When my students saw The Courage of the Little Hummingbird: A Tale Told Around the World on display in the classroom, they demanded an immediate read aloud. I’m not surprised. When I came across the cover for the first time, I was immediately pulled in too, first by the lush …
Is anyone else, after four whole days of spring, already dreaming about the balmier months ahead? Well…”It’s the weekend, first in June; / speaker’s blasting out big tune!” So begins Big Tune: Rise of the Dance Hall Prince, out on March 28. Written by Alliah L. Agostini and illustrated by Shamar Knight-Justice, …
Once a day I experience forty minutes of absolute chaos and those forty minutes are called “cafeteria duty.” There are illegal snack trades to crack down on and treacherous linoleum to navigate. Cartoonists, take note: banana peels aren’t that slippery, but boiled green beans are the black ice of the …
Every Friday from March through November my daughter and I stop for a scoop of ice cream on our way home. I miss this weekly tradition now while our favorite spot is closed for the season. But Ice Cream Man: How Augustus Jackson Made a Sweet Treat Better by Glenda …
My two-year-old niece is obsessed with my fifteen-year-old copy of Lauren Stringer’s book, Winter is the Warmest Season. On her last visit, she rubbed the wintry illustrations whispering snow, snow, snow until her love wore the endpapers right out of the binding. So in preparation for her next visit, I searched the library …
What can you do to solve that problem? It’s what I say when kids tell me their pencil has no point, or that the LEGO brick they need most in the whole wide world is in someone else’s sticky fist. I say it when kids are squished too close together …
My students are really into inventing lately, filling my classroom with incredible oddities. For anyone who ever wished turtles came with more cuddly shells, please take note of Feel Good Turtle, lovingly built with pom poms and feathers. And if you want to house two distinct beverages in a single …
The Tower of Life: How Yaffa Eliach Rebuilt Her Town in Stories and Photographs, a stunning biography written by Chana Stiefel and illustrated by Susan Gal, hit shelves this week. Yaffa Eliach grew up in the Polish town of Eishyshok, helping her grandmother in her photography studio. When Nazi soldiers …
As New York transitions from blueberry season to cranberry, Berry Song, the first self-authored book by Caldecott Medalist Michaela Goade has taken root on the whiteboard ledge in my classroom, where I keep all the books I anticipate kids grabbing over and over again. In this story, a plucky little …
Here in NYC, I am soaking up the last few weeks of summer vacation. It’s hard to think about the frenetic energy of school during the laziest August days. But one thing I look forward to as September looms is imagining all of the glorious books I will enjoy with …