My Best Friend Is As Sharp As a Pencil: And Other Funny Classroom Portraits

My Best Friend Is As Sharp As a Pencil: And Other Funny Classroom Portraits
Author: Hanoch Piven
Publisher: Schwartz & Wade
Total Pages: 41
Release: 2011-02-23
Genre: Juvenile Fiction
ISBN: 0375982787

Here's the perfect back-to-school gift for budding artists. Like the creator's previous picture book, My Dog Is as Smelly as Dirty Socks, this picture book encourages children to be creative and make their own object portraits. It's a fun activity for home or for the classroom. You can even check out portraits made by other readers in the "kids' gallery" of author Hanoch Piven's Web site, www.pivenworld.com—and while you're at it, send in your own! Learn how to create a funny librarian, a colorful art teacher, or your best friend by seeing how one girl does it in this simple, playful picture book that's comprised of portraits made of objects. Once the girl has talked about—and drawn—the key figures in her school, she ends with the pièce de résistance—a class portrait!

My Dog Is As Smelly As Dirty Socks

My Dog Is As Smelly As Dirty Socks
Author: Hanoch Piven
Publisher: Schwartz & Wade
Total Pages: 49
Release: 2013-06-26
Genre: Juvenile Fiction
ISBN: 0307983641

How do you draw your smelly dog? Your playful daddy? Your yummy mommy? See how one girl does it in this simple, clever picture book that's comprised of family portraits made out of objects. For example, her baby brother is so noisy—he's as loud as a whistle, a horn, and even a fire truck!—that she creates a picture of him with whistles for eyes, a horn mouth, and holding a fire truck. After the girl has described everyone in her family (including herself, in great detail), she asks, "What does your special family look like?" encouraging readers to create their own portraits. With a list of objects at the end of the book to use as a guide, this is the ideal choice for budding artists everywhere. Here's a wonderful exploration of simile and metaphor for young readers. And don't miss the companion book My Best Friend is as Sharp as a Pencil!

Colors of Me

Colors of Me
Author: Brynne Barnes
Publisher: Sleeping Bear Press
Total Pages: 34
Release: 2011-09-19
Genre: Juvenile Nonfiction
ISBN: 1410308537

Intriguing collage illustrations frame this timeless story of a young child who questions the significance of color. Speaking in verse, the child wonders if the natural world believes any particular color to be more important than another. Does the rain think I'm a color when it falls on my head? I wonder if the clouds think I'm a color... maybe they think I'm green or blue or red. The child comes to see the importance of a world filled with and accepting of all colors. Do I have to choose one color? I want to be them all - black, blue, purple, brown, pink, orange, yellow, red, white, and green. The whole world is full of colors - just like me. Brynne Barnes earned a B.S. from the University of Michigan and a M.A. from Eastern Michigan University, and she teaches writing at Adrian College. This is her first picture book. She lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan, where she writes books, poetry, and music.Annika M. Nelson's work crosses cultural borders, portraying images of everyday life. She has illustrated several books including Folk Wisdom of Mexico, in addition to illustrations for many national publications. She lives near San Diego, California.

The Perfect Purple Feather

The Perfect Purple Feather
Author: Hanoch Piven
Publisher: Megan Tingley Books
Total Pages: 32
Release: 2002
Genre: Juvenile Fiction
ISBN: 9780316766579

Rhyming text and illustrations take the reader on a journey, in which a simple purple feather becomes a whisker for a cat, a pen for an owl, a quill for a porcupine, and more.

