Stations Books

This is a great book for practical indoor and outdoor activities. It is clear that Dr. Jean is a very creative teacher who presents many great ideas based on her experiences.

I am always looking for those quick ideas that require little prep and will kill time but is still fun and educational. THIS IS THE BOOK

Jean Feldman gives many great ideas for all curriculum areas in this handbook. There are interesting activities for math, language, science and art centers along with easy group games with emphasis on having fun rather than competition. This book even contains fun recipes children can prepare with little help and ideas for special celebrations. These ideas are divided into convenient categories which makes finding the "right" activity a breeze. This is a must-have handbook for early childhood educators!

If you want to learn how to be "appropriate" and become a skillful buisness pioneer, then this is a must own book. It entails key facts about Mr Stanley Marcus, a pioneer of the business realm.

the follow up to 'minding the store',these books give you an excellent overview of running any sort of company in a 1.st class way.
putting the client in a comfortable position,in comfortable surroundings,with well trained staff, add-- product selected with care, usage thought,& background, add--a slight sense of humour, is a recipe to do well.

I first read "Quest for the Best" when it was published in 1979. I was in college then, and Mr. Marcus' view of retailing was so informative, to say nothing of interesting. I learned more from reading that book than I did from some of my college courses. If you're thinking of a career in retailing, or just wanting a glimpse into the high-end retail world, read this book, as well as "Minding the Store," which is also by Mr. Marcus.

I am so glad that we found this book! Five problems a night makes math FUN, rather than WORK for my child. So much so that he will do a few days worth of problems in one sitting.

The book has variety to keep him interested, and he's learning new skills from it also. I will definitely buy the grade 2 book for next year.

I'm a firm believer of practice early on math. It will build kid's interest and confidence for the long run. This book is invaluable. It breaks grade 1 math into small pieces and let your child do a little every day. My son learned a lot from this book. He often asks further questions and thinks a lot more. This book helped him do well in math. In the Beestar online math contest (...), he often wins honor mentions. Highly recommend.

I used this book for after-school review with my 6-year-old son. The format (5 problems per day, including 1 word problem) worked great. Used on a daily basis, it provides just enough repetition to do the trick.

You get a total of 180 sets of problems, broken down into 36 weeks. Each set takes up 1/2 of one side of a page. The book provides lots of variety in its problem sets. All in all, this book delivers what it promises, and then some.

Highly recommended.

This book is brightly illustrated and well priced for the high quality. It is a wonderful resourse for parents as well as children. The subject matter covers a broad range of interesting information. Bravo!

This is a special Thank you to the authors of this book. My 6 yr. old daughter and I have tremendesly enjoyed this book together. She is a great artist and loves to read. The drawing lessons both help to improve on her reading ability, while giving her great tools for drawing the beautiful and fun pictures displyed. We are both looking forward to more great "Draw Write Now" books.

My son (eight years old) (very good artist) ate this book up. He copied every page in just three days then he was mixing scenes. His drawings took on a superb quality that he had not reached before. The bonus is, he practices his handwriting while learning interesting facts that are good to know. We'll be buying each edition for Christmas for him.

I have read all the Mark Berent books and find them all to be first rate and full of action, interesting people and story twists. An excellent read.

This is number four of a five book series that follows the adventures of several pilots and special forces personnel through the war in Viet Nam. For those of us who were pilots in that war, it is the best and most accurate description of our experiences. Each book of the series seems both historically and otherwise factually accurate. All in all, one of the best "reads" to be had since Tom Clancy started writing

It's been a number of years since I've read Eagle Station, but I've read all of Mr. Berents' books and they were spectacular. The detail with which he describes the characters and scenes made you feel as if you were actually in the field, the enemy attacking you. You could almost hear the gun fire and feel the battle rage. His technique even let you inside the characters minds and understand what they might have gone through. I met Mr. Berents at a book signing at Davis Monthan AB in 1990-91. He autographed Rolling Thunder for me, complete with a Jane Fonda toilet paper book mark! I read Rolling Thunder on the flight to Tuscon from Indianapolis. All Mr. Berent's books are great reads, I wish he would write more!

From Space To Earth: The Story Of Solar Electricity surveys the fascinating evolution of photovoltaics from its problematic and controversial nineteenth century beginnings to its outstanding technological success in the space program, to the indispensable and versatile role as a power source for contemporary daily life. More than the story of a technology, From Space To Earth is also a chronicle of the individuals who, for the most part unrecognized in the history of science) persevered, took chances, bucked authority, innovated, invented, and crusaded to provide humanity with an infallible power source in the form of solar cells and the safe, clean, renewable energy they provide for everything from satellite communication systems to hot water heaters for the home. Informative and thoroughly "reader friendly", John Perlin's From Space To Earth is highly recommended reading and an important addition to any academic or public library history of science collection.

