CHILDREN'S BOOK PRESS
OFFERS ONLINE TEACHER'S GUIDES

With the introduction of Reading Communities: CBP Teacher's Guides, Children's Book Press is now publishing online curriculum guides for their books. These free guides offer teachers activities they can use with in their classrooms with Children's Book Press books. The guides present lessons developed by teachers who participate in Children's Book Press' Community Programs, along with the press's own ideas for activities that foster literacy across the curriculum in second- to fifth-grade classrooms.

Every Reading Communities guide contains four sections. The section called What's It All About? describes the book, highlights thematic units of study, and provides information about the book's author and artist. Reading Activities contains lessons that introduce the book to students and prompt critical thinking about the book's themes. The third section suggests Cross Curricular Activities that help students make connections between the book and content areas such as language arts, social studies, visual art, math, and science. These activities include a corresponding California Standard (easily adaptable to other state standards); the time and materials needed; and recommended group size. Finally, the Resources section offers a list of other literature, websites, and audio-visual resources that are related to the book's themes.

Currently, guides for the newest books are available: Bears Make Rock Soup and Other Stories (paintings by Lisa Fifield, stories by Lise Erdrich, ISBN 0-89239-172-3) and My Diary from Here to There / Mi diario de aquí hasta allá (written by Amada Irma Pérez, paintings by Maya Christina Gonzalez, ISBN 0-89239-175-8), and Grandma and Me at the Flea / Los Meros Meros Remateros, (story by Juan Felipe Herrera, illustrations by Anita De Lucio-Brock, ISBN 0-89239-171-5). Additionally, guides for I See the Rhythm (paintings by Michele Wood, text by Toyomi Igus, ISBN 0-89239-151-0), and Just Like Me: Stories and Self-Portraits by Fourteen Artists (edited by Harriet Rohmer, ISBN 0-89239-149-9) are also online. Guides for new books will be put online each season as the books are published. Additionally, as input from teachers using the books in their classrooms flows in, more guides for Children's Book Press' older books will be published.

The web page also features curricula developed as part of the LitLinks program by CBP authors and artists. For each book, the page features a workshop for the students developed by an author or artist working in schools, as well as an example of the students' work.

The guides are available for free, and can be viewed online or downloaded as PDF files. Go to the Children's Book Press' Teaching and Learning page.

Contact: publicity@chidlrensbookpress.org