World War II memorial in Washington, D.C. by Kyle Rush www.flickr.com *Nonfiction historical young adult book *Features members of Hitler Youth and their stories *Rating: Hitler Youth: Growing Up in Hitler’s Shadow is at times gut-wrenching and sad, but Bartoletti does a great job of showing teens (the intended audience) what it was like to [...]

Amelia Bedelia is still alive and well in spite of the fact that lovable author, Peggy Parish, died in 1988. Thank goodness her nephew and HarperCollins have continued the series with one of my favorite characters in all of literature: good-old, literal, fun-loving maid Amelia Bedelia. The first book, pictured here with a new cover, [...]

Lesson plans on teaching writing a personal narrative are often a hot commodity. Personal narratives are what many elementary, junior high, and high school teachers begin the year teaching and students begin the year writing. One of the main problems that students have when they are writing a personal narrative, at any age, is they [...]

Today I’m participating in a mass blogging! WOW! Women On Writing has gathered a group of blogging buddies to write about family relationships. Why family relationships? We’re celebrating the release of Therese Walsh’s debut novel today. The Last Will of Moira Leahy, (Random House, October 13, 2009) is about a mysterious journey that helps a [...]

Hi all, Thank you so much for all the comments for Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins. The winner is Pamela S. Stay tuned for later in the day when I update this post with an interview from a third grade teacher about how she uses technology in an eMINTS classroom. One of my favorite Maniac [...]

Yes, you read that right. . .you can win your very own hard cover copy of Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins (the sequel to The Hunger Games) by leaving a comment below. I’m not even going to make you do anything special in your comment if you don’t want to–you can just say “pick me” [...]

Photo by Yuen Lui Studio Today is National Poetry Day in Britain. On WOW! Women On Writing’s blog, “The Muffin,” I wrote a little about how Britain celebrates this day and included a really cool picture of a refrigerator door with a poem painted on it! Check this post out here if you are interested [...]

The subject of getting our kids to eat healthy, especially in the United States, has been on parents’ and educators’ minds for several decades. There are several teachers’ books that talk about nutrition and give lesson plan ideas. But what about books that talk directly to kids? These two above can be used with elementary [...]

by Clearly Ambiquous www.flickr.com *Picture book for preschoolers through second graders *Two young boys as main characters *Rating: I am in love with Let’s Do Nothing! I laughed out loud at this picture book. Tony Fucile’s illustrations are hilarious, and the story is so cute! Short, short summary: Frankie and Sal do not know what [...]

Master Lock, the world’s largest manufacturer of padlocks and related security products, has special pink locks for sale during breast cancer awareness month. In addition to raising awareness with their pink locks, they are also giving The Breast Cancer Research Foundation a $15,000 donation. This is a topic that is near to my heart as [...]