Sorting Through Spring (Math in Nature Series #2)

by Lizann Flatt, Ashley Barron (Illustrator)

Overview

In Sorting through Spring, the second title in the best-selling Math in Nature series, nature comes to life to help children in Grades K to 2 learn concepts of patterning, sorting, data management, and probability

As young readers journey into the natural world, they will discover that numbers, patterns, shapes — and much more! — can be found by observing everyday plants and animals. What if animals and plants knew math, just like us? Would flowers bloom in patterns? Would raindrops fall in rhythm? Would birds balance evenly on branches? In Sorting through Spring, the second title in the Math in Nature series, nature comes to life to help children in Grades K to 2 learn concepts of patterning, sorting, data management, and probability.

This interactive, poetic, and artful picture book series is a non-intimidating and enticing way to introduce math to kids — they will laugh, use their imaginations, and learn through activities inspired by the books.

Free downloadable teacher's guide, lesson plan, and activities available at www.OwlkidsBooks.com

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781771471534
Publisher:	OWLKIDS BOOKS
Publication date:	03/15/2018
Series:	Math in Nature Series , #2
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	32
Sales rank:	93,161
Product dimensions:	8.30(w) x 10.30(h) x 0.30(d)
Lexile:	570L (what's this?)
Age Range:	5 - 7 Years

About the Author

LIZANN FLATT has written many information books for children, including the Math in Nature series. Her children’s writing has won many honors, including a Distinguished Achievement Award from The Association of Educational Publishers. She lives in Muskoka, Ontario.

ASHLEY BARRON is an illustrator who specializes in cut-paper collage. Her award-winning illustrations have appeared in a variety of magazines, children’s publications, websites, posters, animations, and set designs. She has a deep appreciation for nature and finds inspiration in the vast Boreal Forest. She lives in Toronto, Ontario.

Editorial Reviews

Praise for Counting on Fall:
"Barron's cut-paper collages have the crispness of an autumn afternoon, and Flatt smoothly touches on estimation, counting by fives and tens, counting backwards, and other mathematical concepts while maintaining a gentle, whimsical tone."
— Publishers Weekly

From the Publisher

K-Gr 3—Flatt and Barron's effort suffers from a bit of an identity crisis, as the highlighted math skills are rather sophisticated, but the children who can navigate the concepts of sorting, patterns, and ratios will likely be turned off by the cute representations of wildlife and nature. One of the jewel-colored spreads shows a father fox on the hunt for his family's dinner while varying numbers of potential prey frolic nearby, and readers are asked whether the dinner is "impossibly, unlikely, likely, or certainly" going to be a vole, gray squirrel, rabbit, or cat. Those are fairly challenging words for budding readers, much less budding mathematicians. Also, examples of the concepts presented are not included. Supplemental information focuses on the biology of the animals featured in the main text. Younger kids will delight in Barron's gorgeous cut-paper collage artwork, and they'll learn a little bit from the basic information at the book's conclusion, but this volume will have a hard time fitting in the 510s when it seems more suited to the picture-book shelves.—Alyson Low, Fayetteville Public Library, AR

School Library Journal

Flatt and Barron's second in the Math in Nature series solves many of the first's problems, though the rhythms and rhymes remain inconsistent, and there is still no answer key. Flatt leads readers through sorting, charts and comparisons, though they will need familiarity with these concepts--math is tested but not taught in these pages, and the questions are not always the most basic. "If 8 hummingbird eggs equal 4 robin eggs, which two ratios are correct: 3 to 1, 8 to 4, 5 to 1, 2 to 1?" On a page that finds the fox family wondering what Father will catch: "Is their dinner impossibly, unlikely, likely, or certainly a vole? A gray squirrel? A rabbit? A cat?" Several pages also ask open-ended questions, allowing readers to both construct meaning from the artwork and explain it. "Nature Notes" give a few brief facts about the featured creatures. As in Counting on Fall (2012), Barron's gorgeous cut-paper collages are certainly the highlight, drenching every page in spring sights and colors. Objects are easy to delineate from the background, though that doesn't always mean that the answers are easy to find: On the schooling smelt page, readers are asked to find two patterns. One is a simple, ABA repeating pattern, while the other asks readers to notice that the groups of fish increase by two. The simple is juxtaposed with the challenging, making the book both flexible and hard to pin down, audience-wise. (Math picture book. 5-10)

Kirkus Reviews