Chew on This: Everything You Don't Want to Know About Fast Food

I had a chance to explore a new book to our library titled Chew on This: Everything You Don't Want to Know about Fast Food by Eric Schlosser and Charles Wilson. Not only did this book provide interesting facts for me to use with eighth grade English students, it GROSSED me out! If you are looking for a nonfiction book to read and you have a strong stomach, this book would be the perfect choice.

Chew on This highlights little known facts about the growth of fast-food chains, particulary McDonald's, and the effect this growth has had on American children. Although this may sound a bit dull, it is anything but that. How can your interest not be captured when you learn "Dactylopius coccus costa... bugs are collected, dried, and ground into a coloring additive. It takes about 70,000 of the insects to make a pound of carmine, which is used to make processed foods look pink, red, or purple" (Schlosser and Wilson 121-22)? This fact will make me think twice about ordering a strawberry milkshake!

Don't miss the chance to be entertained while learning some fascinating facts about foods common to the American diet.

Digital Storytelling

Microsoft has come out with one of the coolest new technologies for creating slideshows using your digital photos called “Photostory”. It’s one of Microsoft’s best-kept secrets and it’s free! Using Photostory, you can simply touch-up, crop and rotate pictures or add special effects. You can also add a soundtrack or your own voice narration and then personalize with titles and captions. To download Photostory or see it in action, visit http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/digitalphotography/photostory/default.mspx.

Speaking of digital storytelling, there is a great website in which to obtain instrumental music that can be used in conjunction with a program like Photostory. The website is http://www.freeplaymusic.com/. This website offers instrumental music clips in many different genres. Many of the music clips are also offered in various lengths, which makes them perfect to use in slideshows.

So, get out those captured memories and start experimenting with digital story-telling and these free tools!

Baseball Season Has Arrived!

Neither Chicago baseball team had a favorable beginning yesterday, but we can always hope that this was a slow start and a World Series trip is in one of the team's future. As annoyed as I was with the rain delay during the Cub game, it got me thinking that this would be a perfect opportunity to make a list of some books that celebrate baseball fever for all of you baseball fans.

The following titles can be found in our library. The short summary is taken from our online catalog.


The Boy Who Saved Baseball by John H. Ritter
The fate of a small California town rests on the outcome of one baseball game, and Tom Gallagher hopes to lead his team to victory with the secrets of the now disgraced player, Dante Del Gato.
You may also want to check out another John H. Ritter book called Over the Wall.


Heat by Mike Lupica
Pitching prodigy Michael Arroyo is on the run from social services after being banned from playing Little League baseball because rival coaches doubt he is only twelve years old and he has no parents to offer them proof.






Summerland by Michael Chabon
Ethan Feld, the worst baseball player in the history of the game, finds himself recruited by a 100-year-old scout to help a band of fairies triumph over an ancient enemy.






My 13th Season by Kristi Roberts
Already downhearted due to the loss of her mother and her father's overwhelming grief, thirteen-year-old Fran decides to give up her dream of becoming the first female in professional baseball after a coach attacks her just for being a girl.






Any of Dan Gutman's books about baseball are also many students' favorites. Check out some of the following:
*Abner & Me: A Baseball Card Adventure
*Babe & Me: A Baseball Card Adventure
*Honus & Me: A Baseball Card Adventure
*Jackie & Me: A Baseball Card Adventure
*Mickie & Me: A Baseball Card Adventure
*Satch & Me: A Baseball Card Adventure
*Shoeless Joe & Me: A Baseball Card Adventure

We also own many nonfiction titles focused on baseball that may catch your interest.


Play Ball Like the Hall of Famers: The Inside Scoop from 19 Baseball Greats by Steven Krasner
Presents advice on how to play baseball like the pros from twenty big league stars such as Bobby Doerr, Johnny Bench, Tom Seaver, Whitey Ford, and others, and includes stories from their childhood and career, tips on making difficult plays, and player superstitions.





