Category: Nonna's Reading Guides

Nonna's Reading Guide to Mother Earth, August 2023

8/31/2023

Bees Knees!

Pollinators are essential to a thriving Mother Earth! So many different insects help us to grow our food, but we tend to focus on honeybees when we talk about pollinators. Yet even if we focus on bees, honeybees are only 1 of the 25,000 different bee species!

Holy bees knees!

Honeybee is one of the most beautiful books I've read in the past year. And recognition with the Sibert Book Medal indicates it is also one of the most distinguished information books published in the 2020.

The illustrations will fascinate every reader and Honeybee deserves a place on your child's bookshelf!

From small children to elderly adults many of us are a wee bit frightened by bees. My own Sweet Noodle says, "scared!" whenever she sees the mason bees flying around the garden. But most of us do not need to be concerned about bees and Larkin's book is a lovely first antidote to that fear.

Although it is not a children's book, The Wild Bee Handbook is the perfect handbook to use with kiddos when learning about bees. Many handbooks designed to identify insects are difficult for smaller hands to hold - this one is just right to carry along on a hike when you want to name the wild bees you see along the way. It's also a perfect handbook for learning strategies to support your local pollinators!

Why are the pollinators important?

Pollinators keep our world growing and thriving, but we are out-of-balance with Mother Earth just now and creating a world where the pollinators, animals and plants are struggling. The beauty of our world is essential to our own well-being and I love sharing these books with you and your kiddos - they remind us of simple wonders and encourage us to be better stewards of the planet!

Reminiscent of the repeating refrain in Goodnight Moon, in the night garden will lull little ones to sleep with peaceful images of the night outside their windows. Be sure to read it with your camping lantern turned down low...

Animal Gallery is a best-of collection of Wildsmith's images from three of his earlier titles: Wild Animals, Birds & Fishes. Art is a lovely way for children to begin to understand the complexities and beauty of Mother Earth.

I love this book. It's perfect for helping children to understand climate change and speaks their language - global warming is likened to having a fever which is a way our bodies tell us something is out of whack!

The tone of the book is both factual and hopeful and is our kiddos' modern look at Reduce, Reuse & Recycle!

This book is going on my bookshelf and I cannot wait to share it with Little Guy and Noodle - the pictures will engage their little eyes and the "story" for each plant hero will fascinate them! Introducing 15 plants as heroes and offering step-by-step instructions on how to grow each one is a wonderful way for kiddos to learn how to care for plants.

Nonna's Reading Guide to Heroes & Heroines, 2023

7/31/2023

Photo by Gabriela Braga on Unsplash

12 Exceptional Picture Biographies

Children love to learn about real heroes! July is when we read books about artists, musicians, astronomers, pilots, scientists, athletes, explorers - all ordinary people who have changed the world and are worthy of sharing with your children.

Sharing with our children how others have become heroes and heroines requires books that are not preachy or boring. Books about people with all the character traits we want to see in our kiddos must be exceptional - exceptional writing and exceptional illustration.

Here are 12 books that more than meet these requirements! Enjoy!

Why do I think Edwin Binney is a great hero to share with your children? He was curious. He was kind. He was a great listener to others' suggestions and ideas. He was persistent. And because of these character traits, Binney created one of the all-time best art tools for children! Heroes are not just those who accomplish great feats. Heroes are also those people who are generous with their heart, time and resources!

The real heroes and heroines in this story are the families who live in Cateura, Paraguay, a small village built on a landfill of garbage. Chavez gave music lessons, but the people of Cateura learned to share their new found hope for a better life with each other and the world.

If you can share only one book this month with your kiddos, choose Building an Orchestra of Hope.

Leo Fender is a remarkable hero who just kept on tinkering. Many of our kiddos need to hear the encouragement found in this picture biography to never give up on their passions!

Perseverance requires a strong vision, an equally strong will, and the flexibility to keep on tinkering or trying new ways to accomplish their goals.

I was thrilled to read this picture biography about a wonderful women from my hometown.

Fearless in the face of hardship, fearless in the face of racism, fearless in the face of gender discrimination - this kind of fearlessness is something we must show and teach our children!

Heroes & heroines are problem solvers extraordinaire! They see a big need in the world and find a way to help solve the problem - just ordinary people working to make the world a little bit better! Victor Hugo Green was just such a hero. For thirty years, he published the Green Book for black families traveling by car around the country to help them avoid sundown towns and Jim Crow laws.

One hundred years after Einstein's predictions about ripples in space-time, LIGO announced the first detection of gravitational waves in space - waves created by the collision to two black holes 1.3 billion years ago. And González's work on detecting background noises at the atomic level made this discovery possible - she built on Einstein's theoretical work. Heroes & heroines give credit where credit is due - always.

