So They Build - Meerkats

Meerkats are certainly charismatic. Their sentinel behaviour makes them different from other animals. Whenever we do a display of meerkat books, the books leave the library very quickly. The students that use our school library live near the zoo and visit it frequently. It has a meerkat enclosure that they are always keen to visit.

Meerkats live in groups called mobs. Living in a mob helps the meerkats to find food, protect themselves and look after their young. All meerkats in a mob help with the work. Individuals have different skills that can help a group.They are constantly on the lookout for animals that may attack their mob, such as eagles and hawks. When they spot an enemy, they may scurry into their underground burrows or attack! 

Meerkats are skilled builders, crafting intricate tunnel systems beneath the earth. This network of tunnels is an intricate feat of engineering. The tunnels are used as sleeping quarters, safe nurseries for their young and refuge from the extreme heat, the harsh desert elements and predators.

There are few animals that work together as well as meerkats. When it comes to getting things done, meerkats know that teamwork is the way to go. Families of these furry little critters often live together, forming communities of up to fifty members. They protect other group members by taking turns being a lookout and scanning the area for danger. Everyone in the mob participates in gathering food, keeping a look out for predators, and taking care of the babies. 

This week these books were on display, but then all were borrowed.

And some stories:

And the most popular, but always missing in action:

For the chapter book enthusiasts, look for these series

19th September International Red Panda Day

Red pandas are not as popular as giant pandas in children's books, but they still manage to find their way into endearing stories and are worth celebrating on their special day, the third Saturday of  September annually.

Unlike the name and the diet of bamboo implies, red pandas are not related to giant pandas and were discovered fifty years earlier.

If you want a brief, but useful informative text about red pandas for young students and you do not have one in your school library this is a good start. And this on Kiddle. 

In our library we have:

• Red Pandas by Laura Marsh

• Red Pandas by Victoria Blakemore

Picture book stories that feature red pandas

• Pip and the Bamboo Path  by Jesse Hodgson

• Red Panda's Toffee Apples by Ruth Paul

• Hedgehog's Magic Tricks by Ruth Paul

• Rabbit's Hide-and-Seek by Ruth Paul

• Amy the Red Panda is Writing the Best Story in the World by Colleen Venable & Ruth Chan

Look out for Baby Red Pandas by Kate Riggs, one book in a new series for very young readers by a publisher who really knows how to do young nonfiction with spectacular photographs.

16th September International Red Panda Day

Red Panda Day celebrates that smaller panda that is found in the Himalayas. It looks cute, but it features in children's books far less than the bigger black and white panda. In my library there is only one fiction book, Red Panda's Candy Apples and it is written by a New Zealand author Ruth Paul. It is the sequel to Hedgehog's Magic Tricks in which the red panda is a character. A new fiction book, Amy the Red Panda is Writing the Best Story in the World by Colleen Venable will be published in November. The blurb on websites says

" An exuberant, hilarious guessing game about storytelling, creativity, friendship, and patience-with the most adorable animal menagerie you'll find anywhere! Amy the Red Panda starts to tell her best friend Mervin the Sloth a story when-uh-oh-a rainstorm of letters pours down! When it stops, Amy reads a sentence in the sky: Amy the Red Panda is writing the best story in the world... Marvin is there to give Amy just the right inspiration. A companion to Mervin the Sloth Is About to Do the Best Thing in the World, this funny-bone-tickling picture book brings back a cast of zany, irresistible animal friends and an inventive, playful format."

There are more nonfiction titles. Among them, these three:

 

21st October Apple Day

Apple Day is an annual celebration, held in October, of apples and orchards. It is celebrated mainly in the United Kingdom where it is Autumn and harvest time. The first Apple Day was held in 1990. Given that the Granny Smith green apple originated in Australia in 1868 and apples are popular as snacks in Australian school lunchboxes we should celebrate it here too.

Apples and their place in our language and life could make for some interesting discussions with children, even a whole unit of study. Look at how many sayings there are. Just some that come to mind:
• an apple for the teacher
• an apple a day keeps the doctor away
• that apple didn't fall far from the tree
• rotten to the core
• you are the apple of my eye
• don't upset the apple cart
• don't let one rotten apple spoil the whole barrel.

Scrolling through my library catalogue there were more than thirty picture books which highlighted apples. Some were sheer celebrations of the apple such as Apple by Nikki McClure and Little Apple: A Book of Thanks by Brigitte Weninger; others such as The Apple Trees by Vivian French, One Red Apple by Harriet Ziefert, Apples Apples Apples  by Nancy Elizabeth Wallace, From Seed to Apple  by Anita Ganeri and Apples Grow on a Tree by Mari Schuh explain the lifecycle of apples in an illustrated format suitable for young readers; some tell the benefits of and how to make apple pies (Amelia Bedelia's First Apple Pie; How to Make an Apple Pie and See the World) and yet others are just great stories for young children to enjoy and marvel at.

The most recent acquisition that sent me on this search for an Apple Day is The Apple Orchard Riddle  by Margaret McNamara and Brian Karas. I bought this because their earlier book How Many Seeds in a Pumpkin? had been such a success with the teachers and this story is also about teacher, Mr Tiffin and his class, and in it they go on a trip to an orchard and learn a lot about apples while trying to solve a riddle as well.

Other stories that I have shared with preschool or kindergarten classes to great effect are:
• Mr Brown's Magnificent Apple Tree  by Yvonne Winer and Maya Winters
• A New House for Mouse by Petr Horacek
• Red Panda's Toffee Apples by Ruth Paul
• The Very Helpful Hedgehog by Rosie Wellesley
• The Apple Pie Tree by Zoe Hall and Shari Halpern
• The Apple Tree by Lynley Dodd
and two picture books with more 'meat' and things to talk about
• Hubert and the Apple Tree by Bruno Hachler and Albrecht Rissler
• One Green Apple by Eve Bunting and Ted Lewin. This story also features an excursion to an apple orchard, but the main character here is Farah, a Muslim immigrant who is new to the class.