Animal Atlas

Title: Animal Atlast
Author: Virginie Aladjidi
Illustrator: Emmanuelle Tchoukriel
Publisher: Sourcebooks
Publication Date: October 4th, 2016
Genre/Format: Non-Fiction/Atlas - Informational
GoodReads Summary: Did you know that: 
Sea otters can spend months in the water without returning to land? 
Flying fish can glide for 300 ft over the water? 
A Praying Mantis can rotate its head 180 degrees?

Become an expert on all things that swim, fly, walk, hop, slither, and crawl! In a celebration of the many animals that share our planet, this gorgeously illustrated atlas explores over 250 different animals across the seven continents. Learn where different animals live, what they eat, how they communicate, and many more fascinating facts!What I Think: The setup of Animal Atlas makes it really easy for readers to see where animals live on the Earth. The concept of the Earth being such a big place and understanding where other countries are compared to our is pretty abstract. Animal Atlas is organized so animals are presented with other animals that live near them. Readers can easily see where animals are in the world while also learning about many different animals. This book covers a range of animals, some common and others unique. This book would be a great to use when inviting students to learn about animals in a certain part of the world and could lead into further learning about animals. I work with a 4th grade teacher who did a focused Genius Hour where she let students pick any topic to research as long is it related to the northeast region (which is what their were studying in their SS unit). This book would be great if you want kids to think about researching animals from a certain area of the world and then encourage them to read other texts to learn more about a specific animal they chose.
Snatch of Text: 
"Appaloosa Horse - Equus caballus, Class: mammal
The Appaloosa, with its spotted coat, was brought to American by the Spaniards in the sixteenth century, then raised by the Nez Perce tribe near the Palouse River, from which the horse gets its name. The Appaloosa breed is popular for western riding competitions." (p. 3)
Writing Prompt: Can you find your favorite animal in the Animal Atlas? Incorporate what you learn about an animal in the Animal Atlas and what you read about that animal elsewhere to share what you know about that animals.

The Cosmo Biography of Sun Ra

Title: The Cosmo Biography of Sun Ra 
Author: Chris Raschka  
Illustrator: Chris Raschka  
Publisher: Candlewick Press 
Publication Date: May 13th, 2014 
Genre/Format: Non-Fiction/Biography/Picture Book 
GoodReads Summary: Jazz musician Sun Ra (1914–1993) always said that he came from Saturn. Being from another planet, he was naturally intrigued by everything earthly — especially music, because music is the one thing on Earth most like the stars. Earthlings themselves confused Sun Ra, the way they sorted themselves by color and fought wars against one another. So he made music. And he traveled with other musicians and singers, calling themselves the Sun Ra Arkestra, playing, singing, and dancing for people all over the planet. Because music, he said, is what holds us all together. Join acclaimed author-illustrator Chris Raschka in celebrating a legend of the jazz world who was truly one of a kind. 
What I Think: The colors of Chris Raschka's artwork in The Cosmo Biography of Sun Ra completely bring to life the essence of the musician Sun Ra. I love how the text helps us see how Su Ra was completed devoted to his curiosity about the world and how that extended into his music. As I read this book I thought about Genius Hour and Passion Projects and how when we pursue something we are truly passionate about, we can easily get lost researching and discovering and creating. This story shows how Sun Ra's curiosity led to creation and it's such a great book for thinking about how we moved from taking in information to putting out work. I can see how this book would be a great anchoring text for a teacher encouraging students to discover their passions.
     When I looked at commas with middle school students, I typed sentences from Jimi: Sounds like a Rainbow onto little strips and then asked students to look sort the sentences, looking for how commas were used and where they could see similarities in the sentence structure. We did this to uncover patterns in how commas are used instead of just learning about rules of commas. It was a great activity and as I look at the sentences in Sun Ra and how commas are used, I think the text in this book would lend itself to that same activity. You might even use sentences from both of the books and see how the writing is similar or different. This is one of my favorite ways to use mentor texts, to really look at the structure of a sentence and then to try that in writing.  
Read Together: Grades 3 - 5   
Read Alone: Grades 4 - 6 
Read With: Tito Puente, Mambo King by Monica Brown, Jimi: Sounds Like a Rainbow by Gary Golio 
Snatch of Text:   

"Sun Ra drew other musicians to him. They played in small groups, medium-

size groups, and big groups, with singers or without singers - all kinds of ways.

They were like sailors on a boat bound for a new world, a new world of sound."

Writing Prompts: Write about something that you were so curious or passionate about that you devoted a lot of your time to it.  
Topics Covered: Curiosity, Passion, Creativity 

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