Tom Crean was a British Royal Navy seaman and a crew member on three of Britain's Antarctica most famous expeditions. The naval officers, scientists and explorers who wrote and spoke about the expeditions noted Crean was loyal, courageous, and physically strong with a keen sense of humor - all heroic traits to admire!

Children shape their reality based on the building blocks we provide – home-life, loving relationships, community, culture all play a part in how our kiddos develop a positive self-identity. Heroes and heroines who look like our kiddos and excel at the things which interest our kiddos are the best kind!

Wong's work is most accessible for children through Disney - his Chinese-inspired sketches and paintings set the artistic direction for Bambi! Despite innumerable obstacles and a lack of recognition, Tyrus focused on the one essential passion in his life: his art. Many heroes and heroines go unrecognized....

Pura Teresa Belpré loved the stories her Abuela taught her in Puerto Rico, but was surprised these folktales were not on the shelves when she began to work at the New York Public Library. Belpré's life's work was to make sure her heritage was accessible to everyone through stories. Heroes and heroines take pride in their identity and heritage!

Shoham's Bangle is not a biography about a famous person, but about a heroine closer to home - Shoham's Nana. Sasson's Nana Aziza told her the story of how her family was airlifted from Iraq to Israel in 1951 in Operation Ezra & Nehemiah - relocated along with 120,000 other Iraqi Jews. Heroes and heroines are often the people we love the most.

I admire Stephen Hawking for his dark humor as much as I admire his brilliance in the face of debilitating ALS. I mean, who throws a birthday party where everyone must come dressed as an object in the sky and comes as Pluto, God of the Underworld himself?!!! Hawking's discoveries changed the way we think about the world and his life reveals that heroes and heroines do not need superpowers.

Nonna's Reading Guide to the Heart of Winter

2/7/2023

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

Hope-filled Books

January and February are dark months in the Northern Hemisphere - colder, wetter, shorter days. Add to normal winter weather the crazy snow and rain storms bombarding North America and you've got a solid recipe for sadness and depression. As parents and grandparents, we are responsible for helping our kiddos develop resilience in the face of difficult circumstances.

And I am a firm believer that one of the best ways to do this is to share hope- and love- filled books with our children, regardless of their age.

The February Stories Matter books have been selected to help you build the habits of resilience with your children:

Five Resilience-Building Habits for Children
Give Your Feelings Room
Be Kind to Yourself & Others
Think & Breathe
Cultivate Joy
Transform the Story

Here a just a few of the best of the best hope-filled books to get us through the Heart of Winter - and to help our kiddos develop their resilience muscles!

A live link to a book's full review is connected to the books cover.

His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Desmond Tutu tell a simple story of two young boys finding joy in hard times and how important it is to share joy when possible. This is a very sweet, gentle story which, when read often, will prompt quiet, thoughtful conversations with your child. If you share only one book with your child this year, I hope it will be this one.

A change like moving can be quite difficult for our dearest little people. Our kiddos are going to have some very big feelings - anger, anxiety, fear - when there are significant changes in their lives and it's our job to help them with these emotions. Musser's book is perfect for the job of sharing with our little ones that everyone can have a hard time adjusting to something new.

In addition to the stunning illustrations and lyrical text, I added Hope is An Arrow to this month's curated titles specifically because it tells the story of a young boy who is forced to transform his story more than once as he grows up.
Gibran Kahlil Gibran or Kahlil Gibran? Or both? Our name matters, especially as we navigate our identity.

Poetry is the literary language of resilience and what better month than February to learn about poets who have changed our world - not with just their words, but with the resilience those words embody. Sharing poetry with your child is a simple practice in understanding how someone else has transformed their own story.

I love this book because of the historical context surrounding the first and second editions of the book! The original publishing date for Will It Be Okay? was 1977. And the problems we faced 45 years ago were not much different than today's challenges. Our children are not usually looking for logical answers to their fears, but reassurance that we understand and will face it with them.

Our heart's response to the truth in poetry is powerful. I love picture book illustrations of poetry, especially when the artist understands and has the skill to depict the heart's response to the truth behind the facade. This is one of those books - perfect.

The best way to cultivate our children's joy is to build deep, strong loving bonds with them. Still This Love Goes On is an inspiration to think about the people and the places we love - when we do, joy goes on and on as well.

Angelou's poem is a call, a reminder to be defiantly self-confident in the face of the day-to-day things like shadows on the wall or a new classroom. And Basquiat's art is just as defiantly vivid in depicting the things which scare us. (This might not be a good book for very little persons who still get nightmares....)

Most of the books reviewed can be found at your public library or purchased through your local bookstore.
I am affiliate of Bookstore.org and will earn a commission if you click through the links and make a purchase from
the Stories Matter storefront.
But, really, VISIT YOUR LOCAL PUBLIC LIBRARY! Thank you!

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