Our favorite books this July include the final Elephant and Piggie book. a book to inspire community engagement and creativity, the story of one of your kids’ favorite summertime toys, a captivating novel for animal lovers and a smart and suspenseful novel for mature readers.
Read on to see all the great stories our book experts can’t get enough of this month!
For Pre-K –K (Ages 3-6):
The Thank You Book (An Elephant and Piggie Book) by Mo Willems
The 25th and final Elephant and Piggie book will warm the hearts of grown-ups and have kids in stitches! It makes a perfect gift for a friend, a teacher, or anyone to whom you want to say, “Thank you.”’
For 1st and 2nd Grade (Ages 6-8):
Maybe Something Beautiful: How Art Transformed a Neighborhood by F. Isabel Campoy
“Beautiful” describes both the art and the story in this wonderful picture book (inspired by real events!) about the power of art, creativity, and community engagement. It may invite readers to see the potential for creative change in their own neighborhoods.
For 3rd & 4th grade (Ages 8-10):
Whoosh!: Lonnie Johnson’s Super-Soaking Stream of Inventions by Chris Barton
Kids will be fascinated to learn how their favorite toy was invented. This lively and interesting biography shows the importance of persistence, passion, and problem solving. It’s perfect for budding scientists and engineers!
For 5th & 6th grade (Ages 10-12):
A Dog’s Way Home by Bobbie Pyron
Kids (and adults!) will be utterly won over by this terrific, captivating novel. A deeply moving story of a girl separated from her beloved dog, it’s a true “must read” for any animal lover!
Grades 7 & up (Ages 13+):
Burn, Baby, Burn by Meg Medina
We love author Meg Medina! Smart and suspenseful, her powerful new novel is a great story of personal strength and family loyalty set in NYC during one tension-filled summer. A great choice for mature teens, it’s sure to prompt dynamic discussions about past and current events.
The post Monthly Book List: Our Five Favorite Books this July appeared first on First Book Blog.
Faithful readers will recall that I have gushed on occasion about the book MAYBE SOMETHING BEAUTIFUL by F. Isabel Campoy & Theresa Howell, illustrated by Rafael López. For years he’s been creating truly delicious art in a variety of great books. Remember Drum Dream Girl? Right there. That.
In this latest book, a community comes together to create not just a mural, but a series of public art ventures. Inspired by Mr. López’s public art work with real communities, the book is a joyful dance of colors and tones. I’ve had kids come in for years asking for community garden picture books. Those are great, but if we’re looking for books that speak to the beautification of public spaces, this is a great and slightly different story to start with. There’s even a Twitter hashtag (#maybesomethingbeautiful) for folks looking to show off their own public art discoveries and ventures.
Until then, here’s a truly lovely book trailer for the title. Don’t let it pass you by!
Many thanks to HMH for the link and the scoop.
Juan Diego Campoy Coronado
The strength of your mind sculpted the prodigy of our existence.
The poetry of your heart made you, our example of life.
We come to say good-bye, with our hearts filled with a rainbow of feelings that your life sowed in our hearts. Dressed in black arrived sadness, first. Hidden in her dark clothes she carries the memories of your smile, the serenity of your voice, the sweetness of your kisses, the strength of each of your hugs that your arms offered for any reason. In her pockets she carries 98 years of memories, from your childhood in Aguilas, your adolescence as the first and best student of life, your adulthood as the responsible husband and father, that she is taking today to new horizons.
But our rainbow has also the WHITE of your innocence. You made a century of choices in life, so that the justice of love would triumph. You were our best defense against everything and everybody planting in our heart the strength for any possibility of life, and from them grew a crop of Happiness. Happy our home and childhood, work, studies, play. Happy the abundance of care, and happy even the scarcity in a long post civil war.
GREEN is this fertile field that with your effort you plowed seed by seed, alone, counting only with your determination. In it you designed the goals that would take you to be the first and at that time, the only, professor of English of dozens of generations of students. It was also there where it grew the hope to win a battle to history, to make this a better world. Your idealism is contagious and in it we will always follow you, blindly.