Have you ever asked yourself "Who discovered the photovoltaic effect?". Or maybe you are interested in knowing how the PV industry started and who were the early PV pioneers. Well, look no further, because all of this information and much more make up From Space To Earth: The Story of Solar Electricity by John Perlin.

Several years after writing his first book on solar energy, Mr. Perlin uses From Space to Earth to reflect on the challeges the PV industry and it's early pioneers faced in developing, implementing and introducing a new technology to the World. Personal interviews and historical information are utilized to relay the story of PV technology and the people who helped turn it into a thriving industry that helps to meet the electrical needs of people around the globe.

The future of the PV industy is also addressed and the author expresses his opinions on what the future should hold for photovoltaics. From his support for Building Intergrated Photovoltaics (BI-PV) and distributed generation, to the easy to understand reviews of advances in solar-electric cell and module production, the author provides up to date information on where the industry stands and where it is heading.

I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in the application of solar-electricity or solar energy in general.

Finally, here is a book about an environmental topic that isn't depressing. In fact, it's so uplifting that you may find yourself pumping your arm and cheering. Perlin keeps it light on the solid-state physics and instead chronicles the social, economical, and political issues surrounding the application of photovoltaics. He explains advances in technology clearly and with no jargon. This book should be highly enjoyable even for those who flunked P-chem.

Full Service's characters feel real. The interactions feel like they matter. There is a plot arc but it doesn't dominate the book - instead the book unfolds a particular summer, a particular lens on how it goes in a small white town and the larger world. This particular lens has a lot to do with sexuality and making sense of the world. There are a couple subtle gay characters but the focus is on heterosexuality - and this is one of the few teen books I've read where the women and girls are just as lusty as the men and boys and aren't made to suffer G-d's wrath for it. This is one of the books where each character is rounded with a virtue and a problem. It reminded me of "Our Town" but less feeling of allegory and more the feeling you could know people like these.

In the summer of 1965, shy Paul Sutton, at the urging of his mother, takes a job at the local Shell gas station in the tourist town of Hawk Bend, Minnesota. Paul is a bit apprehensive about his new summer occupation, but nonetheless leaves the shadow of his family's religious farming community and goes to "meet the public." Paul's stint as a full-service gas attendant quickly becomes anything but a simple summer job.

First, there's Kirk, the angry gas station manager whose frequent "service calls" and narrow-minded opinions soon get him in more trouble than he can handle. Then there's Harry, a kind, older gentlemen who's still trying to escape his gangster past. And beautiful Peggy, whose torrid love triangle between her controlling boyfriend Stephen and dark-haired Dale --- Peggy's on-the-side lover who's headed for Vietnam --- snags Paul into its tangled web.

Along with the great expectations of his community's fundamentalist ministers, the family of hippies visiting Hawk Bend on their way to San Francisco, and the various tourists who pass through Shell Station, Paul finds himself dealing with the prospect of a new independent life or continuing to lead the odd quiet farm life in which he grew up.

FULL SERVICE is about a young man's rite of passage as the world he lives in is undergoing its tumultuous own coming of age. It's a strangely compelling, nostalgic novel that may make readers notice how much the world has changed and how they themselves may have changed as well.

--- Reviewed by Sarah Sawtelle ([...])

" 'No, no, no,' she said impatiently, wiping her hands and turning down her radio, 'a real summer job--full-time. One where you could meet the public.'
"I glanced quickly through the screen door. 'What about Father?'
" 'I'll talk with him.'
"I shrugged. 'Yeah, well, what about the others?'
" 'For once let's not worry about the others,' she said. She turned back to her dishes, and her hands again moved into the soapy water as quick as trout among stones.
" 'The others' takes some explaining. We were a Midwestern family long on religion. Not Lutheran, but sort of. Not Mennonite, but kind of. Not Amish, but a little bit. Not Quaker, but a good part. It was a Christian nondenominational faith, a phrase mystifying to my few school friends who were not in it ('Come on, Sutton, how can a church have no name?'). Farmwork was communal. My family shared the larger machinery--baler, grain combine, corn picker, silo-filling equipment--with several other families in the Faith. Planting, haying, threshing, silo filling, corn picking were done on an orderly circuit: VandenEides, Grundlags, Sorheims, Suttons (that was us), and so on. Unlike the Mennonites in Canada or the Amish in central Minnesota, each family owned its own farm, but the focus was on shared work, worship, and fitting in with the others."

