Creating Your Own Connections

Those who read books by Janet Stevens will most likely think first of using the author's Web site at http://www.janetstevens.com to extend and enrich the experience with the books. Those studying lighthouses might find sites about the lighthouses that still exist and utilize the links on Lighthouse Links on the Internet at http://www.maine.com/lights/www.vl.htm. Those are fairly obvious connections. However, children might connect the topic of lighthouses to one of Deborah Hopkinson's titles Birdie's Lighthouse (Atheneum, 1997) and if that connection is made, a connection to Hopkinson's Web site might be useful in creating connections from one topic to another. Students will likely have several ideas for their own connections. They might have connecting topics, a book that fits the theme, or a thought that connects because of an experience they have had. It will be your job as a "facilitator of learning" to help them investigate their questions and topics. There will be obvious connections for many curriculum topics but other connections may come as students add to their schema regarding the theme/topic..

EXAMPLE 1: Marc Brown writes a series of books about a personified aardvark named Arthur. Initially those books appealed to primary aged readers because the situations Arthur and his friend are involved in are situations in which they could easily find themselves. In the course of reading these books and learning about the author, Marc Brown, the most obvious connection will be to the Public Broadcasting Organization's site, dealing with the television series about Arthur. In the process, many children will ask about the type of animal that Arthur is. He is in fact, an aardvark. Often, at this point, children will want to know more about aardvarks. This is an opportunity to expand their knowledge base by reading about real aardvarks. By using the Google search engine and keying in aardvark the following pages can be found and identified for young learners to utilize. They will be able to read about the characteristics of a real aardvark - the Philadelphia Zoo's informational page about the animal. That page also contains a link to the zoo's "Ask a Docent" service. More links to Aardvark information can be found at Aardvark Links from How to Get a head Without Hunting." After reading about the real aardvark students may question why Arthur does not look like a real aardvark. Arthur was considerably more identifiable as an aardvark in Marc Brown's first book about Arthur, Arthur's Nose (Little, Brown, 1976). In later editions, Marc Brown drew Arthur as a more generic animal-character. If none of the resources help students with their questions they might want to write to the author, Marc Brown, to inquire of him regarding the questions they might have. If the questions are actually questions about the aardvark itself the "Ask a Docent" feature on the Philadelphia Zoo's page cited earlier might be useful. From Marc Brown's Arthur books we are lead to investigating zoos and zoo animals.

EXAMPLE 2: After hearing a local college student speak about her home on the continent of Africa and her emphasis on the fact that people often speak about Africa as if it were a country rather than a continent, many students wanted to know more about each of the countries. A site such as Africa Online: Kids Only became one that the students were interested in investigating. The site originated specifically for children and teachers who wish to learn about Africa and the individual countries on that continent. The site also includes opportunities for students to submit questions about Africa and to submit student writings and art about Africa. Young learners might well wish to go beyond the information on the Web site and locate additional information about the continent. They will want to turn to their school library's catalog and search for Africa. A great book to begin with is Yvonne Ayo's Africa (Knopf, 1995). This Eyewitness book is filled with pictures and brief paragraphs. After reading this book and any others that might be located, learners may wish to return to Africa Online: Kids Only to post some of their questions about Africa that have not been satisfied by either the site or the reading of books. The image of Africa readers will get from reading folk literature from Africa is very likely to be much different from the image they obtain while reading contemporary informational books and from visiting sites such as Africa Online: Kids Only. From a factual presentation about Africa, connections are made to the continent and then to individual countries, and then to folk literature and a comparative study of the images portrayed in the folk literature and the present day situation in the representative countries.

EXAMPLE 3: Holidays are always a focus for special activities. There are numerous sites, books, and lesson plans for some for the more celebrated holidays/cultural celebrations. One especially fun celebration is April Fool's Day. The origin of the day is somewhat elusive, but learners may learn more about the origin of the day by viewing a page from the America Embassy in Stockholm. In order to find this site we visited the AltaVista advanced search page and keyed in "April fools day" AND origin and located this site almost immediately. by visiting a virtual bookstoreon the Web, Amazon, we were able to go to the kids section, identify the age group we wanted to address and then keyed in April Fools' Day. We were able to locate several books on the subject, including Karen's Big Joke (Baby Sitters Little Sister, No. 27) by Ann M. Martin (Little apple, 1992); Mud Flat April Fool by James Stevenson (Greenwillow, 1998); or Arthur's April Fools by Marc Brown (Little, Brown, 1985). The titles of the books available will allow learners to either locate the books in their own libraries or in nearby libraries. Finding out what books are indeed available in nearby libraries might be possible via the Internet. There is an "other libraries" connection from the Library of Congress catalog site. These connections are pretty straightforward, but learning about April Fools' Day will provide a direct tie-in to books about the holiday, which in turn presents an opportunity to introduce young researchers with the Library of Congress resource and the ability to search the availability of titles in many libraries throughout the United States. The ability to locate specific titles in other libraries may be an invaluable tool when the students attempt to accomplish some specific research on a topic.

