Going green is a hot topic…and a hot science fair project. Author and scientist Elizabeth Snoke Harris knows what impresses, and she provides plenty of winning ideas, along with step-by-step guidance to insure that the end result is a success. Show how to harness energy with windmills, make a biogas generator, and create alternative fuels. Demonstrate green power with recycled paper, solar building, and compact fluorescent light bulbs. Test the ozone, be a “garbage detective,” and discuss how to reverse global warming.
The importance of what children learn will go even beyond the science fair: they’ll have the knowledge to understand what’s happening to Planet Earth…and the desire to do something eco-friendly every day.

In the greenconscious world we live in today, parents realize the importance of teaching the lessons of green living, early on. With this book, parents can encourage their children to be ecologically friendly with fun lessons such as:

* The three Rs: reducing waste, reusing materials, and recycling
* Why we should keep the air, oceans, and forests pollutionfree
* Why organic food is tastier?and better?for you
* How to protect plants and animals
* Earth Day celebrations

Complete with tips for every day of the year?and activities for home, school, and during playtime?this book reveals how easy it is to be an ecofriendly family?and prepare for a better future together. (Description from amazon.com)

Kids are eager to learn how to help protect the environment and preserve the Earth. This fun guide shows them how to reduce waste, recycle materials, protect plant and animals, and more. Filled with 30 eco-friendly activities and puzzles. Illustrations.

An eminently readable and well-organized offering that’s filled with information. Gibbons’s cartoons in primary shapes and colors graphically illustrate the contents of a landfill and how to recycle various products to cut down on the need for landfills–for which space is already in short supply. Discussing paper, plastic, glass, cans, and polystyrene, the author describes how to recycle, why it’s necessary, and its benefits. The top two-thirds of each page is devoted to illustrations that perfectly complement the brief text below. The book ends with a mention of the ozone layer and the limited potential for recycling polystyrene, followed by 14 facts about garbage. The plea is to make our planet a safer and healthier place to live with a habit that is fun and easy–recycling. An excellent, functional introduction. –Carole B. Kirkpatrick, Terminal Park Elementary School, Auburn, WA
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc. From School Library Journal (This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.)

One 11 year-old girl can make a difference-as budding ornithologist and artist Olivia Bouler has proven, single-handedly raising over $175,000 for the Gulf oil spill recovery. Devastated by the disaster and eager to do her part, Olivia wrote a letter to Audubon, “11 years old and willing to help” offering her own bird paintings to raise contributions for Gulf recovery efforts. The idea took flight, and Olivia proceeded to send out over 500 paintings, many of which are captured in this lavish picture book that recaps her valiant campaign to save birds affected by the spill.
Written in her own words, this unique introduction to backyard and endangered birds features Olivia’s hand-drawn illustrations, bird facts, and full-color photos celebrating Olivia’s campaign. Olivia’s Birds
supports Audubon’s conservation mission, including Gulf Coast cleanup efforts and is printed on FSC eco-friendly paper.

(All descriptions come from IndieBound unless otherwise noted.)

Wendy spends her days drawing fantastical worlds, in the evenings she writes about them and then visits them at night during her dreams. Visit her at http://wendymartinillustration.com

Hi Mixed-Up Readers! It’s me, M.G., and I’m back to update our Kid’s Page after a very busy spring. This year has been full of excitement as I hibernated and transformed and I spent the spring getting used to the new me.  Who knew growing and learning was such hard work?  I have come to appreciate the everyday challenges of being a kid. It was much easier when I thought I knew everything I needed to know!

But it’s also fun to learn new things. I’ve lived at the library for as long as I can remember and was so used to being here that that I’d stopped looking around.  But recently I’ve been examining things I’d previously overlooked and I rediscovered the travel section. I’ve spent the last month taking pretend vacations all over the world just by opening a book.  I’ve gone to Rome and Antarctica, Australia and Peru, and now I have the itch to explore the world in person, so to speak. But when you are a library creature like me, transportation is a huge problem, as I imagine it is for most kids.

But then I stumbled across a book about all about my own city and got a great idea. I’ve called a truce with the library mice. It’s time for an adventure and I need their help. I want to figure out a way to take a vacation that allows me to come home to the safety of my library every night. So we are working together to figure out a plan to check out the treasures near our very own library. The mice have some intriguing ideas. Perhaps I have underestimated them.

