Andy's famous spiced cranberry sauce

If you'd like to try something a little different for Thanksgiving, check out this easy recipe. My husband Andy tasted this at a party a couple of decades ago and has been making it ever since. It gets gobbled up in a hurry every year!

Spiced Cranberry Sauce

4 cups fresh cranberries (2 standard-sized bags)

2 cups water

3 cups sugar

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp ground cloves

1/8 tsp ground ginger

Wash cranberries and drain. Combine rest of ingredients in a large pot, bring to a boil. Add cranberries, cook at medium heat for 7 to 10 minutes until the skins pop (see below.)

Mash the berries (below.) Reduce heat and simmer for 20-30 minutes with the lid on but askew to allow steam to escape. Stir occasionally until dark red and thickened.

Remove from heat, pour into glass or ceramic container, and chill.

Hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Loreen
My web site

Two Book Giveaways and a TpT Flash Sale!

Because TeachersPayTeachers has reached 100,000 followers on Facebook, they've decided to have a sitewide 10% sale until midnight on Sunday, October 13. And everything in my shop is 20% off, so that adds up to a big discount. My sale actually runs through Monday the 14th to give my followers some extra time. Click here to visit my shop.

My brand new Radiant Rainbow Brushes, Pencils, Clouds, Drops, and Borders clip art graphics are included in the sale.

There are only a few hours left in the Jack & the Hungry Giant book giveaway on the Bunting, Books, & Bainbridge blog, so it's enter now or never!

The book giveaway on Goodreads runs until the end of October and there are 5 copies of Jack to win there.

Good luck and happy shopping!

Loreen
My web site

Giveaway of Jack & the Hungry Giant!

During the month of October, my publisher (Holiday House) is sponsoring a giveaway of 5 copies of Jack & the Hungry Giant Eat Right with MyPlate on Goodreads! For more about the book and a link to a free activity, read this post.

I happened to meet a teacher a couple of weeks ago at the UVU Engaged Reading conference who teaches health topics in elementary...she was SO excited to find this book. Apparently, she has a tough time finding fun resources for certain topics. Guess I should keep writing and illustrating!

This #giveaway is a first for me, so it will be yet another "learning experience," no doubt. Click "giveaway details" on the widget below or use this link. I did figure out how to upload an excerpt from the book onto Goodreads, so that's something.

Good luck!

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Jack & the Hungry Giant Eat Right with MyPlate

by Loreen Leedy

Giveaway ends October 31, 2013.
See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win

Information Options: Presenting Nonfiction Topics in Picture Books

Today I'm delighted to be presenting a keynote address for the Utah Valley University Forum on Engaged Reading. This post has my notes as well as links referenced in Information Options: A variety of ways to present nonfiction topics in picture books. The links for my breakout sessions are included also.

NOTES
How do people get information? How do children get information?

From prehistoric times, humans have observed the world around them, and wanted to tell somebody about it.

Kids are told many things by adults including parents, relatives, neighbors, and teachers. Children also find things out by first-hand experience, by doing things.

Long distance and mass communication: Town crier, carrier pigeon, letters, (now emails or texts,) newspapers, magazines, radio, telephones, TV, movies. Then computers, Internet, smart phones, search engines

Today's focus: The kind of information children can find in picture books and the multiple ways it can be presented.

What can nonfiction books look like? The bad old days of long paragraphs of text with a few rectangular photos...are they really gone?

Some general categories of nonfiction books:
Just facts
Information + Context to make it more meaningful
Information + Process: how X is built
Information + Activity: make a craft, do a science experiment
Information + Argument: why X is good or bad

Solving for X: key elements to consider when creating an informational picture book
Main Idea; Facts; Age level; Title; Setting; Characters; Plot or Sequence; Writing options; Image options

Some of the combinations found in my books (links go to the book's page on my web site):

Symmetry + Many Examples + Line & Rotational symmetry + realistic images = Seeing Symmetry
Sequence: “What is symmetry?”...starts with Line then Rotational


Mars + Photographs + Kids + Writing = Messages From Mars
Plot: group of kids that win a trip to Mars, write home about what they learn

