February 6, 2013
Good morning, and welcome to Writing Wednesday!
Today, we’re going to compare and contrast two pieces of writing by Seymour Simon. In each of these excerpts he is writing about Earth’s atmosphere, but the way he writes each of them is quite different.
Your Assignment: Read both of the pieces of Seymour Simon writing below, and then write a paragraph or two about how these pieces of writing are alike and how they are different. Some questions you might ask yourself as you read:
- Who is the audience for each piece of writing?
- What facts does he include in each piece to describe the atmosphere?
- What kind of descriptive words does he use in each piece? How are they the same, or different?
- Is the tone of voice the same or different in each of them? (Try reading each of them aloud to think about this)
- What photographs did he choose to illustrate each piece of writing? Is one more effective than the other?
- How about the design of the pages? Do they look similar? Different? In what ways?
If you would like to post your writing for others to see, you can click on the yellow "Comments" link at the bottom of the article. Happy writing!
From EARTH: OUR PLANET IN SPACE. Simon & Schuster, 1984/2003.
From EARTH: A SHIPMATES GUIDE TO OUR SOLAR SYSTEM. Seymour Science, 2012.
Posted by: Liz Nealon
February 5, 2013
Today’s Cool Photo of the Week is a Porcupinefish. They are found in warm tropical waters all over the world.
People often refer to them as "blowfish" because of their ability to make their body bigger and rounder by swallowing air or water. This reduces the number of predators to fish or animals with very large mouths. They even have a backup defense mechanism - those sharp spines, which stick out when the fish is inflated. Some of them have poison in their internal organs, another reason to avoid them. As you can imagine, this fish has very few predators.
Porcupinefish are just one of the fascinating creatures found in coral reefs, which is the subject of my new book, coming out at the end of April. These reefs are like huge cities under the sea, teeming with inhabitants from fish to plants to a wide variety of invertebrates like coral. I loved studying about them as I was writing the book, and I think you will be amazed by some of the photographs!
Posted by: Seymour Simon
January 30, 2013
Good morning, and welcome to Writing Wednesday!
Today we would like you to look at this photograph and take five minutes to have fun with creative writing.
Background: This is a photograph of a tornado sweeping across the Namib Desert in Namibia, a country in southwestern Africa. Isn’t it a gorgeous sight?
Your Assignment: Imagine you are in Africa, seeing this tornado, and describe this sight. Use lots of strong adjectives to help the scene come to life for your reader. What does it look like? Sound like? How would you feel if you were there in the desert?
When you are finished writing, you can click on the yellow "Comments" link at the bottom of this blog post if you would like to share your writing for others to read.
Happy writing!
Photo: Francesco Middei
Posted by: Liz Nealon
January 29, 2013
The past week’s arctic blast has left this lighthouse in St. Joseph, Michigan encased in ice. It is actually not unusual for the lighthouses at this point where the St. Joseph River flows into Lake Michigan to ice over during winter storms, but this is a particularly magnificent photograph because of the pink, sunset light.
Photo: Lisa Davidson Rundell
Posted by: Seymour Simon
January 25, 2013
Most of North America is shivering in freezing, Arctic temperatures. It is also very windy where we live, near the Berkshire Mountains. I pulled off the road when I was driving the other day to take this shot. The high altitude cirrus clouds were being "shredded" by the wind…and they were pulled into a shape that made it look like an exclamation point.
Or maybe it is a comment on the freezing temperature up there?
Posted by: Seymour Simon
January 25, 2013
When a dolphin needed help off the coast of Hawaii, he swam right up to a scuba instructor and let him know.
Keller Laros was leading a group of divers on a tour off the coast of Kona, Hawaii, last week. "All of a sudden I heard a loud squeak, and I turned around, and the dolphin was literally three feet behind me," Laros said. "He swam right up to me."
The diving instructor could tell that something was wrong, and looking more closely, he saw that there was a fishing line hooked onto his fin.
"I said, ‘come here,’ and he swam right up to me," he said. "I put my hand out and I tried to get the fishing hook out of his left pectoral fin." But the animal was having trouble swimming because his fin was still tangled up in the fishing line. The 10-foot long dolphin - almost twice as long as his rescuer was tall - waited patiently while Laros rummaged through the dive tools that he carries in his suit, pulling out a pair of small scissors.
He was able to clip the line off of the dolphin’s mouth and fin, but there was still a little left. They waited while the dolphin went up for a breath of air and came back down. Then Laros and another dive guide removed as much line from under the fin as they could.
"I guess the dolphin was happy with our work. He swam away and we never saw him again," he said. "It’s a huge thrill to be able to help an animal that clearly knows what’s going on," he said. "He made the effort to come to us… The dolphin is really intelligent. It’s a relationship. He came to us because he had a problem."
