Literature in Context: A Literary Guide for Maple Syrup Season

In late winter when the days are warm but the nights are still cold, the sap starts to run in sugar maples. Throughout New England, buckets and tubing begin to adorn trees, and the steady plinking of sap dripping into buckets can be heard throughout the sugarbush. This month’s literature guide spotlights titles that can be used to learn about sugaring – both the science behind it and the role that it plays in rural New England culture.

Literary Guide for Robert McCloskey’s “Make Way for Ducklings”

“Make Way for Ducklings,” written and illustrated by Robert McCloskey, is our featured title this week in our Summer Reading Resource series. This downloadable literature guide, written for use with 1st & 2nd grade students, includes outlines for activities that call for readers to create their own list of rhyming family names, write a new adventure for the Mallard family, and gain practice reading aloud. The guide also includes suggestions for post-reading discussions about the historical context of the story, the book’s illustrations, protecting animals, and the relationship that animals have with humans when they live so close to each other…

Literary Guide for Roald Dahls’ “Danny the Champion of the World”

Our Summer Reading Resource Literary Guide series continues this week with Roald Dahl classic, “Danny the Champion of the World.” The literature guide is written with 4th grade students in mind, but the story can be easily read and appreciated by youn…

7 Children’s Books that Embody Peace

Blessed are the Peacemakers Now more than ever it seems imperative that we engage and embody and choose peace. From events that hit close to home like the Newtown tragedy and the Boston Marathon bombings, to our sisters and brothers all over the world …

Recommended Fiction Titles with Autistic Characters

QUESTION AND ANSWERS One of our readers is looking for a book recommendation written from the perspective of a child with Asperger’s syndrome or autism for their preteen reader. Any suggestions? Amy Meltzer recommends: Al Capone Does My Shirts by Gennifer Choldenko, and Rules by Cynthia Lord. Kate Holdsworth Hammond recommends: The London Eye Mystery […]

Bad Girls: Sirens, Jezebels, Murderesses, Thieves & Other Female Villains

New Book Portrays History’s Bad Girls with a Modern Twist Delilah. Cleopatra. Anne Bonney. Catherine the Great. Mata Hari. Bonnie Parker. Just a few of history’s bad girls. Or are they? Might they just be misunderstood girls? Smart, strong, outspoken girls? Or girls who are victims of bad circumstance? In their new book, Bad Girls: […]

George Washington Carver: A Life in Poems

In honor of Black History Month I want to share an extraordinary book about an extraordinary human being: Carver, a life in poems (Front Street, 2001) is an intimate portrait of the botanist, inventor, scientist, artist, musician, and teacher, known as…