Companion Resources

Big Book of Big Tractors is a large, full color book that gets even bigger with it's fold out pages. Students will learn the names of many machines and implements used on the farms that grow and harvest their food. How do machines dig in the soil and plant seeds? What kind of tools make physical labor on a farm easier by lifting heavy objects or performing the work of many people? How do machines harvest grains, hay, cotton, and other agricultural products? How are tractors and large machines used off the farm? These questions and more are answered and can serve as a companion to lessons about machines, harvesting, and engineering (STEM).

Bees and Wasps is a 32-page book filled with color photographs and illustrations. Learn about their lifecycle and the varieties of bees and wasps that pollinate flowers and make honey. You will also learn about the organization of beehives, the roles of each bee, and how they all work together to make honey and pollinate flowers.

How Do Flowers Grow is a question and answer based flap-book. Colorful illustrations lead students through an inquiry based learning adventure answering questions such as, "How do flowers grow?" "Why do plants have flowers" "Where do seeds come from?" and many more. This book provides a very interactive opportunity for teachers and students to learn about seeds, flowers, and plants.

Farm Animals is a 32-page book filled with facts to learn about many types of farms and the animals that live there. The book includes real-life pictures and color illustrations. In addition to the text, each page includes a fun fact. Readers will learn why traditional farm animals such as beef cattle, dairy cattle, goats, sheep, chickens, and pigs are kept on farms. They will also learn why specialty farms raise ducks, geese, fish, and ostriches.

Carrie goes from one neighbor's house to the next looking for her brother, who is late for dinner. Each family invites her to taste what they are cooking. She discovers that although each family is from a different country, 'everybody cooks rice.'

Chicks & Chickens illustrates and teaches about the production of eggs. You will learn how eggs are produced for human consumption and how fertilized eggs develop into embryos and grow to be fuzzy baby chicks. Readers will also learn about various chicken breeds, behaviors and terms.

Follow the text and the photographs in this book to learn about the development of a baby chick from the time the egg is laid until the chick hatches.

Sally is a young girl living in rural Alabama in the early 1900s, a time when people were struggling to grow food in soil that had been depleted by years of cotton production. One day, Dr. George Washington Carver shows up to help. He teaches them how to restore the soil nutrients. He even prepares a delicious lunch made of plants, including "chicken" made from peanuts. Susan Grigsby's warm story shines new light on an African American scientist who was ahead of his time.

Follow the production path of peanut butter from the planting of the seed to the manufacturing of peanut butter!

There wasn't anything that George Washington Carver couldn't grow. He took the common goober—today's peanut—and created hundreds of useful products from it, turning goobers into a very profitable staple for the South. At the same time, this very special man passed on to everyone who knew him the importance of following one's own dreams.

This is the inspiring story of the pioneering African-American teacher, scientist, and artist. Carver is perhaps best known for his scientific work with peanuts and sweet potatoes (and for inventing peanut butter!). Adler tells of Carver's work at the Tuskegee Institute with Booker T. Washington, his hard childhood, and his determination to learn despite many obstacles. A man of deep faith, Carver worked throughout his life to create scientific discoveries that would improve the lives of Southerners—especially African-Americans.

This book tells the story of Nobel Laureate, Norman Borlaug. Norman grew up as an average farm boy in Iowa, but later his work as a plant scientist reached far and wide to help improve the growth of wheat, rice, and corn all over the world. This book highlights the benefits of emerging science, but also has an underlying message to teach kids that, "Every choice you make, good or bad, can make a difference."