One of the divers in the class that Laros was teaching had a video camera and filmed the whole interaction. Here it is for you to see. Isn’t that a magnificent moment between two intelligent mammals?
Video courtesy of Jack’s Diving Locker, Kona, Hawaii
Dolphin Rescue Off Hawaii
Posted by: Seymour Simon
January 23, 2013
We are pleased to report that four - count them, 4! - of Seymour Simon’s eBooks received the QED seal of approval at the recent Digital Book World Conference.
Is it true that some cats have no fur? Can you really tell a dog by his noseprints? And what kind of animals are also known as hobs, jills and kits? Find out the answers to all this and more!
If you liked SILLY ZOO ANIMAL JOKES & RIDDLES, you’re sure to enjoy this book about one of Seymour’s favorite topics - SPACE MONSTERS!
Younger readers are sure to enjoy SEYMOUR SIMON’s ANIMAL ABCs, full of fascinating information about baby animals from A to Z.
And finally, the first book in Seymour Simon’s new series, A SHIPMATE’S GUIDE TO OUR SOLAR SYSTEM. "Like the passengers on a ship, all the humans, plants and animals of the world are traveling together, shipmates on this huge spaceship we call Earth."
The 2013 QED Seals were awarded at the recent Digital Book World Conference. The QED process consists of a 13-point checklist to ensure a high quality user experience. DBW considers the QED Seal, which stands for Quality, Excellence, Design, the "Good Housekeeping Seal of ApprovalTM" for ebooks and apps. To ensure that an ebook title submitted for a QED will render well on the device a reader chooses, it is reviewed on three devices: a small, mobile-sized screen, an eInk reader-sized screen, and a tablet-sized screen. The QED is judged on the criteria established on the recommendation of the Publishing Innovation Awards advisory council, who are respected leaders in the digital production and design space.
Congratulations, Seymour, on all this great recognition of your digital original books. All these books are available to purchase individually for Kindle Fire or Nook Color/Nook Tablet, but they are also part of the StarWalk Kids collection of digital books for kids K-8. If you haven’t yet checked out what we are doing, please come have a look today! www.starwalkkids.com
Posted by: Liz Nealon
January 15, 2013
Dust + Rain = An Amazing Sight!
This incredible sight is the result of a rain cloud and a dust storm meeting and combining off the western coast of Australia. Tug boat worker Brett Martin snapped this photograph of the amazing red cloud traveling rapidly across the Indian Ocean.
Posted by: Seymour Simon
January 13, 2013
Thank you to everyone who entered the second MY AWESOME SCIENCE WORD contest. We enjoyed seeing the choices you made and reading your writing using those words. Nealy 100 students and classes entered this contest - that is a lot of excellent research and writing!
As promised, we have selected two winners of this contest, and both will receive an autographed copy of the newly updated edition of Seymour Simon’s SCIENCE DICTIONARY, which was published by Dover Books on December 19th.
Are you ready? Here are the winners of Seymour Simon’s 2nd Awesome Science Word contest:
Individual Winner: Brandon/4th Grade, Penn Valley Elementary, Ms. Kochersperger’s class
Awesome Science Word: ZirconDefinition: Zircons are solid minerals that come in many different colors and can be transparent (see through) crystals used as gemstones.
Why you think it is awesome: I think the word zircon is awesome, not only because of how the word looks and sounds, but also because I like learning about different minerals found in the Earth.
Use the word in a sentence: Yesterday, my friends and I went to a cave full of crystals and my favorite one was a green, transparent zircon.
Classroom Winner: Mrs. Caron’s 2nd Grade Class, Oxford Valley Elementary School
Awesome Science Word: Dry IceDefinition: Dry ice is frozen carbon dioxide that is -107 degrees Fahrenheit or colder.
Why you think it is awesome: Dry ice is interesting because it keeps food cold while it gets shipped to your house.
Use the word in a sentence: When a metal spoon touches dry ice, it makes a high-pitched, squeaky sound.
Both winners will receive a personally autographed copy of Seymour Simon’s SCIENCE DICTIONARY. Congratulations to everyone who entered!
Posted by: Seymour Simon
January 11, 2013
Mr. Guenther’s Third Grade class presented me with a book made up of their writing when I visited Oxford Valley Elementary School yesterday. It was titled: MR. GUENTHER’S CLASS READS AND WRITES SEYMOUR SIMON STORIES!
Wow. It was great. Every student did a full page, with an illustration, writing about a book of mine that they had studied, and telling what they learned. There is not time to show the whole book here, but I’d like to share three great examples.
Good work, everybody, and thank you for your warm welcome yesterday!
Posted by: Seymour Simon
