Charge Ahead

“Yesterday the Chargers read to us at school.”

They told us playing football was a dream come true.

“You can reach your dreams,” they said, “with good habits from the start if you read, eat well, exercise, and think smart.”
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Hansa, The True Story of an Asian Elephant Baby

"Early one November morning at Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle, an Asian elephant named Chai rocked from side to side on her huge legs. She was about to give birth to her first baby."

In November of  2000, after a twenty-two month pregnancy, one of the Woodland Park Zoo’s female elephants  delivered a healthy female calf, one of only three Asian elephants born in a North America zoo that year. The calf was named Hansa which means “supreme happiness” in Thailand, the country where her mother was born.
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Lootas

Selected as a 1999 Notable Book for Children by Smithsonian Magazine

"All alone, in the cold quiet waters of Uganik Bay in southern Alaska, a sea otter gave birth to a female pup. Floating on her back, she licked the small wet ball of fur nestled on her belly."

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Who wakes the rooster

Selected as a 1997 Bank Street College Book of the Year

"It should be morning, but it’s eerie dark. Every thing is quiet…too quiet. Bounce isn’t barking. Where is bounce? Dozing in his doghouse, peacefully dreaming, because Miranda isn’t meowing. Where is Miranda?"

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Partner In Revolution: Abigail Adams

"Thirteen –year-old Abigail Smith brushed a black curl out of her face, her thin lips pursed in frustration. Dipping a quill pen in the ink pot, she wrote, “The mind is like a tender twig which you may bend as you please…(As you get older, it becomes) like a sturdy oak,…hard to move.” Abigail wanted her cousin Isaac to know how lucky he was to be able to go to school…Abigail envied her cousin. While boys and girls could go to school to learn how to write and do simple arithmetic, only boys could continue on to Latin school to prepare for college."

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Manorah The Bird Princess

"Long ago in Thailand, far beyond the human kingdom of Panchala Nakhon, lived a young bird princess named Manorah. Manorah was the youngest of the Bird King’s  seven daughters. She was also the most adventurous. The bird people were magical beings who could fly wherever they pleased or shed their wings and take human form. While her sisters were content to play among the shadowy peaks and silver streams of the Bird Kingdom, Manorah wanted to see what the human world was like."

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Olive and Max's Backyard Adventures

Finalist for the Association of Educational Publishers Distinguished Achievement Award in 2008

"On a hot summer night, Olive Opossum could not sleep. She had just returned from riding on her mother’s back to find food. Lying in all that fur had made Olive even hotter. Olive hung by her tail from a tree branch to catch the breeze. But no breeze came to cool her off. "I’ll go see if my friend Max is awake," said Olive. "I can’t sleep either," said Max.
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A Tale Of Two Rice Birds

Recipient of the 1995 CBC/ABA Pick of the List for "Children’s Books Mean Business" award.

"In the center of Thailand, where the Chao Phrya River flows, there once lived two rice birds. The built their nest in a teakwood tree on a ridge between two rice fields."

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I Could Not Keep Silent: The Life of Rachel Carson

"Ten year-old Rachel Carson ran through tall meadow grass to the cool shelter of the woods at the edge of her father’s land. It was a beautiful summer afternoon in the town of Springdale, Pennsylvania. Squatting beside a shallow stream, she reached down to splash water on her face. A small green frog crouched on a rock at the water’s edge. Rachel stared intently at the tailless creature with bulging eyes. Did it remember its earlier life as a tadpole swimming in the water? Was it waiting to snatch a mosquito with its sticky tongue?"

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