These STEM books encourage children to look about them to notice how science, technology, engineering, art, and math play roles in their own lives as well as to encourage them to get out there and tinker on their own.
Other than some of the picture book selections, these books primarily focus on inspiring kids through fiction.
In the cross-disciplinary tradition of STEM and STEAM, these books inspire kids to learn about science, nature, engineering, math and how they intersect with the social and cultural world kids deal with every day. Thus, I've curated a list of some of the best STEM books for kids. Not long after, I received a beautiful dummy in the mail.In case you've been living under a rock, STEM and STEAM are hot topics these days. When I finally got an acceptable version of the story together, I sent it off to her, asking if she would be interested in illustrating the manuscript. All the while, I was picturing illustrations in my head by Gabi. I also tried to strengthen my case by collecting quotations from teachers and librarians who encouraged me to explore this subject.īack in my writing studio, I tried rhyming versions of the story and many different prose versions. I thought it would be helpful to refer to these quotes if potential publishers doubted whether the topic was age-appropriate. “Infinity is when you ask what is outside of a galaxy, and then outside of that, and on and on.”Īfter talking to children, I had no doubt that a book about infinity would find a receptive audience. “Every other number has a pair, like one has negative one, and two has negative two, but with infinity, infinity and negative infinity are the same thing.” “If you start counting to infinity, you will die and you will still be counting.” “Infinity is a place where you can’t stop counting.”
“Infinity is a number that is supposed to be the last number but it isn’t really the last number because numbers go on and on.” Just to be sure that I wasn’t basing the infinity interest level on a focus group of two, I also visited the classrooms of children from kindergarten through second grade to see what they had to say about this concept. That’s when I knew I had to try writing a picture book on this topic myself. I searched for picture books on this topic, but they didn’t seem to exist. When my own boys were about four and six, we would talk about infinity at home. My interest in picture books continued, however, and I hoped that eventually I would be able to break into that market as a writer. Gabi has a wild imagination and drawing skills that allow her to render exactly what she sees in her head.Īs the years went on, Gabi and I became friends, and I began to spend more time writing and less time illustrating. The first time I saw her artwork, it literally took my breath away. I met Gabi Swiatkowska eleven years ago in an illustrator’s group focused on picture books.
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