Animal sayings + Meanings + Comical animals + Antique art = There’s a Frog in My Throat
The groupings are based on where animals live, e.g. On the Farm; In the Wild

Similes + Story + Comical Animals + Transformations = Crazy Like a Fox: A Simile Story
Plot: Fox acts “crazy,” provokes sheep to follow him, leads her to surprise party

Prehistoric + Chronological + Realistic art + Playful = My Teacher Is a Dinosaur and Other Prehistoric Poems, Jokes, Riddles, & Amazing Facts
Chronological overview, realistic artwork, playful presentation

Math + Delete Numbers + Problems + Fantasy = Missing Math: A Number Mystery
A way to show the value of math by removing it, detective story

Energy + Types + Step-by-step + Characters = The Shocking Truth about Energy
Major types, Steps of energy production, characters come to life with energy

MyPlate + Big food images + Read aloud + Fairy tale = Jack & the Hungry Giant
Large images of food, story for context, Jack & the Beanstalk

Diverse ways of presenting information in books is important, because READERS are diverse.

ALL LINKS

All Loreen Leedy picture books are on this page of my website. There are links to individual book pages that have a summary, the ISBN numbers, activity ideas, trailers, and more.

This is a blog post with ideas for introducing Seeing Symmetry including using hands-on foldables and the words to a symmetry chant.

I've made several free activities for my books including the ones shown below:

Click image to go to activities download page on TpT

Click image to download

Download my free book activities in my Teachers Pay Teachers shop. More are under construction and will be in my shop as they are created. Be sure to "follow me" to be notified.

Other activities are downloadable from this page of my web site.

The Nonfiction Reading Response Cards shown on the left will be free during the conference.

My Pinterest boards are mostly full of teaching ideas on various topics such as Making Math Fun, Kids + Nonfiction, and Eating My Plate. Click to view them all and follow the ones that interest you. A collaborative board I contribute to called Learn to Read has over half a million followers!

ClipArt Etc. has thousands of antique images that are free for educators to use in the classroom. Additional images can be found on a sister site, Presentations Etc.

Holiday House Books for Young People has a page of books categorized by themes such as character education, cultural diversity, math, science and nature, and many more. They also have Teachers guides, Activity pages, and other freebies on this page. Here are all my Holiday House books that are in print.

Life Changing Nonfiction Series: during the month of September, I.N.K. bloggers are writing about nonfiction books that inspired them as children and comparable books that are available today: I.N.K. (Interesting Nonfiction for Kids)

Nonfiction Monday is a weekly roundup of blog posts about nonfiction books. It's hosted on a different blog every week, so check the schedule here.

Here is a free template for kids to make a map of their bedrooms using Mapping Penny's World as a mentor text on the School is a Happy Place blog.

See a class writing their own simile story using Crazy Like a Fox as a mentor text on the 4th Grade Frolics blog.

Why should kids read nonfiction?
Beyond Once Upon a Time by Nell K Duke.

Whew...hope this post is useful...if so, please leave a comment!

Loreen
My web site

Opening night is coming soon for Princess K.I.M. the Musical

With an impressive display of perseverance, an author-illustrator colleague of mine, Maryann Cocca-Leffler, has transformed two of her books into a musical play! Princess K.I.M. the Musical tells the story of a little girl who is new in school…in order to impress her classmates, she claims to be a princess. Once the lie is revealed, Kim starts being overly honest even if it hurts people's feelings. For example, she tells the teacher that her baby is "ugly." Oh dear! Eventually Kim discovers that being authentic and kind is the best way to make friends.

The books are available in your local library or can be requested. To see them on Amazon, click here: Princess K.I.M. and the Lie That Grew
or here: Princess Kim and Too Much Truth

If you'll be anywhere near Milford, New Hampshire on October 3-6, 2013, the production will be at the Amato Center for the Performing Arts. For tickets and more information, visit the Princess K.I.M. blog. The most recent post shows photos of the sets, which are in the charming style of the book illustrations.

New Hampshire is a little far away for me to go, but I am happy to participate in a teensy way by being a sponsor of this lovely ad for the playbill:

My new book is right under the word "mind." For more about my book see this post, or see it on Amazon: Jack and the Hungry Giant Eat Right With MyPlate

I can only imagine how much work it was for Maryann and her team to turn her books into a play...next stop, Broadway? Let's hope so!

