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Our school's science dept. was looking into increasing literacy with non fiction readings for science. I was thinking of the Everyday Science Mysteries, however that aren't non- fiction. Wondering if anyone has suggestions for any area of science that would be a reasonable source for classroom set of books. We teach out of the Foss module and the resource books are not enough. Thanks.

Hi Karen,
There are several great resources that I've found over the past few months in my quest to find non-fiction readers to support my science lessons. Here's a few resources that I've found:

1. Kids Discover Magazine: Although this is a magazine, it is not set-up in the typical magazine format. Each issue covers a specific topic (i.e. blood, birds, nutrition, etc) and has fantastic pictures and articles about the topic. You can either subscribe and get monthly issues, or order just the issues you'd use in your class.

2. Sciecne and Technology Concepts The Smithsonian Institution recently introduced this program. The program includes non-fiction readers (including Kids Discover!) and hands-on lessons.

3. Seeds of Science/Roots of Learning: This is an excellent program that integrates science and literacy.

4. NSTA Press just released a new book called Inquiring Scientists, Inquiring Readers: Using Nonfiction to Promote Science Literacy, Grades 3-5. I just ordered it today, so I haven't had a chance to read it yet. I'm excited to read it when it arrives! I'll post back here to let you know what it says!

I'm looking forward to hearing about more non-fiction literacy resources. Thanks so much for starting this thread!

Maureen

Hi Karen, Can I ask what grade level you are teaching? Do you need non-fiction books for science? I found that I was hard for me as well with teaching. I want to be able to provide a fun learning environment using some books that are fiction just to get the kids excited about science. But, giving them non-fiction books will give them the knowledge and background they need to know for science. I would suggest going on google and typing in science books. I tend to read reviews on what others say about the books to get an idea about what would work and what doesn't. I know there are a great deal of resources on the website pinterest but you have to really look to find what you want. I hope this helps

Maureen, Thanks I will check out Seeds of Learning. We also look at a magazine Current Science or Science Currents. Its a small magazine geared toward kids. In the past I found those magazines either over simplified or very little material. Although they could be a good starting point for discussion.

Rachel, I teach middle school. This year 6th and 8th grades. I have taken quotes from various places, magazines, books, NY Science Times. I find several paragraphs that relate to the unit in general or a specific topic and give guiding questions so students can write a response. I usually ask for 1-2 paragraphs. We also discuss how our language arts usually have a classroom library. They are usually small it would be good to have a science library similar to that.

NAtional Geographi Explorer has MS/HS edition.Extreme Explorer...

I was also thinking aboout Time for Kids TFK I think there is only an edition up to grade 5-6.

I hope this is helpful.

Kathy

Another good non-fiction resource is Schlolastic Science News. This magazine is written for grades 6-10. You can preview an sample on the scholastic website to get an idea of the content. I also found this article about non-fiction books on the NSTA Communities blog.

Maureen

Thanks everyone, make note of all the possibilities for the next time I meet with the department. I clicked onto the blog link it seemed more books gear for teachers- thanks anyway. I also remembered a book I read The Hidden Life of Deer, it wasn't too long. I took a quote from that book when teaching populations and ecosystems for a homework assignment. Does anyone have time in class for students to read through a book- whether it be 10-15 minutes per day to do the reading? Or would you have students do reading from a book on their own and discuss it in class?

Hi Karen, Just wanted to drop in and tell you that my elementary and middle school used Time for Kids and Scholastic News Science journals and I loved them as a student. Some teachers gave them to us as a take home activity (and quite honestly they were thrown away by many) however some teachers gave them to us to read independently and soon after we would join together and discuss main ideas in small groups and then each group would share one idea in whole group discussion. This is great in so many ways as far as producing an increase in literacy in the science classroom but from a student prospective I know I always enjoyed this as a break in the day and a break in reading articles because the magazines always had fun pictures and even the texture was just different from everyday class activities. Good Luck, Julianna

Thanks, that is an idea a group think/share then whole class discussion about the article.

