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Artists working across boundaries must demonstrate profound respect for and deep knowledge of the Other. This means a thoroughly open-minded attitude—and much labor in terms of research and questioning one’s own assumptions.

In Just Like Me Climbing a Tree: Exploring Tress Around the World, award-winning author/illustrator Durga Yael Bernhard travels around the globe visiting 12 beautiful and favorite trees.

Exploration and inquiry are the keys to unlocking the secrets and treasures of the trees. Each page asks a question:

What if we swung from a tree branch as monkeys do ? What type of tree would we be swinging form?

What type of tree would we choose if we were a bat and needed to hang upside down?

Each question takes us to a new tree in a new land.

Just Like Me Climbing a Tree is perfect for ages 5 and above. It is beautifully illustrated with full color drawings, bringing this tree adventure to life. Each double page spread hosts the lyrical poetry of  tree, a question, and the classification of the tree and where it is found on our planet.

In the back of the book there is an entire section called “About the Trees in this Book” which is devoted to describing and classifying each tree in great detail.

This hands on multicultural read is sure to delight you and your family time and again. Just Like Me Climbing a Tree brought to mind all of the trees we as a family have called “friend” throughout the years. In our garden we have a huge Rose Cypress tree that has seen many hours of play underneath its branches. If you ask my children, they will tell you that it is a magical tree where fairies live.

In the country of Lebanon where my in-laws live, there is a gigantic banyan tree. It is a favorite friend where we have picnic lunches and the kids climb for hours. This old and ancient tree is a place of pilgrimage for all of us. We can not set foot in Beirut more than 24 hours without going to see what’s happening with our friend known as “the tree.”

Something To Do

How Old Is A Tree ?

Our beautiful old monkey tale pine tree had to be cut down a couple of weeks ago due to it being severely damaged by an ice storm. After cutting it down, we are left with the stump but it’s the stump which will tell us a lot about the life of this beautiful magnificent tree.

Tree Rings

As a tree grows, it produces new layers of wood around the trunk, just under the bark. If a tree is cut down, the layers are visible in a cross-section. The layers appear as a set of concentric circles known as tree rings.

In general, one layer of wood grows each year. Each layer consists of two colors of wood: light-colored “earlywood” that grows in the spring and summer plus darker, denser “latewood” from the fall and winter.

Tree rings—also known as annual growth rings—vary in size each year depending upon the environmental conditions that the tree experiences. For most locations, tree rings will be wider during years of abundant rainfall and narrower during times of drought.

By counting back from the year a living tree was cut, it is possible to determine how old the tree is. Find a tree stump and start counting the tree rings from the outside and move to the center of the tree trunk.

Climate Records

Some species of trees can live for thousands of years. Because the widths of a tree’s rings reflect yearly precipitation patterns, the rings can be analyzed to reconstruct a record of past climate conditions.

Fires

Tree rings also record the occurrence of forest fires. New layers of wood added around the exterior of tree trunks are vulnerable to damage by fire. If a fire damages a tree’s bark and exterior, but does not kill the tree, a new layer of wood can grow over the scarred layer the next year, preserving the scar as a record of the fire.

Spend some time outside near a tree stump and see what history it’s telling you. How old is it ? Was there years of excessive rainfall ? Was there years of drought ? Were there any forest fires ?

More Things To Do…….

Sing the Just Like Me Song

There’s a song to go along with this wonderful book. Not only will you be climbing trees but you’ll be singing while you do. Story Laurie aka Laurie McIntosh has written the Just Like Me Song. It’s really fun and wonderful. Have a look at the book as you sing along !!! 

The post Do You Like To Climb Trees ? Just Like Me Climbing a Tree: Exploring Tress Around the World appeared first on Jump Into A Book.

Inspired by a medieval legend about the Jewish poet Samuel Ha-Nagid, “never say a Mean Word Again” by Jacqueline Jules, and Durga Yael Bernhard, is a wonderfully crafted story about two little boys, one Jewish and one Muslim, who try to settle their differences.

This light-hearted look at a very serious problem of name calling. After a series of accidental events, Hamza (the muslim boy), calls Saumuel, (the jewish boy) some very unkind names.

Samuel’s father, the grand vizier, noticed this and mentioned that Hama said some very unkind things. Samuel wanted his father to punish Hamza but the wise Vizier said, “No, I’ll let you punish him yourself. Make sure he never says a mean word to you again.”

As Samuel laid in his bed he thought of several very unkind things he could do to Hamza to punish him for his unkind words.

Settling on one punishment in particular, Samuel arrives at Hamza’s door with a lemon. Mahza thinking Samuel had come to help clean his shirt clearly stated that the lemon wouldn’t help so they ended up playing catch with it instead.

The next day Samuel arrived at Hamza’s house with a pen and paper. He would make him write a formal apology then he would have something to show his father the Vizier. But then they just ended up coloring instead.