Loreen
My web site

The Next Big Thing: A Global Blog Tour

The Next Big Thing blog tour started in Australia but has now gone global! The object is to bring awareness of the work of children's authors and illustrators. Extra “big” thanks go to Maryann Cocca Leffler for tagging me. She is a fabulous author, illustrator, and recently turned one of her books into a musical for the stage. Can the movie be far behind?

First I'lI answer these questions, then the next book artists will be tagged.

What is the title of your next book?

It's Jack & the Hungry Giant Eat Right with MyPlate, which will be available in Fall 2013.

Where did the idea for the book come from?

An existing picture book of mine (The Edible Pyramid) was an introduction to the USDA Food Guide Pyramid nutrition education program. It had been in print for many years and had been revised once already. My wonderful editor, Mary Cash at Holiday House, saw the news story about the new MyPlate program the day it came out. She immediately emailed me and we agreed there was no feasible way to revise Edible Pyramid, so it was back to the drawing board! I chose the Jack & the Beanstalk folktale as a starting point because of the visual possibilities...the food is so gigantic compared to Jack, which makes it fun.

What genre is your book?

It's a picture book with 32 pages for young readers from 4 to 8.

Which actors would you choose to play the characters in a movie version?

For the giant, whose name is Waldorf…a big guy who could appear fierce at first yet is really a big teddy bear. Preferably a red head. Though he is now deceased, Howard Keel from Seven Brides for Seven Brothers would have been perfect. So, somebody like him...maybe Tom Selleck? For Jack, a kid version of actor Shia LaBeouf (Transformers, etc.) would be fab.

What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?

Jack climbs the beanstalk to the giant's castle…just when he thinks he's lunch, the giant cooks a wonderful, healthy meal.

Who is the publisher?

Holiday House, who was the first publisher in the United States dedicated to publishing only books for children. They've been around since 1935 (wow!)

How long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript?

Since it's a picture book, I sketch and write the rough draft more or less together. I don't remember exactly how long it took, but it generally at least a month goes by while I'm making a dummy.

What other picture books would you compare this story to?

Currently there are no trade books related to the MyPlate program…there are several textbook-type books with photographs. Hopefully mine will be the first trade picture book! Jack and the Baked Beanstalk by Colin Stimpson is a take-off on the original story, so it has that in common with mine.

A few pages from Jack and the Hungry Giant

Who or what inspired you to write this book?
Food, glorious food, of course! In all seriousness, I think nutrition is a fundamentally important subject—so many people are not eating properly and are unhealthy as a result. One big improvement would be to cook from scratch with actual raw ingredients, as highlighted by the illustrations in my book. And avoid eating the many highly processed factory foods that have taken over the grocery store...uh oh, don't get me started!

What else about the book may pique the reader's interest?

To my knowledge there wasn't a cat in the original story, but there is in my version! This furry feline bears a striking resemblance to a kitty from my childhood named Sandy Claws (we thought his name was so hilarious...!)

Thanks so much for stopping by...I appreciate it so much!

It's an honor to link to the book creators for Thursday, March 28th—click on their names or book covers to visit their blogs:

Patrice Barton, who illustrated The Year of the Baby and also won a Crystal Kite award in 2012:

Linda Shute, who is the Illustrator Co-ordinator of the Florida chapter of the SCBWI and illustrator of Captain John Smith’s Big and Beautiful Bay:

I'm looking forward to finding out about more children's books as the Next Big Thing blog tour continues…see you there!

First Graders See Symmetry!

Two hundred 1st graders came to the annual Young Authors Conference at the University of Central Florida today to share the books they had written and illustrated…always a delightful type of event. I was fortunate enough to be the featured author this year so was able to speak to all the participants.

My newest picture book Seeing Symmetry was the main focus of my presentation, though I wasn't sure how much the kiddos would know about the topic. In Florida it’s taught in 3rd and 4th grade. 