Karen, I really like Science World magazine. Also, the Picture Perfect Science lessons series are written for elementary students, but the book recommendations for the various science content areas include both fiction and non fiction works. The books work for all grade levels. I am attaching a book chapter from one of their books so you can see what I mean.
Imaginative Inventions
Carolyn

Carolyn, Thanks, looking more for reading for the students. I will keep Science world in mind.

This list of science news websites was just posted on the list serve • Science News for Kids Includes snapshots and the weekly scoop. www.sciencenewsforkids.org • Kidsnewsroom.org Features weekly news, games, schools on the Web, and more. http://www.kidsnewsroom.org/ • Yahoo! Kids News Featuring top stories, popular news, photos, and weird news. kids.yahoo.com/news • Simpson Street Free Press Madison's teen newspaper. http://www.simpsonstreetfreepress.org • NewsHour Extra: News for Students Provides students and teachers with quality educational resources based on current events and issues. Includes lesson plans, student comments, video clips, and news stories. http://www.pbs.org/newshour/extra • The Current Events: Good News for Kids Weekly magazine for students that showcases interesting news and current events from around the world. Includes issues for different reading levels, as well as lesson plans and activities. http://www.thecurrentevents.com • Scholastic News Featuring news, current events, sports, games, quizzes, and more for kids. http://teacher.scholastic.com/activities/scholasticnews/index.html • Nick News Linda Ellerbee hosts Nick News, a long-running kids' news show. Read the latest news, view videos, and see past shows on this site. news.nick.com • Student Connections From the New York Times Learning Network. http://www.nytimes.com/learning/students • KidsPost News for kids from the Washington Post. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/kidspost • http://www.headlinespot.com/for/kids/#science This will lead you to various other links for websites with kid appropriate articles and games. • http://teachkidsnews.com/ More current events here. • http://www.middleschoolscience.com/news.htm This is a great site for articles, games, and information about science all at a middle school level! • http://www.smithsonianmag.com/ Features many articles on various topics. Make sure you are reading something you can understand and explain! • http://www.dogonews.com/ Features articles for kids on science and other topics

The Royal Society Winton Prize for Science Books is the leading award for popular science writing. Books shortlisted for the award are accessible, interesting and compelling accounts of the world around us or inside us. Here is a link to the winners You can download the first chapter free http://royalsociety.org/awards/science-books/

I just came across this Discover Magazine blog Herman Melville, Science Writer http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/loom/2012/11/11/herman-melville-science-writer/ Plymouth University in England is posting a reading of Moby Dick, one chapter a day. The readers are a mix of writers, artists, and actors, including Tilda Swinton. http://www.mobydickbigread.com/ "“Cetology” (chapter 32) reminds the reader that Melville came before Darwin. Ishmael tries to make sense of the diversity of whales, and he can only rely on the work of naturalists who lacked a theory of evolution to make sense of the mammalian features on what looked like fish."

Karen, If you school or district has access to Achieve 3000/Teen Biz that is a perfect way to combine literacy and science. Current science articles are added almost daily, and each article is adapted to the reading level of the student. This company takes the articles they find and modify each one to reading levels from Kindergarten to Post High School. Students complete a pretest to set their reading level and then when they read assigned articles it is presented at a level they can accomplish. It also provides short question/answer sections afterwards for comprehension, math, and even a writing segment. I am able to use this program as a opening reading for about 10 minutes and keep the students current on science happenings. Check it out at http://www.achieve3000.com/

While I was at the Atlanta NSTA Area Conference, I purchased the book, Inquiring Scientists, Inquiring Readers: Using Nonfiction to Promote Science Literacy Grades 3-5. This is an outstanding book that provides groups of non-fiction readers with accompanying 5E lesson plans and reproducibles. This is a fantastic resource for teachers who are looking for ways to include informational, nonfiction text resources in their classrooms. Some of the Inquiry Units include measuring, matter, forces and motion, adaptation, trees, birds, the water cycle, fossils, and stars.

This is an outstanding resource that will surely become one of my 'goto' planning resources!

