Math: picture books are GREAT learning fun!

Here are some great picture books we've been using lately to reinforce math concepts. Check these out and I'm sure you'll agree that this is a great way to learn maths!

Kroll, Virginia – Equal Shmequal – equal is more than just the same number and this book helps kids realize that even numbers don’t always make even teams as some forest animals try to have create equal teams for tug-a-war! Very cute and great way to open discussion on concept of “equal” (including an author’s note at the end that explains “equal” from different views: artist, lawyers, sports, mathematicians)
Time Life Editors – Right in Your Own Backyard: Nature Math – filled with lots of puzzles, interesting facts and activities, this book links math with nature! Covers all the basic concepts in a fun, easy way.
Hewavisenti, Lakshmi – Shapes and Solids: with games and puzzles – great overview (with fun projects) for learning all about shapes and solids (tessellations, reflectiosn, moebius strips, tangrams, etc.)
Kohl, Herbert – Insides, Outsides, Loops and Lines – now this is a fun book for exploring closed and open shapes made completely with lines; lots of great games and activities for all ages.
Micklethwait, Lucy – I Spy Shapes in Art – this is another great art book for kids from Micklethwait. Here, the focus is on regular geometric shapes (so, the 14 paintings are primarily modern art) and the kids can really investigate these individual paintings looking for the shape to “spy” and also looking for other shapes in the paintings. Great cross-curriculum stuff here!
Neuschwander, Cindy – Sir Cumference and the First Round Table: A Math Adventure – tells the tale of how to create other regular shapes from a rectangle as well as a description of diameter, radius and circumference.
Neuschwander, Cindy – Sir Cumference and the Dragon of Pi: A Math Adventure – tells the tale of Pi and proves the measurement is always 3.14159…...
Neuschwander, Cindy – Sir Cumference and the Great Knight of Angleland: A Math Adventure – tells the tale of how to measure angles and describes acute, right, obtuse and straight angles.
Neuschwander, Cindy – Sir Cumference and the Sword in the Cone: A Math Adventure – tells the tale of how to create other regular shapes from a rectangle as well as a description of diameter, radius and Euler’s Law that says that any straight-sided, solid shape that, if the numbers of faces on a solid is added to the number of points (or vertices), then subtracted from the number of its edges, the answer will ALWAYS be two – works for every polyhedron.
Neuschwander, Cindy – Sir Cumference and the Isle of Immeter: A Math Adventure – tells the tale of Per and her cousin Radius and their discovery that an area of a circle equals half the circumference times the radius (also, area = pi x radius-squared).
Pluckrose, Henry – Math Counts: Shape – cute picture book about regular geometric shapes and looking for (and finding) them everywhere.
Reisberg, Joanne – Zachary Zormer Shape Transformer – when measuring perimeter, Zack teaches the class about moebius strips, expanding frame and increasing the size of light. This is a fun book – the kids really got into stumping dad with the doubled length of the moebius and the five-times-larger frame!
Wilson, John – Mosaic and Tessellated Patterns: How to Create Them – this is a great Dover book that gives wonderful illustrations of tessellation and mosaic patterns (with great overviews of how to create a myriad of designs). The book includes 32 “plates” to color … which copy wonderfully so you can color, and color and color!

Author Fiesta: May with Patricia Polacco

We have had such fun over the past week or so. With school winding down -- and all our things being packed, tossed or given away in preparation for the big move -- we spent the last couple of weeks on fiesta, author fiesta that is with our good internet friend, Cay!

Each month, Cay posts links and information about a different author ... and May was Patricia Polacco month!

Here are all the books we read (we saved her five Christmas books to read during Advent and to give us a chance to re-live our Author Fiesta!) and a short summary to whet your appetite:

Wednesday May 7, 2008:
The Keeping Quilt – the true family history of a quilt
My Ol’ Man – lovingly retold story of the author’s dad and the magic they discover
Thank You, Mr. Falker – finally, Trisha gets a teacher who understands her
When Lightning Comes in a Jar – a family’s reunion and memory-making
Babushka’s Doll – when a demanding girl is allowed to play with her grandmother’s doll, she finally learns the meaning of patience!
Babushka Baba Yaga – is Baba Yaga really a grandma at heart?

