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With Maryland passing an Environmental Literacy graduation requirement, and other states soon to follow (I hope!) this blog will be addressing ideas and resources for incorporating Eco Ed into all the core subjects beginning today with English.
1. My Side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George
This 1959 classic will never go out of style. Plus there are great online resources for teachers like this printable teaching the book for grades 5-8 or Scholatic’s reading guide.
Sam Gribley is terribly unhappy living in New York City with his family, so he runs away to the Catskill Mountains to live in the woods-all by himself. With only a penknife, a ball of cord, forty dollars, and some flint and steel, he intends to survive on his own. Sam learns about courage, danger, and independence during his year in the wilderness, a year that changes his life forever.
2. Hoot by Carl Hiaasen
One of my favorite adult novelist, I was excited to see Hiaasen venture into YA literature with the same quirky humor and Florida setting that makes the swamp just another character of the story. Scholastic also has a teachers’ guide for grades 6-8.
Roy Eberhardt is the new kid–again. This time around it’s Trace Middle School in humid Coconut Grove, Florida. But it’s still the same old routine: table by himself at lunch, no real friends, and thick-headed bullies like Dana Matherson pushing him around. But if it wasn’t for Dana Matherson mashing his face against the school bus window that one day, he might never have seen the tow-headed running boy. And if he had never seen the running boy, he might never have met tall, tough, bully-beating Beatrice. And if he had never met Beatrice, he might never have discovered the burrowing owls living in the lot on the corner of East Oriole Avenue. And if he had never discovered the owls, he probably would have missed out on the adventure of a lifetime.
3. Hachet by Gary Paulsen
Another story of survival (seeing my theme?) with a Scholastic guide.
Thirteen-year-old Brian Robeson is on his way to visit his father when the single engine plane in which he is flying crashes. Suddenly, Brian finds himself alone in the Canadian wilderness with nothing but his clothing, a tattered windbreaker, and the hatchet his mother has given him as a present — and the dreadful secret that has been tearing him apart ever since his parents’ divorce. But now Brian has no time for anger, self-pity, or despair — it will take all his know-how and determination, and more courage than he knew he possessed, to survive.
What YA books do you think teach environmental literacy?
http://www.sterlingpublishing.com/Olivias-Birds-by-Olivia-Bouler?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_term=children%20environment%20books&utm_campaign=Olivia's%20Birds&gclid=CJ_ihdK00akCFcTe4AodWgIkTA
Great suggestion. I am adding it to my list. Although it’s more a picture book than a YA Book. I think I need to keep different running lists of books – children’s, YA, and adult. Keep sharing titles!
I haven’t read either of these books in a long time so I don’t know for sure if they are actually environmental or not, but Island of the Blue Dolphins by Scott O’Dell and The Cay by Theodore Taylor came to mind. I want to think of some others like Hoot, that talk about things beyond living off of the land.
There is a magazine called “Green Teacher” that could be a good resource for this blog. Here’s a link to a sample of their magazine http://www.greenteacher.com/freeissue87.html
Lastly, this site focuses mostly on younger children but it’s still a resource: http://www.childrenoftheearth.org/Navy%20Pages/recommended-books-children-environment.htm