As part of our research, the mice and I have been reading family newspapers, magazines and books searching for thing to do while we explore our town.  But you have another resource! The Mixed-Up authors have created some fun and tasty activities for you to do while vacationing at home this summer.

To get a head start on places to visit this summer (or a virtual vacation, too), check out our Destination: Books! book list. If you want to exercise your mind while thinking of other exciting destinations, try our Summer Travel Word Search.  Weather not cooperating with your plans for outside fun?  No worries. The Mixed-Up Authors have you covered with ideas for lemon science in the kitchen. While you are in the kitchen, try out these tasty kid-inspired smoothie recipes. And as long as you have the snacks ready, invite some friends over for a summer lemonade party. And last but never least, we are back to books with these links for summer reading clubs. After all, you have the food, the friends and the fun—why not bring the books?

So, my Mixed-Up friends, let’s all have a wonderful summer, whether we travel far or create a vacation at home.  I’ll be back in the fall, ready for fresh, new school year. Have fun and most of all   . . .

Keep reading!

M.G.

When my sons were small, I would often find them playing in the middle of a pile of books. Sometimes the books were used as ramps for their Matchbox cars or walls to a house for their action figures.  But many times, I would find the boys lying in the middle of the pile, looking at the pictures, making up their own stories and eventually reading.

Not everyone is so lucky to grow up surrounded by books.  In some homes, books aren’t around because reading isn’t something that was modeled for the parents, so it’s not a value they bring to their own parenting. That’s a skill can be learned. But when gas and food eat up a tiny budget, books can seem like luxury items and that is another problem all together.

My last post introduced a short series on Barriers to Reading by discussing the difficulties some readers have along with some suggestions to help them over their internal hurdles. Today’s post is about an external barrier–no access.

I work between several school and home locations in a lower income area and am continuously surprised at how seldom I see buses go by. Library options are not convenient. There are no big box stores or bookstores around. If I lived there and wanted to buy a book for my child, I’d be hard pressed to find one even if I had the money to spare. When I do home visits, sometimes there’s not a book to be seen. Studies show that the presence of books in the home has a direct relationship with school success. Not having books is a huge obstacle.

The problem is far worse in many other countries. Even the poorest communities in the United States are rich compared to the poverty overseas. Where does reading fall into the pyramid of life choices when you are struggling to survive? But books open a door to literacy that provides increased job opportunities, ability to participate in elections and ability to understand health and education services wherever one lives. 

Almost Effortless Ways You Can Make a Difference

1. Donate new books to your local school. We do this with my children’s school or classroom libraries at typical gift-giving times.  We also buy extra books at the Scholastic Book Fair to donate to their classrooms or library. For some kids, school is their only link to books.
2. In the same vein, donate your gently used children’s books to your local school for them to use or give away to children who need them.
3. Give a brand new hardback book to a school counselor to give to a child who could use an extra special boost. Write a short, encouraging note inside about your favorite book-related memory, a related quote or what you hope the gift will represent to make the gift more personal.   
4. Take the above suggestions a step further and find a school in a low income neighborhood. Do steps 1-3.

 **When interacting with schools, you should call first to make the appropriate arrangements.  Nice, up-to-date books or classics are generally welcome. Don’t give away books that have out-lived their usefulness. Remember to also look for books with multcultural characters. If you aren’t sure what’s appropriate, contact the school’s librarian.

For bigger scale ideas, check out these links.

First Book:  Supports children in need by providing access to new books.

Book Bus: A Books by the Busload event held in Omaha last February took books to the people who need them.

Book Drive Toolkit: Tips from United We Serve for starting a book distribution team.

Books by Elephant: One man’s mission to bring books to rural Laos.

Successful reading is the first key to open doors of opportunities. But this door remains firmly closed for many people with serious ramifications.  How else can we connect books with readers who have difficulty getting them? Share your ideas and your books!

Photos compliments of www.morguefile.com

Joanne Prushing Johnson is a middle- grade writer, middle- grade mother, middle- grade occupational therapist (and middle-aged woman but we aren’t going there!). Take a lucky guess at her birth order and you’ll see she’s spent her entire life firmly planted in the middle. She lives in the middle of the U.S. in the state of Nebraska in the middle of four boys, one husband and double-sized dog. Joanne is represented by Quinlan Lee of Adams Literary.