Thursday, May 08, 2008:
Something About Hensley’s – true story of the local general store (and its owner) where townspeople always find everything they need.
Mommies Say SHHHHH! – the sounds on a farm where the only quiet animals are the bunnies. A Polacco book for the little ones.
The Butterfly – the true story of Polacco’s great aunt who helped save Jews in Nazi-occupied France; beautiful!
Thunder Cake – Tricia gets over being afraid of storms with a little help from her babushka (wonderful recipe at the end of the book!)
Boat Ride with Lillian Two Blossom – an ordinary summer day gets a bit more eventful for William and his sister when Lillian Two Blossom offers some answers to some questions
The Lemonade Club – when Traci’s best friend gets sick, only their teacher and the other students can make lemonade out of life’s lemons; excellent book about cancer and surviving and living life to the fullest.
Rotten Richie and the Ultimate Dare – sibling rivalry turns the corner when Richie and his sister “walk a bit in the other’s shoes”; very funny events occur!
The Bee Tree – when Mary Ellen gets tired of reading, her grandpa takes her on a hunt for a bee tree; wonderful story – when we first read this book a few years back, we went off on a whole study of bees and honey!

Monday, May 12, 2008:
Casey at the Bat: A Ballad of the Republic, sung in the year 1888 – a version of the famous poem with Polacco’s signature illustrations.
Mr. Lincoln’s Way – a great principal and a tough kid work together to help the birds.
Oh, Look! – a clever version of the old “can’t go over, can’t go over it” story. VERY cute illustrations!
Picnic at Mudsock Meadow – At the annual Harvest Festival, a boy who can’t do anything right finally solves an age-old mystery.
Some Birthday! – Patricia thinks everyone has forgotten her birthday, but her dad and family pull through with an unforgettable outing.
The Graves Family – an “Addams Family” like family moves across the street in the dead of night. Seth and Sara befriend the family and have amazing adventures!
The Graves Family Goes Camping – a sequel, this time the family takes Seth and Sara camping to a disused spot and bring home something they never imagined!

Tuesday, May 13, 2008:
Appelemando’s Dreams – how one little boys dreams can color a drab little town that’s forgotten how to dream.
Rechenka’s Eggs – a babuska’s beautiful eggs are accidentally ruined but the solution is even better than imagined.
Ginger and Petunia – Ginger and her pet Petunia are more alike than they ever imagined.
I Can Hear the Sun – a story about the homeless that has an uplifting ending
Pink and Say – two young Union soldiers find friendship and then are separated at Andersonville Prison.

Wednesday, May 14, 2008:
Meteor – when a meteor lands on the Gaw’s family farm, everyone in town comes out and learns how special they are.
Chicken Sunday – the kids sell pysanky eggs to earn enough to get EulaMae her Easter bonnet, but the hatmaker has something else in mind.
John Philip Duck – this is the fictionalized account of how the Peabody Hotel’s famous ducks first started swimming in the hotel fountain.
Luba and the Wren – here’s a fabulous retelling (and the pictures are glorious) of the Russian folk tale of the “Fisherman and His Wife”.
Tikvah Means Hope – a story of the famous Oakland (California) hills fire that devastated lives, but some stayed and hope returns.
My Rotten Redheaded Older Brother – Tricia finds out that sometimes older brothers are useful.