RED is the love that will remain alive, because you made its path eternal. Used, used daily, infinitely used love, made of close-afar, present-absent, from us to you-from you to the world “I love yous”. Love generously shared from dawn to forever.
BLUE is your kindness, and the peace with which you built the roof of our house. It is also de color of those eyes where you saw yourself daily. She is waiting for you, willing to close the cycle of your absence by her side. It is in the happiness of that road that you begin today, in which your memory will live, eternally.
Juan Diego Campoy Coronado
La fuerza de tu mente esculpió el prodigio de nuestra existencia.
La poesía de tu corazón, te hizo nuestro ejemplo de vida.
Venimos a decirte adiós, o quizás solo, ¡hasta luego!, llenos de un arco iris de emociones que tu vida supo sembrar en nuestro corazón. Vestida de negro llegó primero la tristeza. Entre sus ropas oscuras lleva envueltos los recuerdos de tu risa, la serenidad de tu voz, la dulzura de tus besos, la fortaleza de cada abrazo que los tuyos daban por cualquier razón. En sus bolsillos guarda 98 años de memorias, desde tu infancia en Aguilas, tu adolescencia salesiana, tu madurez responsable de esposo y padre, que hoy se lleva a otros horizontes.
Pero nuestro arco iris de emociones tiene también el BLANCO de tu inocencia. Un siglo –casi- de elecciones en la vida para que triunfara la justicia del amor. Tu fuiste nuestra mejor defensa, frente a todo y todos. Tu sembraste en nuestro corazón, cualquier posibilidad de vida y sobre ella, creció la cosecha de la palabra FELIZ. Felices nuestro hogar y la infancia, el trabajo, el estudio, los juegos. Feliz la abundancia de cariño, y feliz incluso la escasez de una larga posguerra.
VERDE es este campo fértil que con tu esfuerzo plantaste semilla a semilla en solitario y contando solo con tu tesón. En él trazaste las metas que te convertirían en el primer –y entonces único- profesor de inglés de decenas de generaciones de estudiantes. También allí nació la esperanza de poder ganarle un pulso a la historia para crear un mundo mejor. Tu idealismo es contagioso y en él te seguiremos siempre a ciegas.
ROJO es el amor que seguirá vivo, porque así labraste tú su camino. Usado, usadísimo amor, hecho “te quieros” cercanos - lejanos, presentes- ausentes, nuestros a ti, tuyo para los tuyos. Amor a manos llenas desde el amanecer hasta el infinito.
AZUL es tu bondad, y es la paz con la que edificaste nuestro techo. Es también el color de esos ojos en los que te miraste siempre. Ella te espera ya, deseosa de cerrar el ciclo de tu ausencia. Y es en la alegría de ese camino que hoy recorres, en la que vivirá eternamente tu recuerdo.
Tus hijos,
María del Pilar, Diego Alberto †,
Francisca Isabel, Vicente Lázaro
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F. ISABEL CAMPOY is the author of numerous children’s books in the areas of poetry, theatre, stories, biographies, and art. As a researcher she has published extensively bringing to the curriculum an awareness of the richness of the Hispanic culture. She is an educator specialized in the area of literacy and home school interaction, topics on which she lecturers nationally. An internationally recognized scholar devoted to the study of language acquisition, a field in which she started publishing in l973 after obtaining her degree in English Philology from Universidad Complutense in Madrid, Spain; and post graduate work in Reading University in England, and UCLA in the United States. Among others, she is the recipient of Junior Guild Award, ALA Notable Book Award, San Francisco Library Award, and the 2005 Reading the World Award from the University of San Francisco.
Todo es canción: Antología poética
(Everything is a Song: Poetry Anthology)
Written by Alma Flor Ada .
Illustrated by Maria Jesus Alvarez.
- Publisher: Santillana USA Publishing Company
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1 Comments on New Books by Alma Flor Ada, last added: 11/2/2011
This is lovely, and the book was wonderful too!