1st June International Dinosaur Day

The third Tuesday in May is also International Dinosaur Day, but  Dinosaur Day on the first day of June is easier to remember. It is s a celebration of dinosaurs, the prehistoric creatures that roamed the earth millions and millions of years ago. These animals went extinct somewhere in the region of 65 million years ago 

May 7th May is Australia’s National Dinosaur Day. On this date in 1903, William Ferguson found a partial dinosaur claw along the Cape Patterson shoreline in Victoria. This theropod claw was the first dinosaur fossil found in Australia.

It doesn't really matter when you celebrate dinosaurs, because with the age group I teach, 3 to 8 year olds dinosaurs are always popular and we could have dinosaur books on display permanently! They are even popular with the girls. When they read about Mary Anning they are so keen to tell you that it is okay for girls to like dinosaurs. Mary Anning  was only twelve years old, when she discovered the first complete ichthyosaur skeleton and she spent the rest of her life searching out fossils that helped change humans' understanding of prehistoric life and natural history. Sadly, because she was a woman, she was rarely credited for her critical discoveries, and only in recent years have her wide-ranging contributions received the recognition they deserve.

There are so many picture book biographies about Mary now. The library has:

• Stone Girl Bone Girl: The Story of Mary Anning by Laurence Anholt and Sheila Mosley

• The Fossil Girl: Mary Anning's Dinosaur Discovery by Catherine Brighton

• Mary Anning by Maria Isabel Sanchez Vegara and Poppy Marigot

• Dinosaur Lady by Linda Skeers and Marta Alvarez Miguens

• Fossil Hunter: How Mary Anning Changed the Science of Prehistoric Life by Cheryl Blackford

• Mary Anning: Fossil Hunter and Dinosaur Expert by Kay Barnham

If you don't have any of these, perhaps you can find:

• Gutsy Girls Go For Science: Palaeontologists by Karen Bush Gibson and Hui Li

or this picture book biography

• When Sue Found Sue:Sue Hendrickson Discovers her T-Rex by Toni Buzzeo and Diana Sudyka

As a child, Sue Hendrickson was shy, but she had a knack for finding things: a unique combination of curiosity, determination, and luck that helped her find everything from perfume bottles to lost coins. As an adult, she sought out adventure, first as an underwater archaeological excavation diver, and then as a field paleontologist. One summer in South Dakota, Sue spotted three backbones in the dirt... and discovered that they were part of the largest and most complete T. rex skeleton ever found! 

There are so many picture books that feature girls and dinosaurs too:

• If I Had a Dinosaur by Gabby Dawnay and Alex Barrow

A little girl dreams of having her very own pet. As she plays with her toy dinosaur, inspiration strikes. What about a real, live dinosaur?

• The Girl and the Dinosaur by Hollie Hughes and Sarah Massini

When Marianne visits the beach, she digs for buried treasure — and the treasure she discovers is a real life dinosaur skeleton. After naming her skeleton Bony, Marianne wishes it would come to life, and to her delight, Bony responds.

• We Don't Eat Our Classmates by Ryan Higgins

Penelope Rex is startled to discover her classmates are all children, so she does what comes naturally... and eats them. Children are delicious, after all! 

• The Dinosaur Expert by Margaret McNamara and Brian Karas

Mr. Tiffin's class is visiting the natural history museum, and dinosaur-loving Kimmy is thrilled! She is excited to share facts about Stegosaurus and Archaeopteryx and Titanosaurus... until one of her classmates sneers that "girls aren't scientists."

• Hattie and Hudson by Chris van Dusen

Hattie McFadden loves paddling her canoe out on the lake every morning, singing a song as she goes. One day, though, a huge mysterious beast emerges to listen to her song!

• My Dinosaur  by Mark Alan Weatherby 

Every night a little girl waits by her window for her friend the dinosaur, and when he comes, they play in the woods all night until the sun comes up.

• Katie and the Dinosaurs  by James Mayhew 

Entering a door at the Natural History Museum marked "No Admittance," Katie finds herself in the world of the dinosaurs. She helps a baby dinosaur find his family, rides on the back of a Brontosaurus, and has a picnic with a Triceratops. But just what will she feed a very hungry Tyrannosaurus Rex?

• Frankie and the Fossil by Jess McGeachin

Frankie knows everything there is to know about dinosaurs. But when she ignores a sign at the museum and is followed home by a friendly fossil, Frankie finds there's more to dinosaurs than she ever imagined.

• Tea Rex; Camp Rex; Santa Rex and Sea Rex by Molly Idle

These three books feature Cordelia and  her Cretaceous comrades.

• The Dinosaur Department Store  by Richard Merritt and Lily Murray

Eliza Jane was an unusual child. Some called her wilful, some called her wild!  She has her heart firmly set on a prehistoric pet.

and some short novels

• Lulu and the Brontosaurus by Judith Viorst and Lane Smith

• Ivy and Bean Fossil Break the Fossil Record by Annie Barrows and Sophie Blackall

• Lila's Little Dinosaur by Hanel Wolfram and Alex deWolf

• Thing and Thingnapped by Robin Klein and Alison Lester

Yes I know I have only written about girls and dinosaurs and boys love dinosaurs too. There are many more dinosaur picture books here that feature boys. If you need to settle an argument as one of our preschool teachers did, this is a good book to start a discussion:

• She Rex by Deborah Allwright and Michelle Robinson

Ed won't let his sister Maisy share his toys. He says. "Dinos are for boys." But he hasn't met She Rex. She Rex is a big and burly, multicoloured dino girly. She's as fierce and as loud as any dinosaur. Look out, Ed - you may just discover that dino toys are for girls and boys.

