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Have you ever wondered what sparks an idea for a book?

Author Jennifer Keats Curtis talks with us about the process of writing Primate School and how one idea lead her to a deep study in animal behavior, feelings and thinking.

When I learned that orangutans were using iPads, my first thought was, Oh good, there’s hope for my mother. Ok, I’m kidding. My real thought was that despite extraordinary study and learning, there is so much about animals that we still don’t know.

As I set off to learn about orangutans and other primates for the nonfiction Primate School, I thought about how much I love animals and want to understand them. I thought about my own connections with animals and my personal belief that animals have feelings and emotions. I believe that they feel joy and sadness, perhaps not in the same way that we do, but that they are conscious, sentient beings and I wish I could better relate and communicate with them. I think that we have missed a lot with animals in the past for fear of anthropomorphizing them.

I joyfully learned about how primates communicate with each other through verbal cues and behavior and how they express themselves, show happiness and love, and learn from each other and keepers. I loved learning about how primates connect to each other and to humans. I was fascinated to learn about aunting behavior among langurs and saddened to learn about the gibbons who had been raised as pets and had trouble relating to other gibbons.

I wrote Primate School ecstatic to use what I’d learned from cognitive ethologists. Ethologists study animals in their natural settings and cognitive ethologists get to focus on the thinking process, including communication, culture, and learning. I embrace this concept and cannot get enough of what these scientists have to say. Even though that book is complete, I never want to stop learning about what primates and other animals think and feel, how they learn from us, and how we can learn from them. That is one of the main reasons that I write about animals for children.

Award-winning nature author Jennifer Keats Curtis is frequently found among students and teachers, talking about literacy or conservation. In addition to Primate School, Salamander Season, the Animal Helpers series, Baby Owl’s Rescue, Kali’s Story, and Turtles In My Sandbox  for Arbordale, some of her other recent titles include Osprey Adventure, Saving Squeak: A River Otter’s Tale, and Seahorses. Jennifer resides in Maryland, with her family and a wide variety of pets. Visit her website at www.jenniferkeatscurtis.com. 

Learn more about Primate School and Jennifer’s other Arbordale books here!

Title: Ape Written by: Martin Jenkins Illustrated by: Vicky White Published by: Candlewick, 2007 Themes/Topics: five categories of great apes, humans Suitable for ages: 4-8 Non Fiction, 32 pages Opening: There are five kinds of great apes in the world. Each of them is different … Continue reading →

4 Stars 
Monkey of the Month
by Adam Kramer / David Kramer
Schiffer Publishing
978-0-7643-4156-4
No. of Pages: 40    Ages: 2 to 7
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Inside Jacket:  Bored with mundane birthday gifts, a young boy unexpectedly receives a most peculiar gift on his birthday one year—membership to the "Monkey of the Month Club."  Though pleased it isn't just a pair of socks, he is very confused by this odd gift, until, month-by-month monkeys and their primate cousins start appearing at his door.
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Monkey of the Month is adorable. If you have ever received a gift-of-the-month club membership, whether it be fruit, candy, flowers, or monkeys, you will enjoy this cute book.  I liked the colorful illustrations of each different monkey and their contribution to the boy’s household, not always to his mother’s delight.

You will not find a “message” in Monkey of the Month, but you will find loads of laughs,  plenty of giggles, and a few guffaws. Parents will not be bored reading this night after night. Told in rhyming verse, the monkeys arrive one-by-one each month and stay on to do whatever they arrived to do.  One cleans, another decorates, a third simply sits on his bu–chair watching television all day, eating, drinking and making a mess.

I think kids will adore the different monkeys and the effect they each have on the boy’s mother, who eventually has had enough.  But true to fashion, the story does not end with the last   monkey. No, there seems to be a series developing as the last creature rings the boy’s doorbell.

 …………………Monkey of the Month is a fun picture book that will become a favorite read-to-me book of the 2 to 8 year-old crowd.  Anyone who enjoys a picture book, whose only purpose is to entertain, will enjoy Monkey of the Month for its bright and humorous illustrations, exaggerated expressions, and quirky story of the imaginative birthday gift that is far from mundane.

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Monkey of the Month

Author: Adam Kramer   facebook
Illustrator: David Kramer    facebook
Publisher: Schiffer Publishing   website
Releaase Date: July 28, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-7643-4156-4
Number of Pages: 40
Grades: Pre-K to 3rd

Today we've got a great trailer to share with you - straight from the TIGERS (The Institute of Greatly Endangered and Rare Species) preserve in South Carolina. 

Suryia & Roscoe are real buds, and it truly was friendship at first sight.  When they first met, they were drawn to one another, and have remained close every since. Even stardom hasn't broken up this pair - appearing on major morning shows and appearing at events throughout the country. 

Here's a glimpse into their day to day relationship in our trailer:

Be sure to check out the photo gallery starring S&R that didn't make it into the book!

We'd love you to let us know what you think!

Color in this Orangutan coloring page and send it to me at [email protected] as a jpeg or pdf and I'll post it on my blog! Happy Coloring!! For more Coloring pages click here.