Thursday, May 15, 2008:
In Enzo’s Splendid Gardens – an outdoor restaurant is enlivened with this “house that Jack built” type story about a bee that lands on a tree.
Aunt Chip and the Great Triple Creek Dam Affair – books aren’t used properly once a town gets too used to television; a great book about the joy of reading.
G is for Goat -- an alphabet book of goat-life; one of Polacco’s books for younger children.
Just Plain Fancy – an Amish girl finds a fancy egg after complaining that their life is too plain.
Mrs. Katz and Tush – Larnel gives Mrs. Katz a kitten and all their lives are enriched.
Betty Doll – Polacco’s mother tells Patricia the whole story of her doll, Betty Doll.
Mrs. Mack – when Patricia spends her 10-year-old summer in Michigan, she meets Mrs. Mack and learns about horses.
Emma Kate – a story from Polacco’s childhood of her imaginary elephant friend, Emma Kate; one of Polacco’s books for younger children (and the drawings are wonderful!).

Friday, May 16, 2008:
Babushka’s Mother Goose – is much more than a retelling of Mother Goose! This is a tribute to Polacco’s Babushka and has a wonderful Ukranian/Eastern Europe feel to the poems and stories. This is wonderful.
Firetalking – an autobiography, this ended our unit on Patricia Polacco. She lovingly explains how she came to write and illustrate so many wonderful books for children and the great influence her family (and extended family) have had on all her work.

Books to save for Christmas:
Uncle Vova’s Tree
Christmas Tapestry
The Trees of the Dancing Goats
Welcome Comfort
An Orange for Frankie

Books coming out in 2008:
For the Love of Autumn (August)
Someone for Mr. Sussmann (November)

As you can see, Mrs. Polacco is quite prolific -- 47 books written plus two new ones coming out this year. She has such a gift of story-telling -- primarily because she comes from a family of storytellers (or "fire talkers") and because so many of her stories are based on ones that happened to herself or family members. The love of family shines through all her stories!

We can't wait for June to see who our next author will be!

THANKS Cay for such a wonderful way to make sure we read all the best picture book authors before we turn 100!

Unit Study: Mittens

Today, as it was supposed to be kind of snowy (but was instead just bitter cold!), we did a mini unit on mittens. We read some GREAT picture books, made fleece mittens and watched the old Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe while eating whole-wheat brownies we made yesterday from flour ground at the National Western Stock Show.

Here are the picture books we read about mittens:

Noah’s Mittens: The Story of Felt by Lise Lunge-Larsen (illustrated by Matthew Trueman). What all happened on the Ark anyway? This picture book (with wonderfully whimsical illustrations) explains how wool felt was “invented”, why and what uses it could be put to once the Ark rested on Mount Ararat.

The Winter Mittens written and illustrated by Tim Arnold tells the story of a little girl who finds magical mittens in a silver box (and the trouble that occurs when she uses them just a bit too long). This book is more a short-chapter book than a picture book – but definitely read-able in a short time.

The Missing Mitten Mystery by Steven Kellogg. Where did Annie lose her mitten (her 5th lost mitten of the season) and who might have taken it? These questions are answered in Kellogg’s classic story – with his signature illustrations throughout.

The Missing Mittens by Stuart J. Murphy (illustrated by G. Brian Karas) is a wonderfully illustrated story that explains the difference between even and odd and easy ways to remember the difference.

and some other picture books about snow and winter:

Annie and the Wild Animals written and illustrated by Jan Brett has all the charm of Brett’s books – but this one tells of Annie’s search for a pet after her cat, Taffy, goes off and Annie has no one with whom to play. The wild animals that offer to be Annie’s friends are “just not right”.

The Polar Bear Son: an Inuit Tale retold and illustrated by Lydia Dabcovich does a wonderful job of portraying/relating the life in an Inuit village, especially for a woman who has no one to help her. The illustrations are gorgeous!

Little Daughter of the Snow by Arthur Ransome (illustrated by Tom Bower) is the retelling of a Russion folk-tale about a childless couple who create a snow-daughter but don’t quite love her enough for her to stay forever.

Wild Horse Winter written and illustrated by Tetsuya Honda is a story about the Dosanko horses indigenous to the Japanese island of Hokkaido. This is a fascinating story of a breed of horse that does unusual things to combat the stormy weather on the island.