EXAMPLE 4: Jan Brett is a very popular author and the focus in many of her books are animals. She often hides hedgehogs in her illustrations, a fact she discusses on her Web page. However one book, Armadillo Rodeo (Putnam, 1995) features an armadillo and her four identical male offspring. One of the young armadillos wanders off and finds himself in several adventures. Throughout the book readers can pick up several facts about the armadillo including the fact that armadillos are very nearsighted and that a litter is always four of the same sex. Learners will want to confirm some of that information and can do so on a page mounted by the San Antonio Zoo. That page discusses three-banded armadillos and does not mention the litter of four. However, another article does talk about the litters of four. An article from the American Scientist (May-June 1998), "Polyembryony in Armadillos," is available online. This article will introduce the nine-banded armadillo, native to parts of the United States. This article tells us about the nine-banded species of armadillo that does produce the identical quadruplets. Students may wish to research the difference between nine-banded and three-banded armadillos and investigate if Jan Brett has illustrated the correct species of armadillo.

EXAMPLE 5: Young artists may wish to investigate careers in art, display their own art work, or study famous artists that created some of the masterpieces that are treasures in museums. The following sites will provide learners with many references with which to build on their knowledge of art. Celebrate art with young artists by visiting the following sites:

Sanford's ArtEdventures where visitors can Create Art, Study Art, Play Art Games, and Teach Art.

The Children's Art Gallery provides a location for children to submit their art work.

The Web Museum displays hundreds of famous paintings.

World Wide Arts Resources provides a searchable site with information on artists and museums and much more.

Arts EdNet includes lesson plans and access to student galleries.

The Refrigerator provides a showcase for student art.

Crayon Site includes many coloring activities as well as brief introductions to famous artists accompanied by suggestions for projects children can try.

The @rtroom offers six activity centers that give visitors the opportunity to learn about art, artists, and to create their own projects.

Kinderart offers a large free collection of art lessons and art information.

All of this information will contribute some information to the reading of several art-focused titles including those with parodies in books for children. Famous art works created by Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse are included in Tomie dePaola's Bonjour Mr. Satie (Putnam, 1991). Other parodies of famous paintings are part of Art Dog by Thatcher hurd (HarperCollins, 1996). Biographies of many famous artists are available. Particularly accessible for the intermediate reader are the titles in Barron's Famous Artists series and Chelsea House's Art of Children series. These sites and books will contribute to young learners and their interest art and art-related careers.

EXAMPLE 6: Those studying Australia may happen across the books by Mem fox who has written some distinctively Australian titles, including Possum Magic (Harcourt Brace, 1994). An obvious connection to these books may be Mem Fox's Web site. But information about Australia itself might be found in books such as, DK Publishing's Eyewitness Travel Guide: Australia (DK, 1998) or on the WWW site Guide to Australia.

EXAMPLE 7: Jane Kurtz grew up in Ethiopia and has written several books set in that country. A novel The Storyteller's Beads (Harcourt, 1998) will be a great novel for middle school readers. A natural site to complement this book is Jane's site. This site includes a links page which will lead users to sites about Ethiopia. One of the sites is a page on the Library of Congress site, under the Federal Research Division. This site provides an extensive list of links/pages for "Ethiopia: A Country Study." In this example secondary students are lead from a novel set in Ethiopia to learning more about the setting and about the role of women in that setting. Many informational pages are include on the Library of Congress pages. The "Role of Women" page summarizes the role Ethiopian women play in society, their hardships, and economic and social implications. The links connect a reading of Jane Kurtz's The Storyteller's Beads to information about Ethiopia to the role women play in society.

Excerpted from Chapter 7: Getting Started - Making Connections to Curriculum, pages 187-190 from Internet for Schools: A Practical Guide, 3rd edition by Carol Simpson and Sharron L. McElmeel (Linworth, 2000). Reprinted with permission of Linworth Publishing, Inc. 480 E. Wilson Bridge Rd., STE L., Worthington, OH 43085. http://www.linworth.com