Crazy Like a Fox

Crazy Like a Fox
Author: Loreen Leedy
Publisher: National Geographic Books
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2009-09-15
Genre: Juvenile Fiction
ISBN: 0823422488

Rufus the fox is up to something-- find out why he's acting so crazy in this clever simile story. All night, he's been sleeping like a log. When the sun rises, he feels as fresh as a daisy. In a story told entirely with similes, Rufus sneaks up and startles his friend Babette, and leads her on a wild chase through the woods. Perfect for teaching figurative language, this brightly-illustrated picture book includes the definition of a simile, as well as a brief introduction to idioms and cliches-- and examples on every page of different sayings and similes. Loreen Leedy's zany illustrations depic the figurative sayings in literal ways-- a wooden fox sleeping like a log, a yellow and black striped sheep who's as mad as a hornet-- to bring home the meanings of the expressions. Perfect for kids studying creative writing, or English language learners who may not be familiar with common but less literal sayings, Crazy Like a Fox will make readers happy as a clam-- and help them incorporate similes into their own writing.

My Dog's a Chicken

My Dog's a Chicken
Author: Susan McElroy Montanari
Publisher: Schwartz & Wade
Total Pages: 22
Release: 2016-02-09
Genre: Juvenile Fiction
ISBN: 0385384920

Lula Mae wants a puppy, but times are hard and she’ll just have to make do. Her family has plenty of chickens, so she decides maybe a chicken can be a dog. Pookie, as Lula Mae names her, is an ordinary chicken, but Lula Mae thinks she is very doglike indeed. With a bow in Pookie’s hair, Lula Mae declares her a show dog. When she runs circles around the other chickens, Pookie is a shepherd dog. And when Cousin Tater sneaks up with a snake and Pookie starts bawk, bawk, bawking, well, she’s a guard dog, too. Then Lula Mae’s brother, Baby Berry, wanders away, and who do you think comes to the rescue? Readers will cheer for plucky Lula Mae and giggle over her beloved Pookie, who quite unknowingly saves the day.

Dear Data

Dear Data
Author: Giorgia Lupi
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Total Pages: 304
Release: 2016-09-13
Genre: Design
ISBN: 1616895462

Equal parts mail art, data visualization, and affectionate correspondence, Dear Data celebrates "the infinitesimal, incomplete, imperfect, yet exquisitely human details of life," in the words of Maria Popova (Brain Pickings), who introduces this charming and graphically powerful book. For one year, Giorgia Lupi, an Italian living in New York, and Stefanie Posavec, an American in London, mapped the particulars of their daily lives as a series of hand-drawn postcards they exchanged via mail weekly—small portraits as full of emotion as they are data, both mundane and magical. Dear Data reproduces in pinpoint detail the full year's set of cards, front and back, providing a remarkable portrait of two artists connected by their attention to the details of their lives—including complaints, distractions, phone addictions, physical contact, and desires. These details illuminate the lives of two remarkable young women and also inspire us to map our own lives, including specific suggestions on what data to draw and how. A captivating and unique book for designers, artists, correspondents, friends, and lovers everywhere.

The Library Book

The Library Book
Author: Tom Chapin
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 48
Release: 2017-10-03
Genre: Juvenile Nonfiction
ISBN: 1481460927

Using the lyrics to Tom Chapin and Michael Mark's "The Library Song," this picture book celebrates the magic of reading and of libraries.

My Best Friend Is As Sharp As a Pencil: And Other Funny Classroom Portraits

My Best Friend Is As Sharp As a Pencil: And Other Funny Classroom Portraits
Author: Hanoch Piven
Publisher: Random House Studio
Total Pages: 41
Release: 2010-05-11
Genre: Juvenile Fiction
ISBN: 0375853383

Here's the perfect back-to-school gift for budding artists. Like the creator's previous picture book, My Dog Is as Smelly as Dirty Socks, this picture book encourages children to be creative and make their own object portraits. It's a fun activity for home or for the classroom. You can even check out portraits made by other readers in the "kids' gallery" of author Hanoch Piven's Web site, www.pivenworld.com—and while you're at it, send in your own! Learn how to create a funny librarian, a colorful art teacher, or your best friend by seeing how one girl does it in this simple, playful picture book that's comprised of portraits made of objects. Once the girl has talked about—and drawn—the key figures in her school, she ends with the pièce de résistance—a class portrait!