Day after day this continued. Each time Samuel thought up a “new punishment”, the ended up playing together. This created a great dilemma for Samuel. What was he going to do to show his father that he had punished Hamza and that he would never say a mean word to him again ?

The entire story as well as the ending of this book is completely charming and engaging on many levels. The art is beautiful and deepens the story with it’s beautiful colors. The print is big and easy to follow and the whole feel of the book is welcoming. The best thing of this book is it’s message. Though the intention to do something unkind to Hamza to return his unkindness was clearly there, Hamza never say any unkindness coming towards him. He only say a new friend instead. It is a beautiful story of conflict resolution perfectly told. This book is out on the coffee table where it is picked up often by family and visitors alike. I’m so glad this book exist. It is an invaluable tool to teaching children how to deal with conflict in kind ways.

Something to Do:

The problem starts when Hamza views Samuel’s clumsy actions as mean intended. So to return Samuel’s unkindness, Hamza calls him mean names. Samuel then feels its his turn to show unkindness but it always unfolds into kindness. How can we do this in our own lives? How can we turn unkindness into kindness.

Let’s start with the way we speak. Here’s a few nice things to say to people whenever you should encounter them.

• Hi my name is______ what’s yours?
• Can I help you?
• What’s your favorite color?
• Say thank-you
• I’m sorry.
• I forgive you
• Please
• I’m glad you’re my friend.
• You’re awesome
• I like you
• That’s Incredible !!
• Want to play?
• Want to play: Charades, hop scotch,board game, cards, Hide & Seek, Simon Says, 20 questions, I spy, Catch?
• Awesome

Along with kind words, we can also choose not to view someone’s unkindness as unkindness but an invitation to play. If someone should say something unkind, compliment them on something and then include them in an activity.

Please note that I’m referring to simple childhood disagreements and not full on bullying which is a much bigger problem and is dealt with differently. It’s my hope that simple kind actions when children are small will provide them with the tools they need to deal with conflicts in a kind way as they grow as opposed to aggression.

Along the same lines of this whole post is a free gift I would like to offer my readers! “Conditions of the Heart” is a FREE kids activity book filled with fun activities & crafts that teaches values and conduct. Grab your copy HERE:

Need gift ideas for Christmas? Give the gift of education and guidance with Donna Ashton’s The Waldorf Homeschool Handbook Now available through Audrey Press Books!

The post Want to Put an End to Name Calling ? Never Say a Mean Word Again appeared first on Jump Into A Book.

Retold by Alexis York Lumbard, illustrated by Demi,
The Conference of the Bird
Wisdom Tales, 2012.

Ages:  7 +

Artist Demi has provided a lavish visual feast to illustrate Alexis York Lumbard‘s adaptation of a Sufi classic, The Conference of the Birds. Farid al-Din Attar’s 12th century Persian poem presents an analogy of the human spiritual quest through the quest of thirty birds (si morge in Persian) to find Simorgh, a phoenix-like enlightened being reputedly residing on a faraway holy mountain. They are led by a hoopoe, the long-beaked, apricot-crested bird with dramatic black and white markings that is legendary in desert countries for finding underground water.

Along the way, various birds suffer the same setbacks human beings do on their spiritual paths: in Lumbard’s text, the duck procrastinates; the parrot is attached to her gems; the finch fears a storm; the partridge becomes impatient; the hawk forges ahead and gets lost. With the hoopoe’s encouragement, presented in verse, each bird lets go of whatever obstacle is in its way.

“So do not let your many doubts
Destroy this golden chance.

Release their hold upon you now,
and to your King advance!”

Demi’s vivid water colors and lively lines reveal quirky individual bird personalities and egos as she renders the birds overcoming trepidation in response to the hoopoe’s admonishments. Her paintings, on pale or midnight blue washes, are framed with gold borders that depict in tiny images characteristic postures of the particular bird in question. Young children can intuit an inspiring story from the illustrations alone.

In traditional versions, the birds arrive at the holy mountain to find not Simorgh, but a reflecting pool in which they see themselves. The story subtly suggests that one finds the infinite in the particular, the holy in the very self that seeks the Other. Lumbard has appended a page to her version in which the sun on the water transforms the birds’ reflections into dazzling light. “In this moment of silence when no thoughts…passed before their minds, the birds found themselves in the loving embrace of God, their true King.”

Islamic scholar Seyyed Hossein Nasr‘s introduction offers background on the original Persian poem. Parents and teachers who prefer that young readers realize for themselves the profound wordless insights of this enduring story may find, for example, Peter Sis‘ beautifully printed 2011 version more to their liking; but many others will appreciate Lumbard’s explication and look forward to her continued project of providing children with books of spiritual guidance.

Charlotte Richardson
August 2012

NB: Read our interview with Demi here and view our gallery of her work here.