We looked at the cover of the book and I used my Super Simple LOS Locator…

…(a barbeque skewer with the point cut off) to show how the tiger and butterfly image can be divided into equal mirror image halves. (A high-res version of the above poster plus quite a few related printables can be found in the Activity pack for the book on my Teachers Pay Teachers store.)

Though the kiddos weren't very familiar with the word symmetry, they had no trouble making great guesses about what various shapes folded in half would turn out to be. I held up folded cutouts of various items from the book such as a butterfly, teddy bear, and star, which they could readily guess.

The trickiest ones were the number 3 and the letter Z (which has rotational symmetry for those of you who haven't thought about this subject recently.) The red construction paper Z has a button in the middle…in its collapsed state it looked like a 7 or a 1, but once the parts were rotated into their proper position, the Z revealed itself.

I drew a symmetrical butterfly, then asked for ideas from the students to draw a symmetrical alien, which turned out perfectly silly, as intended! Copies of the aliens will be sent to the schools later for the kids to color or otherwise embellish upon. In addition, each child received a copy of the book for his or her very own! They were very excited about that and kept asking when they would get their book.

Another highlight was a Symmetry Chant that had its world premiere (ha!)…since I've never tried writing or leading one before, it was hard to predict how it would go. The kids acted like they do call and response chants every day and had no trouble following me. The specific items mentioned in the verses were the various shapes I had shown earlier. We practiced first with me saying 1-2-3; they repeat 1-2-3; A-B-C; A-B-C; and so on a few times. Then on to the real deal:

Seeing SYMMETRY Chant

Here and there       Here and there
And everywhere     And everywhere
We can see            We can see
Symmetry!              Symmetry!
Our two eyes          Our two eyes
See butterflies        See butterflies
A perfect square     A perfect square
A teddy bear           A teddy bear
The number 3         The number 3
The letter Z             The letter Z
Most any car           Most any car
A shiny star             A shiny star
Up and down           Up and down
And all around         And all around
We can see             We can see
Symmetry!               Symmetry!

I held up the various cutouts as we went along. It worked really well in a spontaneous situation like this, and would certainly be awesome with a little rehearsal. If anyone would like to use this chant for educational purposes, by all means feel free. If you'd like to include it in a blog post or article, please credit me as author and give a link if possible.

For those teachers who are incorporating the Common Core Standards in their classroom, the applicable one is 4.G.3:

Recognize a line of symmetry for a two-dimensional figure as a line across the figure such that the figure can be folded along the line into matching parts. Identify line-symmetric figures and draw lines of symmetry.

Many thanks to Penny Leggett and Taylar Clements for inviting me and making this event run so smoothly with the help of a small army of UCF students. The tech set-up was great and special thanks go to the guy who found me a clip-on mike instead of the big handheld one! We were discussing afterwards how visiting a college campus can make such a big impression on young students and hopefully will inspire many of them to think “I can go to college, too” when the time comes.

IRA 2011 panel discussion: Digital art & more

On Monday, May 9th I’m one of the speakers from 3:00 to 5:45 for the International Reading Association Teachers’ Choices program along with authors Jon Scieszka, and Elizabeth Partridge. The overall topic is Integrating Technology and Reading, so I’ll discuss how I use digital tools to design and illustrate my picture books. These notes and links are for the attendees as well as anyone else who is interested.

Drawing as Fast as Lightning

...as fresh as a daisy

The examples used are from Crazy Like a Fox: A Simile Story and The Shocking Truth about Energy.

Why I use digital tools.

The premise of Crazy Like a Fox is to illustrate the comparison used in the simile. When Rufus the fox is sleeping like a log, he turns into a log.

The art in The Shocking Truth about Energy serves to bring dry facts such as “Energy can change into different forms” to life. For example, LIGHT from the Sun is changed by a tree into wood, which is a FUEL that can be burned, thus changing the energy into HEAT (as shown in an illustration on page 4–5 of the book.)

Analogy: a typewriter is to a word processor as traditional art media is to digital illustration.

My 4 Stages of Technology Adoption:
I hate it.
That’s interesting.
Let me try that.
I can’t live without it!

Would Aaron Copland have used GarageBand?

Early digital art to vector and painting software.

