In this children's story full of native plants and wildlife, learn how lonely Bear Cub invited friends to his new home- by creating a Puddle Garden.Bear Cub plants cardinal flower, swamp milkweed, blue flag iris, elderberry, and more. His garden quickly fills with grateful wildlife. His home landscape is no longer lonely!Children and parents alike will be inspired by this story to create homes for butterflies, hummingbirds, turtles, frogs and other wildlife, using native wildflowers and shrubs that provide shelter and sustenance.Written by botanist Jared Rosenbaum, and illustrated by artist Laura Rosenbaum, this book is both a charming story and a template for restoring our home landscapes to natural beauty and abundance.
Early in the year, our North American forests come to life as native wildflowers start to push up through patches of snow. With longer days and sunlight streaming down through bare branches of towering trees, life on the forest floor awakens from its winter sleep. Plants such as green dragon, squirrel corn, and bloodroot interact with their pollinators and seed dispersers and rush to create new life before the trees above leaf out and block the sun's rays. Wake Up, Woods showcases the splendor of our warming forests and offers clues to nature's annual springtime floral show as we walk in our parks and wilderness areas, or even in shade gardens around our homes. Readers of Wake Up, Woods will see that Gillian Harris, Michael Homoya and Shane Gibson, through illustrations and text, present a captivating look into our forests' biodiversity, showing how species depend on plants for food and help assure plant reproduction. This book celebrates some of nature's most fascinating moments that happen in forests where we live and play.
A 2020 Caldecott Honor Book From the New York Times best-selling author behind The Quiet Book comes a mindful contemplation on the many ways nature affects our everyday lives, even when we’re stuck inside. Five starred reviews! Perfect for fans of Joyce Sidman and Julie Fogliano, Outside In reminds emerging readers of the ways nature creates and touches our lives in homes, apartments, and cars, and is the perfect homeschooling tool to reflect on the world’s connectedness. Outside is waiting, the most patient playmate of all. The most generous friend. The most miraculous inventor. This thought-provoking picture book poetically underscores our powerful and enduring connection with nature, not so easily obscured by lives spent indoors. Rhythmic, powerful language shows us how our world is made and the many ways Outside comes in to help and heal us, and reminds us that we are all part of a much greater universe. Emotive illustrations evoke the beauty, simplicity, and wonder that await us all . . . outside.
How still it is! Nobody in the village street, the children all at school, and the very dogs sleeping lazily in the sunshine. Only a south wind blows lightly through the trees, lifting the great fans of the horse-chestnut, tossing the slight branches of the elm against the sky like single feathers of a great plume, and swinging out fragrance from the heavy-hanging linden-blossoms.
The Book That Launched an International Movement Fans of The Anxious Generation will adore Last Child in the Woods, Richard Louv's groundbreaking New York Times bestseller. “An absolute must-read for parents.” —The Boston Globe “It rivals Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring.” —The Cincinnati Enquirer “I like to play indoors better ’cause that’s where all the electrical outlets are,” reports a fourth grader. But it’s not only computers, television, and video games that are keeping kids inside. It’s also their parents’ fears of traffic, strangers, Lyme disease, and West Nile virus; their schools’ emphasis on more and more homework; their structured schedules; and their lack of access to natural areas. Local governments, neighborhood associations, and even organizations devoted to the outdoors are placing legal and regulatory constraints on many wild spaces, sometimes making natural play a crime. As children’s connections to nature diminish and the social, psychological, and spiritual implications become apparent, new research shows that nature can offer powerful therapy for such maladies as depression, obesity, and attention deficit disorder. Environment-based education dramatically improves standardized test scores and grade-point averages and develops skills in problem solving, critical thinking, and decision making. Anecdotal evidence strongly suggests that childhood experiences in nature stimulate creativity. In Last Child in the Woods, Louv talks with parents, children, teachers, scientists, religious leaders, child-development researchers, and environmentalists who recognize the threat and offer solutions. Louv shows us an alternative future, one in which parents help their kids experience the natural world more deeply—and find the joy of family connectedness in the process. Included in this edition: A Field Guide with 100 Practical Actions We Can Take Discussion Points for Book Groups, Classrooms, and Communities Additional Notes by the Author New and Updated Research from the U.S. and Abroad
Brimir and Hulda are best friends who live on a small island on a beautiful blue planet where there are only children and no adults. Their planet is wild and at times dangerous, but everything is free, everyone is their friend, and each day is more exciting than the last. One day a rocket ship piloted by a strange-looking adult named Gleesome Goodday crashes on the beach. His business card claims he is a “Dream.ComeTrueMaker and joybringer,” and he promises to make life a hundred times more fun with sun-activated flying powder and magic-coated skin so that no one ever has to bathe again. Goodday even nails the sun in the sky and creates a giant wolf to chase away the clouds so it can be playtime all the time. In exchange for these wonderful things, Goodday asks only for a little bit of the children’s youth—but what is youth compared to a lot more fun? The children are so enamored with their new games that they forget all the simple activities they used to love. During Goodday’s great flying competition, Hulda and Brimir fly too high to the sun and soar to the other side of planet, where they discover it is dark all the time and the children are sickly and pale. Hulda and Brimir know that without their help, the pale children will die, but first they need to get back to their island and convince their friends that Gleesome Goodday is not all that he seems. A fantastical adventure, beautifully told, unfolds in a deceptively simple tale. The Story of the Blue Planet will delight and challenge readers of all ages.