Baseball: Startling Stories Behind the Records by Jim Benagh
Relates the stories behind a number of record-setting feats in the history of baseball, in such categories as "Long-ball Sluggers," "Age Gaps, " and "Hitting Feats."

Belles of the Ballpark by Diana Star Helmer
Describes the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League, which gave women the opportunity to play professional baseball while America was involved in World War II.


Roberto Clemente: Baseball Player by Jerry Roberts
Presents a biography of Roberto Clemente, Latin American baseball player, providing information on his childhood, his education, and his achievements in Major League Baseball with the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Transporting Files Between Home and School

A jump drive is a compact storage device that can be used to save files to or from a computer. They are a handy and durable replacement to writing files to CD or floppy disk. Jump drives are smaller in size than a pack of gum and can be attached to a key chain, or worn around your neck. The jump drive plugs into the USB port of a computer, which then provides easy access to your files. Jump drives are also referred to as flash drives, and USB memory sticks. They can be purchased at every major retail and office supply store. As the storage capacity has gone up, the prices have come down and a 1GB jump drive can be found for under $20. We recommend that every student have their own jump drive and many teachers at Prairie require them for their classes. We do have jump drives in the Library Media Center available to students for a 1 week check-out, and they are very popular items!

Jump drives are the best way for students to transport their files between home and school. CD’s do not hold nearly as much data and are not as durable as jump drives. Many students think they can email themselves documents between home and school, only to find out that access to their personal email accounts are not allowed on school computers. Having a jump drive would alleviate many of the issues of transporting files between home and school and they are a great investment for students!

Rebecca Caudill 2008 Winner

The state winner of the 2008 Rebecca Caudill award is Drums, Girls, and Dangerous Pie by Jordan Sonnenblick. A total of 38,340 votes were cast across the state and these voters agree with Prairie students that Drums, Girls, and Dangerous Pie is definitely a book worth reading! The other place winners are:

2nd place: The Old Willis Place by Mary Downing Hahn

3rd place: MVP*: Magellan Voyage Project by Douglas Evans

4th place: The Miraculous Journey by Kate DiCamillo

5th place: The Ranger's Apprentice/Ruins of Gorlan by John Flanagan

We have four days left before Spring Break. Stop by the library to check out some books for vacation. We have just added many new books to our collection. Another item for checkout that might help break up a long car trip would be one of our audiobooks. We have many titles on cassette and CD. We would be happy to recommend or help you find a book or audiobook to enjoy over break.

Sharing Books

According to our question of the week, it looks like many of us get book recommendations from friends. So here is your chance. Post a comment about a book(s) you have read recently that you would recommend to one of your friends.

Over the weekend, I finished the book Wolf Brother by Michelle Paver. This was the first book in a series called Chronicles of Ancient Darkness. The main character, Torak, along with his wolf friend try to save the ancient clans from a demon bear. It is a true adventure as Torak searches for the items listed in an ancient prophecy that will help him conquer the bear. I really liked how friends played such an important part in the story.

Urban Legends

Have you ever heard of an Urban Legend ? According to Dictionary.com, an Urban Legend is “a modern story of obscure origin and with little or no supporting evidence, spreads spontaneously in varying forms and often has elements of humor, moralizing, or horror: Are there alligators living in the New York City sewer system, or is that just an urban legend?”.

In this age of technology, Urban Legends have found their way into our everyday life. You know those emails that get forwarded to you with stories of “millionaires giving all their money away if you just forward this email to 20 people”? How about the various viruses you can catch from email, cell phones, etc? How do you know if theses stories are true or Urban Legends?

The site I visit most often to sort fact from fiction is Snopes.com. Otherwise known as the Urban Legends Reference Page, Snopes.com is a well-known resource for validating or disproving, Internet rumors, email forwards, and other such stories of uncertain or questionable origin in popular American culture.

Snopes.com is an interesting and fun website to browse and most importantly, it reminds us that not everything we read on the Internet is true!