3rd April Find a Rainbow Day

How appropriate that there is a day such as this when we are in the middle of a crisis.

Rainbows are symbols of many things, peace, hope, prosperity, new beginnings and good luck, so no wonder  the Irish believe there is a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.

The rainbow is a comprised of seven different colours.  Each of these colours is vibrant and beautiful, and each one is different than the next. This conveys a beautiful message of inclusiveness and cohesion. It demonstrates how beautiful diversity can be, but these colours work together to make a new beautiful whole so it can also be about working together.

Rainbows are often seen after a storm when the sun breaks through the clouds. This provides us with a very powerful message. Good and beautiful things often follow the darkest storms. We need to remember this right now!

I walked up my street (exercise) and counted how many rainbow paintings were affixed in windows. I counted eight in my neighbourhood. These children have done these paintings to thank all the health workers who are at work saving lives . In fact it was this that sent me looking for rainbow stories for a virtual display. It has to just be a pinterest page  because I'm not at school in my library for a while.

While looking I learned that it was Find a Rainbow Day!  this week, which gave me another reason to put together the list of books.

Thinking of rainbow stories, the first one I thought of was Annie's Rainbow by Ron Brooks. It is old and long out of print, but a real favourite when I first started teaching. Annie loves rainbows and whenever she sees one she tries to catch it. She just wants one of her own. What a wonderful thing to think you could do! What else is there?

I remember reading Esther's Rainbow by Kim Kane and Sara Acton to a preschool class last year and they really enjoyed it. It is a joyous story about a girl who also sees colours everywhere and goes looking for them.

A parent came to the library last week when we were still open wanting The Rainbow Plate a story by doctor Preeya Alexander, which she wrote to encourage children to eat fruit and vegetables of a variety of colours. There are other books too about eating the rainbow.

I like the concept and the fun of How the Crayons Saved the Rainbow by Monica Sweeney. Just like the children around here, the crayons draw rainbows all over the place. There are so many versions of this on Youtube!

And then for older students there is the colorful picture book biography Newton's Rainbow by Kathryn Lasky that celebrates Newton's discoveries that illuminated the mysteries of gravity, motion, and even rainbows, discoveries that gave mankind a new understanding of the natural world, discoveries that changed science forever. 

So lots of avenues to explore while you're looking for rainbows and hoping for an end to the isolation of Covid 19.

Champions Read 1 - Science Champions

In Australia the theme for Book Week this year is Champions Read, probably partly because of its close proximity to the Olympic Games. As I only teach very young children from 3 to 8 years old, this theme didn't strike me as being that exciting and I wasn't all that enthusiastic, but the more I have thought about it and the wider I am able to make the definition of 'champion' the better I feel about it. I have been putting together a reading list of picture book biographies for teachers and my Year 2 Book Club group and have decided to spread them out over several blog entries. I plan to look at Champions of Science; Champions of the Environment; Champions of Art; Champions of Literature and others as well as Champions of Sport.

For me a champion is:

• someone who surpasses all rivals,

• someone who commits an act and is worthy of positive recognition for such an act,

• someone who vigorously supports a cause.

To start with Science Champions:

Mary Anning (1799 - 1847) fossil collector

As a young girl in Lyme Regis, England she collected fossils along the shoreline. She is believed to have been the first to find the bones of an Ichthyosaurus. There are two picture books that tell her story:

* The Fossil Girl by Catherine Brighton, and

* Stone Girl Bone Girl by Laurence Anholt who also lives in Lyme Regis.

Eratosthenes - (276 BC - 194BC)

Greek philosopher and scientist who compiled the first geography book and accurately measured the globe's circumference. This book tells his story:

* The Librarian Who Measured the Earth by Kathryn Lasky

Galileo (1564 - 1642) astronomer

* Starry Messenger by Peter Sis

* I, Galileo by Bonnie Christensen

John Tebbutt (1834 - 1916) Australian astronomer

* Bright Star by Gary Crew and Anne Spudvilas. This book tells the story of Alicia whose life is influence by John Tebbutt.

Buzz Aldrin (1930 - ) astronaut

* Reaching For the Moon by Buzz Aldrin

Charles Darwin - naturalist

There are a large number of picture books about Darwin's life, but these three are in my library and offer the opportunity for a thorough examination of his work and life with wonderful illustrations.

* What Mr Darwin Saw by Mick Manning and Brita Granstrom

* One Beetle Too Many by Kathryn Lasky

* The Tree of Life by Peter Sis

The students who are interested in Darwin will also like this biography about the geneticist, Mendel.

* Gregor Mendel: The Friar Who Grew Peas by Cheryl Bardoe

And lastly, although I am sure there are many more that you would add, a book about Thomas Edison.

* Odd Boy Out by Don Brown

12th February David Small (1945) Charles Darwin (1809 - 1882)

It is American author/illustrator David Small's birthday today. I do not know his writing well as my library only has one of his authored works, Imogene's Antlers. This is a humorous story about what happens to Imogene after she wakes up to find she has grown antlers overnight. We do however have two of the picture books that are written by his wife Sarah Stewart and illustrated by him, The Gardener and The Library and When Dinosaurs Came With Everything which is written by Elise Broach and illustrated by him.

The famous naturalist, Charles Darwin celebrated his bicentenary two years ago and at that time many books about him were published for children, many of which were picture books. Three picture books that deal very positively with Darwin's life and his concept of natural selection are Peter Sis's Tree of Life; Mick Manning and Brita Granstrom's What Mr Darwin Saw and Kathryn Lasky and Matthew Trueman's One Beetle Too Many: The Extraordinary Adventures of Charles Darwin.

24th June John Ciardi (1916 - 1986) Kathryn Lasky (1944)

John Ciardi was an American poet who published over forty volumes of poetry. He is known to teachers and children because many of his poems were written for children. The best known of them, such as Mummy Slept Late and Daddy Fixed Breakfast; The Reason for the Pelican; and About the Teeth of Sharks are humorous, often absurd and depend heavily on wordplay. Ciardi believed in poetry for the masses and not only for the scholarly. He began writing children's poetry in order to get his own children interested in reading. He inherently knew that children respond to rhythm, rhyme, humour and everyday themes. Many children's poetry anthologies include poems by Ciardi, but a good starting point is For Laughing Out Loud: poems to tickle your funnybone an anthology of poems selected by Jack Prelutsky.

Kathryn Lasky is an American author who has a wide repertoire, writing novels, series and picture books. Two picture books in my library that I particularly like are Humphrey, Albert and the Flying Machine and The Librarian Who Measured the Earth. The first is a fractured fairytale which includes brothers Humphrey and Albert, a princess, Briar Rose, a hundred year sleep, kissing to break a curse and the inventor Daniel Bernoulli (of the Bernoulli Effect). Science meets fairytale! The second combines history, geography and librarianship as it is about the Greek philosopher and scientist, Eratosthenes who becomes the chief librarian of Alexandria.

A True Person by Gabiann Marin and Jacqui Grantford is the title for Refugee Week. It is the story of Zallah, a young girl who arrives in Australia by boat and finds herself, with her mother, in a detention centre. The story is told from Zallah's point of view, which enables young readers to empathise with her and to imagine being in her position. Reading this story with a class enables you to introduce the concept of detention centres and their history for child refugees in Australia. It also allows for meaningful discussion about what constitutes a 'true person'.