My set-up, hardware and software. Mac Tower; NEC LCD monitor; Wacom tablet; Epson scanner; Sony camera; Epson printer; Photoshop; Illustrator; InDesign.

The basics of brushes, color, and layers in Photoshop. Incorporating traditional media.

From sketch to final art.

Design and layout of pages in InDesign.

The good news and bad news of creating artwork digitally.

Finding image reference:
Historical images from the Library of Congress American Memory collection.
Clipart ETC: Over 60,000 free antique engravings for students and teachers.
Tag Galaxy: A gorgeous animated search of Flickr images.
My blog post about Tag Galaxy.

Sneak peek of my next book, which is ALMOST finished. : )

Here’s a tip about how to get circular images into an iPad Keynote presentation:

Save round or otherwise irregular image with a transparent background in the PNG format.
Email it to yourself.

Open email on iPad, select and Save Image.

Image will appear in Photo app on Camera Roll.
Select image, then Copy.
Paste it into the iPad Keynote app and transparency will be maintained (yay!)

How Andy Went to Mars

Today’s post is in celebration of Share a Story ~ Shape a Future week. For more links to similar posts, please visit Elizabeth O. Dulemba’s blog.







Once upon a time, 
there was a little boy in the 4th grade who had loads of fun at school every day. He loved to sit in the last row of the classroom making his friends giggle and folding paper airplanes. Andy was reading well below grade level, but he thought:

One day his mom gave him four quarters for book club day. On the way to school, he saw a pretzel vendor and bought one. Mmmm…Andy loved pretzels!

After polishing off the salty snack, Andy sat at his desk studying the order form. With 50¢ left, he searched for a book that was cheap enough. A book called Mission to Mars looked okay and cost 49¢, so he ordered it. Then he folded a paper airplane and aimed it at a kid in the front of the room. The boys in the back row giggled as usual.

A week or two later, the brand new book arrived. The story was about a family that moved to a Mars colony (wow!) The two children played hooky from school, snuck outside and got lost, wandered into a cave, and then met some (previously unknown) native Martians!

Andy was amazed at how much fun a book could be and that it could bring a story to life in his mind. When that adventure was over, he had to have more. Books, books, books, he wanted to read more books. After a few months, Andy was reading at 6th grade level. He went on to attend collage, then graduate school, and earned his Ph.D.

Nowadays, Andy is a research scientist whose lab is at the Kennedy Space Center. He investigates a variety of topics in astrobiology, which is: the study of the origin, evolution, distribution, and future of life in the universe. (Quote is from NASA.) He even has a Mars chamber in his lab that simulates the conditions on the Red Planet.

After Andy and I met and eventually married, one topic that often came up was “Why don’t we do a book together?” and “...about what?” One day the obvious solution occurred to us…Andy began downloading incredibly detailed NASA photographs taken on Mars and I started drawing characters to populate the barren landscape. The end result was our picture book Messages from Mars:

The story takes place one hundred years in the future and stars a group of students that get to visit Mars. They explore the historic sites of the Viking, Pathfinder, and Spirit and Opportunity missions, and fly over many of the planet’s spectacular features such as the largest volcano in the solar system and a canyon as long as the United States is wide.

So, because Andy read a book in the 4th grade that captured his imagination, not only did he get to go to Mars, so did I! You never know which book a child will fall in love with so it only makes sense to keep offering kids as many diverse options as there are stars in the sky.

Happy Reading!

The Storymaker's Art exhibit in Fort Lauderdale

The Storymaker’s Art is an exhibit of artwork from eight Florida children’s book illustrators. If you’ll be anywhere near the Art Institute of Fort Lauderdale on Friday, December 3, 2010, you’re welcome to attend the panel discussion, reception, and book signing at the Mark K. Wheeler Gallery on campus. Click to enlarge the flyer below:

Seven of the eight illustrators will be answering questions at the panel discussion from 2–4, then we’ll be on hand for the reception and book signing from 5–8. I’ll have six illustrations in the exhibit, including one from my fall book, My Teacher is a Dinosaur.

For more details, please visit The Storymaker’s Art web site. Hope to see you there! If you can’t attend the opening, the exhibit will be up until January 5th.