Maureen

A new study of the PBS KIDS television series based on the books by H. A. Rey and Margret Rey finds that the show and books developed to tie into the program improved the science and math test scores of 4- and 5-year-olds. http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/rulesforengagement/2012/11/curious_george_inspires_childr.html?goback=.gde_1146517_member_186515083 You can read the entire report here http://www.pbs.org/parents/curiousgeorge/program/pdf/Curious_George_Evaluation.pdf

http://www.readworks.org/books/passages has over 1000 non fiction passages grade 4-6 but good for middle and even high school students, low level readers or ELL students in some topics. Also, http://www.readwritethink.org/ has great literacy strategies I uss to incorporate literacy in the clasrroom and prsent knowledge. They have non fiction cubes the kids can make, commics etc...

Lessons in English and science can go hand in hand through the genre of "lab lit," offer the writers of this blog post. In one suggested exercise, students would discuss recent science topics and determine how they might be used as the basis for a novel or movie. In another exercise, students examine the novel "Frankenstein," which is cited in an accompanying article as probably one of the earliest examples of "lab lit," and the authors also suggest studying scientists' blogs. http://learning.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/12/05/lab-lit-writing-fiction-based-on-real-science/

Research has shown that when language arts experiences are embedded within the context of learning science, students improve in their ability to use their language arts skills. Learn how the new FOSS Third Edition integrates content area reading, science notebooks, and other literacy strategies to promote this type of reflective thinking http://www.deltaeducation.com/science/foss3/index.shtml

I see that someone mentioned one of the National Geographic reading programs and I can't say enough good things about the one I'm using right now. Here's a link: [url=http://www.ngsp.com/tabid/1104/default.aspx]National Geographic Reading and Writing Workshop[/url]. The teacher's guide and student materials are AMAZING and then there are the non-fiction books used for guided reading, as well as blackline masters for many, many articles taken from the various Nat Geo magazines for kids. This program makes me want to teach language arts at the middle school level - but only if I can use the Nat Geo program. ;) Did I mention that your lesson plans are done for you in both reading and writing??? Rather than me going on and on about the program, I'm just going to copy/paste directly from their web page: Each Workshop focuses on a specific reading comprehension strategy as well as on the writing process and characteristics of one nonfiction writing form. The Nonfiction Reading & Writing Workshops instructional approach includes: Teach/Model Engaging color transparencies model the comprehension strategy Teacher’s Guides provide think-alouds, modeling and highlighting that makes instruction explicit and interactive Practice the Strategy Annotations and hints in the Guided Instruction Book support the student at the outset in a gradual release model Students then apply the strategy to pages of the article with less support Teachers review and assess before moving students to the Strategy Application Books Apply the Strategy The Strategy Application Book connects directly to the article students have been using for practice The Strategy Application Library provides one easy-reading alternative to the Strategy Application Book and three leveled titles for extended practice. Connect to the Writing Process Students return to the Guided Instruction Book to see the Writing Process, Writing Focus, and Nonfiction Text Structure modeled Teacher's Guide and Writing Transparencies provide explicit instruction, tips for young writers, and think-alouds to make it real Engaging prompts for independent writing and scoring rubrics for writing assessment are provided in the Teacher’s Guides

For anyone looking for current science literacy articles on the cheap (free) take a look at www.sciencenewsforkids.org. They have nice articles that can be formatted for printing. I take those and then develop 5 questions about them (that are not simply find the answer in the text. No subscriptions to buy for each kid and you can just use the ones you want so no waste.

Thank you for the lead Mike. I had not used www.sciencenewsforkids.org. before. It will definitely be one of my first areas to check out when I get to school tomorrow. Kendra, I had not heard of National Geographic Reading and Writing Workshop before even though I used National Geographic website before. Just glancing through the website, the books so look like ones all students would be interested in and willing to look at. I actually had a chance at a local Science convention to see several of the titles up close. I was impressed the content was strong, yet the readability was accessible to so many students. Thank you both for sharing.

Here is a list of ideas to support students' reading of text. I just attended an AVID workshop that advocated many of these same things http://www.carolina.com/teacher-resources/Interactive/science-literacy/tr25342.tr?s_cid=em_CTGen_201305&utm_source=bronto&utm_medium=email&utm_term=Read+the+entire+article&utm_content=auburnp%40uhd.edu&utm_campaign=2013+MayJune+General+Tips