Tag: music

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NATURE-WISE – Connecting the Climate, Environment, Young People And You

YOU’RE INVITED: Leaders at schools, youth, religious and other non-profit or for-profit organizations are invited to book trainings for NATURE-WISE for 2024-2025!  You can host a professional development training or a Youth Engagement Program. Read below for Professional Development and here for Youth Engagement and email: caroline@carolinebrewerbooks.com for more information.

What is Nature-wise? Nature-wise is a professional development training for educators and youth leaders designed to help children and teens understand and practice, on creative levels, that human beings are included in the definition of the environment. Protecting it is protecting us. We can’t protect what we don’t know or understand. The good news is that from our earliest days, we practice literacy and that opens a world of wondrous possibilities and opportunities to explore all the literacies — reading, writing, speaking, seeing, hearing, visual arts, music, dance, games, and so many more – as we dig deeper into the natural world, our place in it, and our power to be climate activists and better protect all living things.

Teachers will enjoy to work with me, a children’s book author, to introduce students to children’s books on the environment; Help students tap into the power of poetry to articulate feelings and observations about the environment; Bring local, national, and global environmental champions into students’ lives through picture books and online resources; Lead students on fascinating nature exploration journeys outdoors; Help students evaluate wildlife (colors, shapes, patterns, textures, and behaviors) in their school and home neighborhoods and create a neighborhood nature encyclopedia — and have fun!

Teachers will have opportunities to address fears about being outside and about various forms of wildlife; Create and play vocabulary games based on books and other literature; Help students write class and individual letters to authors, climate and environmental champions; Help students create interview questions for environmental champions and authors; Help students create artwork inspired by stories and the work of environmental champions. And so much more!

Email: caroline@carolinebrewerbooks.com for more information about how to bring Nature-Wise to your school or organization.

WHAT TEACHERS ARE SAYING ABOUT NATURE-WISE!
Dear Caroline
Just a note to thank you for your workshop last week. I had the most wonderful time and got so many great ideas. I’m a new-ish teacher (switched from journalism mid-career) and am always looking for ways to better my craft. Thanks to your ideas, I’m now using rhythmic poems every day and putting lyrics up on the board for my learners to read. They love it! I’m also halfway through your HTHS manual and am putting more of those ideas into practice. Thank you so much for doing what you do and for inspiring so many of us. It is helping countless numbers of children! All the best.

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Nature-Wise: Environmental Programs for School, After-School, and Home

Nature-Wise: Explore the environment, our place in it,
and our power to protect all living things
Youth Engagement Programs for School, After-School, and Home
with Children’s Book Author, Literacy and the Environment Consultant Caroline Brewer
www.carolinebrewerbooks.com * caroline@carolinebrewerbooks.com

Nature-Wise helps children and teens understand and practice, on creative levels, that human beings are included in the definition of the environment. Protecting it is protecting us. We can’t protect what we don’t know or understand. The good news is that from our earliest days, we practice literacy and that opens a world of wondrous possibilities and opportunities to explore all the literacies — reading, writing, speaking, seeing, hearing, visual arts, music, dance, games, and so many more – as we dig deeper into the natural world, our place in it, and our power to be climate activists and better protect all living things.

With the Nature-wise Student Engagement Program, students will be treated to at least one of the following opportunities  based on a series of presentations:

  • Explore human and wildlife literacies, the environment as a love story and a reason to say their names
  • Engage with books that share paths for how to tap into our gifts, super-powers, and “somebodiness” as Dr. King explained, to explore our place in the natural world
  • Engage with books that help students get hooked on reading and writing and the exploration of a variety of literacies
  • Introduction to children’s literature on the environment and artistic responses to stories
  • Explore and respond to stories of “belonging” in nature
  • Explore the power of poetry to articulate feelings and observations about the environment
  • Meet local, national, and global environmental champions through books and online resources
  • Explore and evaluate wildlife (colors, shapes, patterns, textures, and behaviors of plants, animals, waterways, and humans) in our school and home neighborhoods; Create a neighborhood nature encyclopedia
  • Address fears about being outside and about various forms of wildlife
  • Create and play vocabulary games based on books and other literature
  • Write class and individual letters to authors and environmental champions
  • Create interview questions for environmental champions and authors
  • Create artwork inspired by stories and the work of environmental champions

*Professional Development Trainings for educators are also available. Email caroline@carolinebrewerbooks.com or Click here: https://carolinebrewerbooks.com/carolines-blog/nature-wise-reading-writing-probing-and-playing-in-the-outdoor-classroom/

NOTE: All photos in the graphic, except the Ghanaian child pointing to the garden egg in the garden, are images from the FREE e-book, Belonging: African Americans in Nature Photography Project, created by Nature Forward in partnership with the U.S. Forest Service’s Urban and Community Forestry Program.

 

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D.C. Author Launches Musical Children’s Novel

D.C. Author Launches Musical Children’s Novel

Darius Daniels: Game On! promotes literacy through music and poetry

For Immediate Release – Tuesday, October 29, 2019

Washington, D.C. – Veteran Children’s Author and Literacy Activist Caroline Brewer will launch a musical children’s novel on Friday, November 1 at www.carolinebrewerbooks.com. Free downloads with activities, games, and chances to win free books will be featured. Book “tasting” parties are scheduled later this month and year. Ms. Brewer is open to media appearances and interviews that will showcase the musical, poetic, and instructional elements of the book.

Darius Daniels: Game On! is a 35,000-word middle grade adventure novel about an 11-year-old boy, a video game, and a great and scary adventure the boy cannot escape – until he hurts somebody. Travel to the game world Washington, D.C. is part of the game. The book also represents a new genre, the rhythmic novel, where the plot pulses with musical rhythms and songs.

“Based on national assessments, for more than 30 years, about two-thirds of American children have entered and exited school reading below grade level. This book was written to Change the Game for them. Every child I have ever met is hungry to learn to read, eager to improve as a reader, and ready to devour more books. This book will feed their appetites,” said Brewer, a D.C.-based author who has given reading and education presentations to more than 25,000 teachers, children, parents, and librarians across the U.S and in Ghana.

Darius Daniels: Game On! is a Wizard of Oz-like virtual urban fantasy sprinkled with rhythm, rhyme, rap, riddles, and more than 10 forms of poetry (which research and experience show accelerate reading progress and deepen engagement). It comes in a 256-page Complete Volume edition or as three individual books (Book 1, Book 2, and Book 3 for children who want to read the story in smaller chunks). Available at bookstores everywhere now!

Caroline Brewer is the author now of 12 books, editor of five books written by students, a former teacher, and wildly successful reading coach of children. She’s coached hundreds of children, personally and professionally, to bridge the literacy gap by as many as nine grade levels. She lives in Washington D.C. Click bar above to hear our featured demo of the rap WOKE, contact Caroline for excerpts from the book, a copy of the book, or additional information.