International Children's Digital Library

The International Children’s Digital Library is wonderful website full of great resources for educators, parents, and anyone who loves children’s literature and illustration. 

There are many science and nature themed books with high-res scanned images of all of the pages, including the illustrations. And many of the book’s copyrights have expired so you can used the illustrations for programs. The organization has even developed a Teacher Training Manual. 

“the mission of the International Children’s Digital Library Foundation is to prepare children for life in an ethnically and culturally diverse world by building the world’s largest online multicultural repository of children’s literature.”

Image form the International Children's Digital Library

Charles Darwin

Science writer John Whitfield has a PhD in in evolutionary biology but admitts he has never read Darwin’s Origin of the Species. To rectify this, he has started a blog book club where he is going through the book chapter by chapter. 

I haven’t read Origin of the Species either. Which is rather shameful considering how much of my career I’ve spent talking to people about geology, environmental science, and evolution. So I’m going to jump in and join the club. I’m a little behind as John has already completed chapter one, but a nice thing about the blog venue is that I can catch-up at my own pace.  If you want to join in but don’t have a copy, here is an online version.

Here is a list of books that first jump to mind when I think of must-reads for Minnesota environmental professionals. I know I’m missing a bunch, send me a note with your additions.

A Sand County Almanac
Last Child in the Woods
Silent Spring
The Adventures of Huck Finn

Environmental Education additions from Judy Geck (USFWS Visitor Services Specialist and Librarian)

Place-based Education: Connecting  Classrooms and Communities by David Sobel
Sharing Nature with Children by Joseph Cornell
Experience & Education by John Dewey

The Wild Woods Guide

This website, created by John P. Loegering (a Wildlife Ecologist at the U of M),  is a handy compilation of websites for gardeners and naturalists seeking info about land and wildlife management. 

The book The Wild Woods Guide is an indispensable book full of interesting and little-known facts about north woods animals, plants, weather, and more. Written by journalists, this books gives a different perspective on what people find intriguing about the north woods. Lots of little facts, like name origins and connections to historic lore, that will make you seem like a super -genius if you spit them out during a program. Also, the couple-page-long chapters make for perfect bus reading and easy referencing. 

ScienceBlogs – Environment Channel is a compilation of blogs written by professional earth scientists. Its the best resources for discovering the new research, trends, and for getting sound scientific responses to current issues. These blogs are all personal soap-boxes for the authors, so you get a non-censored perspective which can be refreshing. These blogs are also great inspiration if you are trying to create a press release which connects to current issues. 

Website to watch: Telling River Stories is the brain-child of Patrick Nunnally of the River Life Program hosted by the Institute on the Environment at the U. The website is a connection to river stories accessed through a geographic interface. Its similar to the Friends of the Mississippi River‘s Field Guide, but for the entire Mississippi River. 

Free images from the Fish and Wildlife Service! As an environmental educator I was always looking for high-res copyright free images of animals, plants, and landscapes to use for programs. This FWS website a great resource! 

Those are just a few resource which I hope are new and helpful for you! There are of course lots more (link to a compilation created by the Sharing Environmental Education Knowledge website).  If you have additional good resources to share, send ‘em my way!