A Book a Day: Lety Out Loud

Lety Out Loud by Angela Cervantes

At school, Lety Munoz is an ELL.-- English Language Learner. Lety thought ELL sounded like a slimy sea creature. But this summer, Lety has decided not to take the summer ELL class and instead participate in a day camp at the animal shelter. She immediately become attached to a rambunctious dog named Spike who became a local hero by alerting the shelter workers to a baby who had been locked in a hot car. Each of the campers is assigned a job and Lety wants to help out as the shelter scribe who writes short profiles of each animal to encourage visitors to adopt the animals. Another camper named Hunter also wants to be camp scribe and he brags about his writing abilities and challenges Lety to a competition for the job. As the rules for the competition develop, each potential scribe must use five words in their profile. Lety's friends Brisa and Kennedy chooses the five words for Hunter: "rambunctious," "gush," "beckon," "scrumptious," and "cerise." Hunter and his friend Mario choose "supersonic," "infectious," "rigid," "colossal," and "fusion" for Lety. Lety is confident she can do it, but worries about being able to write fast enough and she also worries about the shelter staff finding out and being kicked out of the program. If she's kicked out of camp she won't be able to adopt Spike.

DAY TWENTY-SIX TRIVIA

We sure get weird weather in Michigan.

Did you wake up to little white snowballs? It's called graupel and your job is to find how its created and how it different from snow or hail and sleet.

A Book a Day: Stick Dog

Stick Dog Dreams of Ice Cream by Tom Watson

In one of my first blog posts I wrote about how I waited until last summer to read the Wings of Fire Books, well it took me a reeeeeeeally long time to get to reading the Stick Dog books. So today I finally picked up Stick Dog Dreams of Ice Cream. What a hoot! Stick Dog gets spotted by a human, oh no. It was a beautiful sunny day and I wanted ice cream bad.

"What was going on was some of the strangest behavior by a bunch of humans the dogs had ever seen. A group of humans had gathered around that strange screen window on the side of the truck. They were mostly small humans, but there were a couple of bigger ones too. The music had stopped. The driver had parked the truck and climbed into the back of it, and a few seconds later appeared in the screen window.

That's when the really odd things started. The humans stood in a line at the window and spoke one at a time to the driver. Then the driver came back, he held a pointed brown cylinder with circles on top of it."


No ice cream trucks are coming to my neighborhood for now, but the good news is a bunch of the Stick Dog and Stick Cat books are available to read or listen to on Hoopla--

DAY TWENTY-FIVE TRIVIA

The egg has a special place in almost every culture, especially at spring time where it represents hope, renewal, promise of life, and so on. Passover started this week and at the Passover supper a hard boiled egg is one of the symbolic foods on the plate. In Jewish tradition eggs are given to mourners. Elsewhere in the Middle East, eggs are symbols of beginnings and family. The Persian New Year celebration, Nowruz, also has a special table of symbolic foods that includes the egg.

Children in the United States love hunting for Easter eggs hidden around the house or outside. Other spring celebrations involving eggs include egg rolling, egg tapping, and egg dancing. So today's trivia question is to see what you can find out about egg dancing: where and when did egg dancing start?

A Book a Day: The Undefeated

The Undefeated by Kwame Alexander and Kadir Nelson



"This is for the unforgettable.
The swift and sweet ones
who hurdled history
and opened a world of possible.

The ones who survived
America
by any means necessary.

And the ones who didn't.

This is for the undeniable.
The ones who scored
with chains
on one hand
and faith
in the other."


Kwame Alexander tells how he wrote the poem the year his second daughter was born and Barack Obama became president. He wanted to remind his daughter and all of you children of the 21st Century to never, ever give up. And to remember all the greats that came before you. He first performed the poem on ESPN. Alexander won a Newbery Honor for writing and illustrator Kadir Nelson won this year's Caldecott Medal for the best illustrations. They both received Coretta Scott King medals, as well.

Undefeated is available from Overdrive.

DAY TWENTY-FOUR TRIVIA

From 1935 to 1974, Babe Ruth, "The Bambino," held one of the most famous records in sports: the most home runs in major league baseball--714. Who broke Babe Ruth's record on this day, April 8, 1974?











The Baseball Hall of Fame

A Book a Day: I Can Make This Promise

I Can Make This Promise by Christine Day

From the very first day of kindergarten, adults have asked Edie "where are you from?" When she answers "Seattle," they still want to know where her parents are "originally" from. And that's the problem. Her dad is American, white, with ancestors from Germany, England, and Wales. Her mom is Native American. So everyone wants to know what tribe she's from, what buffalo tastes like and stuff like that. The problem is that Edie doesn't know anything about her mom's family because she was adopted. Edie's grown up like any other kid in Seattle. The only contact she has with the nearby reservation is that it's a place they can go and set off fireworks on the Fourth of July. And its where she is recognized for the first time, by a boy named named Roger who says "You look Native." Then she discovers a mysterious box filled with letters from a women named Edith. Could it be her grandmother?

Available in both eBook and eAudiobook from Hoopla.

DAY TWENTY-THREE TRIVIA

Disc golf first became popular as the frisbee became popular in the '60s and '70s, but the very first disc golf game was played long before that. Elementary school kids started a game throwing tin lids into circles on their playground. What was the name of the school? Where was it located? What year did the game begin? And what was their name for this game?

Disc Golf Hall of Fame

A Book a Day: Funny Girl

Funny Girl edited by Betsy Bird

"A couple of wise women once said, 'Joke-telling is the greatest superpower a gal can possess.'" Twenty some women--some you might know like Raina Tegemeier, Cece Bell, Shannon Hale, Jennifer Holm, and Sophie Blackall, other you may get to know soon--explore the way humor makes the tough times easier, and the good times memorable. What could be funnier than family? What could be funnier than friends? What could be funnier than YOU? It's time to let the world know about these superheroes.

Available online from Overdrive.

DAY TWENTY-TWO TRIVIA

April is National School Library Month. Below I have some links to some very unusual libraries around the world. Maybe you remember me reading a book called The Inside-Outside Book of Libraries with books of different sizes and types, but these are weirder than anything in that book.

So today's trivia question is this: who founded the first library in America? When? Where?



Do you have a Little Free Library in your neighborhood? Email me at pbutts@portageps.org and I will put it on my route and help keep it filled.







Bike Library, Dubuque, Iowa


Camel Library, Garissa, Kenya

Vending Library, Contra Costa, California

Tank Library, Buenos Aires, Argentina

Biblioburro, Columbia

A Book a Day: Stargazing

Stargazing by Jen Wang

If you  love Smile, Best Friends, and El Deafo, you'll love this graphic novel. Moon and Christine are unlikely friends. They both grew up in the same Chinese-American suburb. Moon is confident, impulsive, Christine is a quiet violin player. When Christine's family gives Moon and her mother a place to live, the two girls quickly become friends sharing music, K Pop videos, and secrets. Moon reveals her visions through her artwork, but then they take a dark turn and Moon ends up in the hospital. Can Christine be the friend Moon really needs when the sky is falling?

Day Nineteen Trivia

I'm hearing all kinds of stories lately from my parents about their childhood and my grandparents, and I bet you are too. Have they talked about old fashioned video games? Today's trivia question is what is the name of the carpenter who first appeared in the popular 1980s game Donkey Kong?

Here's a great online destination,  The Strong National Museum of Play in Rochester, New York. Be sure to check out the Pinball in America exhibit and the Video Game History Timeline.