We are so excited to have Jane Kurtz join us today to share information about Nonfiction Science Picture Books!
Jane Kurtz is the author of more than 40 books for young readers—and has collaborated to create many more through her volunteer efforts to invent Ready Set Go bilingual books in Ethiopian languages. Because of those efforts, she is a winner of the IBBY-iRead Outstanding Reading Promoter Award. She is sometimes lucky enough to teach the Picture Book Intensive at the Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Children’s and YA Literature.
Where is that just-right picture book idea lurking?
One day, I was on a writing retreat. Picture books were then in a phase of irony and sly winks that baffled or infuriated a number of grandparents (try reading buyer reviews) and some writers. This photo from retreat shows my sense of humor. As Betsy Bird wrote, “It'll be the wry child that takes to I Want My Hat Back but the world is full of wry youth.”
We were making each other laugh by coming up with outrageous ideas for picture books, when the words “zoo poo” came out of the mouth of Jackie Briggs Martin whose lyrical Snowflake Bentley won a Caldecott medal. “Hold on,” I said.
Jackie and I are both interested in compost and gardens and citizen science. We both love the sounds of words. And nonfiction picture books were starting to enter a glorious age. I tried to convince her to take that idea seriously. She gave it to me instead.
Then I was stuck.
Picture book biographies often flow from a childhood incident to some kind of amazing accomplishment. A person’s life gives a place to start and end.
A creative nonfiction science book? What’s a pleasing and effective shape that pulls the reader in…and builds…and has some kind of turn or change…and delivers a payoff?
I’d visited the Portland zoo with my grandkids. Their zoo doo was enticing for my backyard habitat.
I also watched a delightful video about the Woodland Park Zoo, which composts approximately 500 tons of Zoo Doo each year. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjfNVEvRI3w
So focus on one of those zoos? Or write about different sustainability efforts with zoo poo all around the world?
Much later, some smart nonfiction-writing fifth graders helped me see that I ended up with a “problem-solution” structure. At the time, I just kept thinking about how to hook the reader.
One day, I was looking at the worms in my compost bin. It occurred to me that my audience might not even know to connect poo-ing with chewing. Although I had no plans for a rhyming text, this popped out:
Welcome to the zoo and the peaceful sound of chewing.
Everybody eats, all around the zoo.
Different mouths. Different teeth. Welcome to the view.
Munch munch the herbivores eat fruit and leaves and trees.
Crunch crunch the carnivores devour meat with glee.
Oh, oh the omnivores nibble spiders and seeds.
And then…
Splat
Splosh
Plop
Dink
Welcome to the zoo with the funny sounds of poo-ing.
(All those words ultimately boiled down to this.)
My research process was fairly simple. I started with what I knew about animals in Ethiopia where I grew up seeing lots of scat. Hyenas, giraffes, monkeys, and elephants all auditioned and got in.
Then I poked around, looking for whatever fascinated me: pandas with their pleasant bamboo-scented poo. Wombats with their puzzling cube-shaped poo that scientists were trying to understand.
My initial question (what do zoos do with all that poo?) became the turn, leading in to various answers to that question. I had to fight for the worms from my compost bin to make their way in (worm poop plus zoo poop grows perfect zoo-chini).
In the end, my book does make readers laugh. Here are my grandkids celebrating with me on the book birthday.
But I’m proud that it was also a finalist that year for the AAAS/Subaru SB&F Prize for Excellence in Science Books. What a reward for a ton of hard work: science that engages readers and makes them laugh and think!