Connecting Children to the Wonder of Nature There's a whole world outdoors waiting to embrace young children--with their curiosity, imagination, and enthusiasm--and to impart its treasures. Experiencing Nature With Young Children invites you to explore this world with children from birth to age 8 in ways that will - Awaken their enjoyment and appreciation of nature - Nurture their emotional development - Enhance their cognitive growth - Spark their creativity - Help them discover how we all--people, animals, plants--are connected - Engage families and communities in preserving nature Along the way, children will learn to love nature and its inhabitants. And in learning to love, they will learn to care--helping to ensure that our natural environment will be well looked-after by the next generation. Part ballad to nature, part irresistible invitation to teachers, this book will awaken and renew your own joy in nature--and move you to experience it with young children.
Jayden and a new friend bring nature to the city in this timeless story about a community garden Amidst all the buildings, people, and traffic in his neighborhood, Jayden sees nature everywhere: the squirrels scrounging, the cardinals calling, and the dandelions growing. But Mama doesn’t believe there’s nature in the city. So Jayden sets out to help Mama see what he sees. With the help of his friend Mr. Curtis, Jayden plants the seeds of a community garden and brings together his neighbors—and Mama—to show them the magic of nature in the middle of the city. Timeless and vibrant, this story highlights the beauty of intergenerational relationships and the power of imagination and perseverance in bringing the vision of a community garden to life. Jayden’s love of nature will inspire readers to see their environment and surroundings as bursting with opportunities for growth and connection. At the back of the book, readers will find activities to make items found in the book, such as the milk jug bird feeder. Jayden’s Impossible Garden is the winner of the 2019 African American Voices in Children’s Literature writing contest, cosponsored by Strive Publishing and Free Spirit Publishing, and the recipient of the 2021 Foreword INDIES Honorable Mention, Picture Books, Early Reader (Children's). .
Real-life 7-year-old Sophia Spencer was bullied for loving bugs until hundreds of women scientists rallied around her. Now Sophie tells her inspiring story in this picture book that celebrates women in science, bugs of all kinds, and the importance of staying true to yourself. Makes a perfect gift for nature lovers on Earth Day and every day! Sophia Spencer has loved bugs ever since a butterfly landed on her shoulder--and wouldn't leave!--at a butterfly conservancy when she was only two-and-a-half years old. In preschool and kindergarten, Sophia was thrilled to share what she knew about grasshoppers (her very favorite insects), as well as ants and fireflies... but by first grade, not everyone shared her enthusiasm. Some students bullied her, and Sophia stopped talking about bugs altogether. When Sophia's mother wrote to an entomological society looking for a bug scientist to be a pen pal for her daughter, she and Sophie were overwhelmed by the enthusiastic response--letters, photos, and videos came flooding in. Using the hashtag BugsR4Girls, scientists tweeted hundreds of times to tell Sophia to keep up her interest in bugs--and it worked! Sophia has since appeared on Good Morning America, The Today Show, and NPR, and she continues to share her love of bugs with others.
