Author Fiesta

Animal Tracks

The Jim Arnosky Author Fiesta is still going strong around the Ten Kids and a Dog home.

Joann says:

One of the kids favorite books by Jim Arnosky has been Wild Tracks! This contains beautiful Arnosky animal illustrations along with life size illustrations of mostly North American animal tracks,tracks that can be found out and about right here in our neck of the woods.

After enjoying perusing this book for a few weeks, the time came to start some projects.

Here is a sampling of the great activities they have been doing that focus on animal tracks.

Check out the entire post here.

What's Happening?

I know, I know...it's a week into October and you haven't heard anything new on the Author Fiesta blog.  Sorry about that. Cay asked me to post today so everyone would know what is going on.

So...because Jim Arnosky has such a huge volume of works and fits so well into the fall study time we are continuing with that study into this month.  With school starting, illnesses, hurricanes, etc. in our personal lives we hadn't been able to get into the Arnosky study as deeply as we had hoped.  So thanks for bearing with us.

One thing that is also happening is we are preparing quite in advance for the November study and you may want a jump start on that. I am so excited - as this is one of my favorites. The November author is a classic author illustrator who was quite prolific for the time period, but not necessarily by today's standards. Many of this author's books are unfortunately out of print so we want you to have plenty of time to request them from libraries or find them used. So I guess that means I'm opening up the guessing for November's Author Fiesta author. And a hint: there is definitely a reason for picking this author to highlight this year. After the author is guessed, I'll post.

Cute Crinkleroot Caps

(Make sure to check out the Crinkleroot hat post compiled by Joann over at Ten Kids and a Dog. A portion of which is being reprinted here with her permission. Aren't they just too cute for words!)

Keeping in the Jim Arnosky nature theme, and wanting to honor our favorite nature guide, Crinkleroot, I made the four littlest kids "hiking hats". We plan to use them on all of our nature walks, especially this autumn, as we continue enjoying the Author Fiesta.

The kids are really enjoying their hats. I used Simplicity #5540 as my pattern. I think they only cost about $3.00 each to make.

Narration Idea

A creative way to do an oral narration of a book is through a dramatic production or puppet show. Jim Arnosky's books lend themselves well to a presentation by stuffed animals or puppets.  We have quite a collection of animal puppets and other stuffed animals so this was a natural choice. Even without actual animal puppets or stuffed animals, children could pretend to be the animals or paper animal puppets could be made (ala Crinkleroot) or use animal figurines for a mini show. After reading a book, the child(ren) can present the information and facts about that animal as a show acted out by the animal being featured in the book.  This works well with the "All About" or "One Whole Day" books.  With other Arnosky picture books that tell more of a story, such as Every Autumn Comes the Bear or Coyote Raid in Cactus Canyon the show could be a re-enactment of the storyline.

READY, SET, ACTION!

More Research Forms Uploaded

Several more research forms have been uploaded in this previous post.  They are All About Manatees, All About Turtles, All About Frogs, and All About Deer. Still working on more. Stay tuned.

Jim Arnosky for the Littlest

(This post was compiled by Joann over at Ten Kids and a Dog. It is being reprinted here with her permission.)

* * * * *

While the older kids are enjoying the nature study that Jim Arnosky encourages, my littlest kids have been enjoying the many books written for our youngest students.Here is a list of Jim Arnosky's books that are suitable for the toddlers among us.

We have been enjoying Crinkleroot's Animals That Every Child Should Know books. Sadly, these books are out of print, but many library systems have them available.
To make this book a little more hands on for Luke and Kimberly, I searched through our animal bucket and found most of the animals featured in the book. We were missing a few of the animals, so I searched around the house and found pictures of the missing mammals.
We looked at the page and named the animal in the book and then looked for the matching animal among the pictures and toys I had set out. During this time we also made the animal's sound and crawled around and acted like the creature.
This also served as a good lesson in taking turns. Something that has to be learned, and learned, and learned. There is nothing worse than a 2 and 3 year old diving on top of each other as they moo like a cow!

"ALL ABOUT" Resources

A Jim Arnosky series we really enjoy is the "ALL ABOUT" books. They are well done with lots of details about the named class of animals in a nice condensed format and of course excellent and engaging illustrations.  As you read along and learn "About" these animals, you can complete a research form for your notebooks. I'll add more forms for the remaining books as they are completed.

All About Deer - Download all_about_deer.pdf
All About Frogs - Download all_about_frogs.pdf 
All About Manatees - Download all_about_manatees.pdf
All About Owls - Download all_about_owls.pdf
All About Rattlesnakes - Download all_about_rattlesnakes.pdf
All About Sharks - Download all_about_sharks.pdf
All About Turkeys - Download all_about_turkeys.pdf
All About Turtles - Download all_about_turtles.pdf

Crinkleroot, Your Nature Companion

Taking the Crinkleroot Guide concept one step further and also borrowing an idea from Flat Stanley, the famous paper traveler, how about having a paper Crinkleroot accompany your family on this month's nature adventures.

We printed an image from the internet (I wanted it bigger but it lost clarity as I enlarged). You could also enlarge a copy from one of the books. Cut it out (we put a construction paper backing on it to make it sturdier and added a popsicle stick handle) and he's ready to go along on nature walks and assist with the studies.  Here's where he went with us today.

Here's one printable image of Crinkleroot: http://jimarnosky.com/factpage.html

Joann's contribution: Crinkleroot w/ an added idea for older children

Your Guide, Crinkleroot

Undoubtedly, Jim Arnosky's most beloved character is Crinkleroot, the jovial woodsman who serves as a "nature guide" in a series of nature guides.  Here is your opportunity to take Crinkleroot along as your personal guide through this Author Fiesta study.  Joann's very talented daughter has created a wonderful coloring page of our good friend, Crinkleroot, for you to download, color, and add to your Author Fiesta notebook. Download crinkle_root.pdf

Speaking of Crinkleroot, have you ever wondered about the name? Well, crinkleroot is the common name for a woodland plant (Cardamine diphylla) of eastern North America, having fleshy rootstocks, trifoliolate leaves, and clusters of white or pinkish flowers.

September's Author/Illustrator

...is Jim Arnosky. 

His birthday was September 1st.

Let's hang on to that last bit of summer stretching into fall.  It's a great time for some nature study in our Author Fiesta.

Jim Arnosky is a self taught writer, artist, and naturalist.  He is a prolific author and illustrator, with well over a 130 books to his credit.  His outstanding work has received many honors and awards including the Christopher Medal, Orbis Pictus Honor, ALA Gordon Award, and Outstanding Science book awards from National Science Teachers Associations.

We  hope you will join us this month as we hone our naturalist skills and knowledge and share Jim's passion for nature through the books he has written and illustrated.

A great place to start is Jim Arnosky's website, which is full of nature facts, coloring pages, and book lists.