5th June Hot Air Balloon Day

Did you know that the hot air balloon is the oldest form of flight technology used for carrying humans? The first manned flight occurred in 1783. The balloon itself consists of an envelope, which is used to contain the hot air, and a gondola, where passengers and a means of creating hot air are typically housed. 

Recently a popular television program started its new season with a harrowing scene which involved a hot air balloon. My husband and son think this show is very humorous, but often I find myself squirming. A book I really enjoyed, Enduring Love began with an awkward hot air balloon incident too. It was made into a movie and I had to cover my eyes at the beginning of it while the hot air balloon scene was playing. You guessed it, there is absolutely no way I would ever get in a hot air balloon. I do think they look good sailing across the sky. They are beautifully bright and demand your attention, but my attention is from the ground with my feet touching the dirt.

Today I collected up some books to put together a display. We had a Donut Day display out for the 2nd of June, but it had been decimated so I had to find something to replace it. Obviously donuts are popular. I could have had several copies of the Mr Panda books. I have a Mr Panda toy and together with the books he is popular. 

Hot air balloons has proved an ideal replacement ...there are plenty of books across a wide reading range. Some special books worth mentioning are:

Picture books:
• The Great Balloon Hullaballoo by Peter Bently
• Flight of the Dodo by Peter Brown
• Miranda the Explorer by James Mayhew
• The Cloudspotter by Tom McLaughlin
• Hot Air: the Mostly True Story of the First Hot-air Balloon Ride by Marjorie Priceman
• Hot Air by Sandrine Dumas Roy (about global warming really...wonderful art)
• Sebastian and the Balloon by Philip C. Stead

Nonfiction:
• Hot Air Balloons by Joanne Mattern
• How Do Hot Air Balloons Work?  by Buffy Silverman

Novels:
• Emily Eyefinger and the Balloon Bandits by Duncan Ball
• Fortunately the Milk by Neil Gaiman
• Meerkat Madness Flying High by Ian Whybrow

and two that are worth searching out in a library because they are out of print :
• Cinderella and the Hot Air Balloon by Ann Jungman
• The Balloon Farmer by Geoffrey Lehmann

23rd April Shakespeare Day

23rd April marks the 400th anniversary of the death of English playwright and poet William Shakespeare. Isn't it amazing that he is still so revered? There are anniversary events everywhere, even here in Australia. Australian musician Paul Kelly has even chosen this day to release a new album Seven Sonnets and a Song where he has set Shakespeare's words to music.

Although my library only caters to children under eight, their parents and teachers we will still celebrate Shakespeare with a display of books. Many parents like to share the little Andrew Matthews and Tony Ross and Usborne versions of the stories. In this way young children know the stories well before they meet the Old English language versions. Other parents are avid borrowers of biographies, so they will be borrowed from any display and some of my Year 2 boys who love Marcia Williams' 'comic' format books will borrow her Shakespeare stories, so as you can see it is well worth making the effort. My own favourite Shakespeare books are the poetry illustrated by James Mayhew in To Sleep, Perchance to Dream and the exquisitely illustrated version of Romeo and Juliet by Margaret Early, both of which will be hard to buy now but may well be in your library, as they are in mine. What is in my school library is on my pinterest page.

If you are short of books, find the witches poem from Macbeth and have fun reciting it, acting it out and just playing with the magic of the words. There is a version here already done as a readers theatre script. I would use a more abridged version with my Year 2 students such as this, where language is the key element, not the gore or frightening aspects that many of the film clips of it emphasise.

31st December The Nutcracker

As the year ends and I now have time to reflect on year's end in the library and just how many Christmas books we have, I still have trouble discarding favourites and those by favourite authors or illustrators. This year we contemplated culling the large number of versions of The Nutcracker we have, yet as we agonised over which ones to let go we realised that every single version we owned had been borrowed during 2015, so ultimately none went. I have a diehard group of girls who will borrow anything that has to do with ballet, so James Mayhew's Ella Bella Ballerina and Marilyn Singer's Talulah versions had been borrowed several times. That is due too, to the power of a series. Tallulah stories are borrowed frequently. James' ballet series is even more popular at the moment than his Katie and artist series.

The story of the Nutcracker has two sources...a story by German author E.T.A. Hoffman called The Nutcracker and the King of Mice and the ballet The Nutcracker by Tchaikovsky which was also based on this story and was first performed in 1872. At Christmas many ballet companies perform this ballet so many children know the story of Clara, the Land of Sweets and the Sugarplum Fairy. It's plot is very appropriate for young children as it is about overcoming obstacles and of course good triumphs over evil.

Some very well known illustrators have done picture book versions, even Maurice Sendak who was involved in designing the sets for a production. If your library doesn't have a version look at these four:
• Jane Ray
• Susan Jeffers
• Alison Jay, and
• Ian Beck (author Berlie Doherty)
From these you will be able to select the 'right' amount of text and still have a 'traditional' version of the story.

The other titles above are for more specific audiences. Bea in the Nutcracker  is an ideal introduction for a very young ballerina. Whatever you choose from above you will get exquisite artwork and a good read. Happy New Year.