earlier, hang up clothes instead of dropping them on the floor! Be better! Be nicer! Be more generous! Be more appreciative! Be a better friend! Be a better neighbor! Be tolerant, be understanding, be kind, be GOOD!

Chinese New Year, Illustration Susan L. Roth

Once the list is begun, it can quickly fill the page, and usually the list is adhered to, at the beginning, anyway. But what if we were given a plethora of second chances for celebrations as well as for second chances to improve ourselves?

Every Month is a New Year, (Lee and Low, 2017) a book of poems by Marilyn Singer, illustrated by me, is a book full of Happy New Year celebrations from all over the world. I learned so much from making the pictures for this book:  there are no two even similar looking. And as for resolutions, every page turn affords a fresh start.

Muslim New Year, Illustration Susan L. Roth

Herewith I am presenting you with another big list full of related activities for students, at least enough for an entire happy new year.

1-Ask students to write a short piece about the new year celebrations that they enjoy in their own families. 

2-Suggest that they create an accompanying illustration. My favorite medium is collage, but they should choose their own favorite.

3-For the most energized, curious and adventurous students: let them try to find other new year celebrations not mentioned in Every Month Is A New Year that they can write about and illustrate.

4- Invite your group to make a joint project calendar of happy new year illustrations which could certainly begin in February or March. Pictures would not have to correspond with unusual-to-us month-specific celebrations, but rather, personal ones. If there are more than a calendar year's worth of students in your group, continue the calendar for as many months as there are students. The finished product could be presented as a big wall of illustrations as well as a calendar, designed to fill a bulletin board, and/or it could be a consecutive band of illustrations designed to go around the walls of a classroom.

5-Encourage each student to start his/her own list of resolutions. Designate one day every month for looking back to see how they did. Invite anyone who managed to keep his/her resolution for that month to give a 30 second speech telling about it. Was it easy? hard? worth the effort? Does the student feel proud and victorious? Take time for applause! 

Do the same for anyone who wishes to tell about failing in the attempt, with applause for the courage it takes to speak about the failure. (This should be handled with humor).

6-Encourage a designated time, probably monthly, to look into each of the cultures explored in Every Month Is A New Year. The back matter in the book includes great explanations and resources for each holiday.  For example: make a dragon; watch wheat grass grow fast daily, right before everyone's very eyes, in a little dish in the classroom; make a kite and fly it; eat green grapes. With permission and supervision, break pots. (Do skip fireworks and firecrackers).

7-Maybe you could even create a brand new holiday: Happy New Month! Let it include a short monthly LITTLE party, and don't forget the Happy New Month's resolutions.

8-Finally, here are some heavier thoughts to think about, write about, to illustrate. 

Encourage everyone, including teachers and librarians, to think about the concept and idea of starting new, starting over. Why is the possibility of one more chance to BE better and to DO better so important? Does hope REALLY spring eternal? And why do we have celebrations anyway? for incentives? for rewards? just because they are fun?

I hope this food for thought gives you something to ponder all year long.

http://susanlroth.com/

Have A Blast With Beep And Bob!

guest blog by Jonathan Roth

Bob is an ordinary kid who finds himself having to go to school in the most terrifying place he can imagine: outer space! Luckily he makes friends with a lost little alien named Beep, and together they face all the usual school challenges (tests, too much homework, bullies) and the not-so-usual (lack of gravity, black holes, giant space spiders). You can read all about their adventures (Bob keeps a journal and Beep draws the pictures) and use the following prompts to create your own!

Writing Prompts:

In a few words or paragraphs or pages, complete the following:

“I was just accepted to go to school that’s located _____________ miles away, somewhere near ________________________ but I’m super nervous to go there because ___________________________.”

“Don’t be mad, but I just let an alien into the school and it___________.”

“You’re never going to believe this, but we just went on a field trip to _________ and just when I thought it couldn’t get any worse ____________________.”

“I once traveled to the future for a day and to my great surprise _____________________.”

“Whatever you do, don’t push the red button because it ___________________!”

“I just found a special spray that cures me of my biggest fears, which are ______________ but the spray also gives me strange side effects such as ______________.”

“My Emergency Space Pack is full of such helpful items as ___________________ but also has some pretty useless things like _______________________.”

“Oh, no, I forget the password that disables the Self-Destruct Button I just accidentally pushed, but I know it’s one of my twenty favorite things, which are _________________ and _____.”

“I just read the entire BEEP AND BOB series, which was pretty good, but I have an idea for an even better series which is about ___________________.”

Illustration Prompts:

Beep is a cute alien, but there are some aliens Bob hasn’t met. So Bob will know who to look out for, please draw:

Squeep, who’s even cuter than Beep

and Klob, who’s super scary.

Know any other aliens? Draw them too!

I hope you have fun with your writing and illustrating. The main thing to remember is that you can always, always improve with practice. And being creative can be a blast!

http://beepandbob.com/