All You Need for a Snowman by Alice Schertle (illustrated by Barbara Lavallee) is a rhyming story about “all you need” to build a snowman or two. The illustrations really add to this story – with their pastel-y rainbow palette and the white of the snowmen!

Building an Igloo text and photographs by Ulli Steltzer explains in words and black/white photographs how an igloo is built (right down to an ice block used for a window). This is a really cool book that describes clearly enough to make you own igloo (if you’re lucky enough to have that much snow).

Snowmen: Snow Creatures, Crafts and Other Winter Projects by Peter Cole, Frankie Frankeny and Leslie Jonath – this is a GREAT winter craft book with unique and creative projects to make with snow as well as a few edible and non-edible inside projects. The uniqueness of the projects makes this a really special book.

Here is a quicky tutorial on the fleece mittens. A while back we'd gotten some fleece remnants from Jo-Ann Fabrics (a wonderful fabric store that happily gives a discount to educators -- even homeschoolers!). Today, we pulled out the pieces and the littles picked out their favorite color.

Folded so there would be four layers, I then traced around their hand -- with the fingers closed but the thumb extended.

The kids then picked out embroidery floss in a coordinating color and sewed the mitten-halves together.

Once the mittens were sewed -- for Bam-Bam's, I did a blanket stitch on the right side, for String-Bean's blue mittens she over-stitched on the wrong side, for Lego Maniac's green mittens he did a running stitch on the wrong side -- we turned them out onto the right side and I did snow flakes and a snowman on Bam-Bam's with gold glitter paint while Lego Maniac used fabric paint to decorate his with mountains and a Chinese dragon. Ever-thinking String Bean decided to leave her's plain so that if she wears them on a cold day in the Spring, they don't look "out of season"!

Pretty cool -- or rather, cozy --, huh?

Books: Another Random Reading Day selections

We had such fun during yesterday morning's Random Reading day that the kids and I decided to do another, shorter one today. Here are the books we got through this morning:

The Minstrel and the Dragon Pup by Rosemary Sutcliff and illustrated by Emma Chichester Clark – is a great story about the relationship between a person and his pet. In this case, the pet is a dragon pup that only knows the minstrel and the minstrel’s kindness. A villain (the illustration is even VERY sneaky, skunky looking) steals the pup and sets in motion many events.

Three Days on a River in a Red Canoe by Vera B. Williams – is a wonderful overview of a family’s trip in a newly purchased, used red canoe. The narrator writes in her journal from the moment she sees the canoe for sale, through the preparations for getting the boat and themselves sea-worthy, on the river for three days and then back home again. The cover even looks like a child’s composition book. This is definitely a read for getting the kiddoes rather for summertime fun!

Stringbean’s Trip to the Shining Sea by Vera B. Williams and Jennifer Williams – is about a trip from Kansas to the Pacific ocean. The neat thing is that the story is told through a series of “postcards” from Stringbean and his brother Fred back to their Ma, Pa and Grandpa. It’s a great overview of the geography and history between Kansas and the Ocean, with lots of nice side-notes on brotherly love and brotherly spats.

The Train of States written and illustrated by Peter Sis – is a lovely tribute to the 50 states as well as the Nation’s Capitol! Peter Sis is an immigrant from the Czech Republic and has really embraced his new homeland. This book is a lovely tribute to each of the 50 states – each state is its own train car with details of state nicknames, state flower, state tree, fun fact and other information packed into each train car illustration. The cars are in order of statehood. This is one of those “gaze at the picture for an hour and find more and more interesting things” kind of books. The pictures are fun – almost cartoony – but never lose sight of the respect Sis has for each state and America. The last page shows all the train cars gathered together and it’s fun to pick out the different states by their “symbols”. This is a great way to introduce American geography and state-history to children!

Books: Random Reading Day

Occasionally, I gather a bunch of different books and we sit and read for the day. These may be easy readers, older picture books or just a random selection of things to read; the books may be all one author's, all one subject/theme or just a mish-mash of fun reads.

We call this "random reading day" and we have so much fun -- often launching off into rabbit trails or individual kids' interests are piqued.

Here's our list of great, mixed picture books we read today in case you'd like to try this too:

Tiger of the Snows: Tenzing Norgay - The boy whose dream was Everest by Robert Burleigh and illustrated by Ed Young – a beautifully illustrated picture biography of the Sherpa mountaineer who climbed with Sir Edmund Hillary to the top of the world, Mt. Everest!

Stealing Home: Jackie Robinson Against the Odds by Robert Burleigh and illustrated by Mike Wimmer – a very exciting picture book of Jackie Robinson’s ability to steal home. The pictures are wonderful and the text exciting. A fabulous baseball book.

The Red Wolf by Margaret Shannon – ok, this one is near and dear to my heart! A little princess is kept in a tower by her loving (if slightly obsessive) father who worries the world will corrupt her. She is given the gift of a golden chest full of WOOL with a note that says “knit what you want”. She knits a red wolf suit and escapes. The rest of this rather unique story has the kids guessing until the end.

A Small Tall Tale from the Far Far North by Peter Sis – this is the story of a real man: Jan Welzl, who left his home in Moravia in the late 1800s and headed for the Far North. Based on facts as well as the tall-tales the man himself told, Peter Sis creates a beautifully detailed picture book of life in the Far North. A fabulous lead-in to a study of Alaska, exploring, and Eskimos.

Black Beauty’s Early Days in the Meadow by Anna Sewell and illustrated by Jane Monroe Donovan – the pictures of this book are worth hunting for this one! Anna Sewell’s story of Black Beauty is enhanced with this picture book that tells of the pony’s life in the fields and the very important lessons he learns from his mother.

Read Anything Good Lately? By Susan Allen and Jane Lindaman, illustrated by Vicky Enright – if you love reading, you’ll love this unique alphabet book where the writers describe different things you can read using the letters of the alphabet. At the end are some other ideas of things to read and we had fun thinking of where you would read an essay (on an elephant?) or a picture book (on a pony?). A wonderful introduction for those learning to read.

Thanksgiving Wish by Michael J. Rosen and paintings by John Thompson – this book always makes me cry, but in a good way! The story of a grandma’s traditional thanksgiving feast is enhanced by the first thanksgiving after she dies. A wonderful book that we’ll read every year at Thanksgiving!

One Hundred Hungry Ants by Elinor J. Pinczes and illustrated by Bonnie Mackan – how many ways can 100 be re-grouped to make it to the picnic in time? This is a great, repetitive book that had my kids responding right along with the ants. Great way to introduce multiplication/division with 100.

One Hundred is a Family by Pam Munoz Ryan and illustrated by Benrei Huang – starting with one family, this is a great counting book that shows that even 100 people living in an apartment house are a family. Lots of fun in this counting book.

On Beyond a Million: An Amazing Math Journey by David M. Schwartz and illustrated by Paul Meisel – is a great introduction to the power of ten and how easy it is to count to a googol if you count exponentially. But, as the book clearly points out, you can never count to infinity nor are bajillion or gazillion real numbers. Lots of fun in this math book.

Roman Numbers I to MM by Arthur Geisert – is a great way to introduce, practice and review roman numerals. Starting with the basic seven letters I, V, X, L, C, D and M – you can make ANY number imaginable (Romans didn’t have a symbol for beyond “thousand”). And Geisert proves it with his MMMMDCCLXIV (4764) pigs and other drawings throughout the book. One thing that’s very cool (other than page numbers in Roman numerals) is the last 11 pages are practice pages for what XI means or how many tire swings. Lots of great rabbit trails from this one!

As you can see, it's really a mixed bag today -- some I chose for their illustrations, some for their content, some becuase I'd heard good things about the authors. All were well-received and have the kids really thinking (and understanding that reading really can be fun and interesting). Here's a blog post of more books from Random Reading day.