It's 1965, and Paul Sutton has spent his first nearly-sixteen years pretty-well sheltered by life on the farm, and living among those families of the Faith. Tumultuous events elsewhere--the Civil Rights Movement, the War--seem like they're taking place in another world as heard through Paul's mom's little transistor radio. But Paul's life is about to get shaken up in a big way thanks to one of his mom's infamous "plans":

" 'All right. I'm listening,' my father said, though he really wasn't.

" 'First, Paul finds a job--a real job, one where he can meet the public--and then we hire someone to take up the slack here at home,' she said.
"My father reached for the bread He began to butter a piece. The silence went on. Finally he said, 'First, I don't know that Paul necessarily wants to work in town. Second, who could we find to take his place? There are no hired men anymore. But third, none of it really matters, because there aren't any jobs in Hawk Bend for farm kids. Town kids have them all.'
"There was silence. I looked down at my food.
" 'It must be nice to be right all the time,' my mother said.
"I sucked in a breath and held it."

"Well, I try my best
To be just like I am,
But everybody wants you
To be just like them."
--Minnesota native, Bob Dylan (1965), "Maggie's Farm"

Thirty or forty pages into reading FULL SERVICE, I found myself thinking back to such wonderful children's books as BECAUSE OF WINN-DIXIE, A YEAR DOWN YONDER, and THE CANNING SEASON. These thoughts did not spring from any belief that Will Weaver's new book is the appropriate next read for the elementary school fans of those award-winning titles.

In fact, FULL SERVICE is a real sex, drugs, rock & roll, told-in-the-first-person, oft-rude, coming-of-age, YA novel that takes place back in '65.

But what Kate DiCamillo, Richard Peck, and Polly Horvath did so well with those books was to create unforgettable, multigenerational, ensemble casts of characters. And in FULL SERVICE, Will Weaver accomplishes this so exquisitely that I could easily imagine him writing another book about any one of, perhaps, a dozen different members of "the public" with whom Paul Sutton comes in contact as the result of landing a job at the Shell service station in downtown Hawk Bend, Minnesota (population 1,750) over that summer that he turns sixteen.

That list of characters begins with Paul's coworkers, Kirk and Bud. Kirk's the former high school jock with a wife, kids, and a rather healthy number of bad habits, as Paul quickly learns when he takes over manning the pumps at that full-service Shell station and starts meeting "the public."

"I met a local housewife with blonde hair piled high and sprayed in place. She seemed annoyed that I came out to wait on her, and she asked for fifty cents' worth of gas. She kept looking toward the office, the back room. 'Isn't Kirk on today?' she finally asked.
" 'Kirk is engaged by a service call.'
" 'I'll bet he is,' she said.
" 'Is there anything Bud or I might help you with?' I asked.
"She gave me a long look. 'Bud--it'd be a cold day in hell. And you--not for a couple of years.'
"My ears reddened like train semaphores.
"Unless you know furnaces, that is,' she said, raising one eyebrow at me.
" 'No, ma'am,' I stammered.
" 'There's the main boiler and then there's the pilot light,' she said, gesturing, drawing a circle with her hands.
"I nodded.
" 'Oh, you do know furnaces after all?'
" 'Well, kind of--I mean I know what a pilot light is,' I stammered. " 'Good. Good. A lot of men go through life never understanding the difference between a pilot light and the main boiler. My first husband, Bill, he never knew where to look. Matter of fact, he couldn't even find the basement.' "

Other notable characters include the "hired hands" Paul's mom succeeds in locating and "The Workers" who are supposed to be assisting Paul in preparation for his transformation into a grown member of their religious community.

Then those distant world events make their presence felt in Hawk Bend in the guise of a family passing through town in their VW bus on their way to joining the antiwar efforts in Berkeley, and a barber in town who lost his son in the Korean "conflict."

Through it all, Paul has to figure out where he stands in regards to his beliefs, his religion, and those world events, and how he fits into "the public."

In the long run, one of the characters we see through Paul's eyes who really surprised me is his father. The author sets him up as a rigid man of strict habit who strongly adheres to the rules of his religion, but, in contrast to stereotypes, Paul's father ends up as the rare character who really understands what being a Christian is all about.

As with Will Weaver's previous book, CLAWS, this is not only a book that I'm anxious to recommend, it is also a book about which I'm anxious to sit down with a bunch of teens and have long discussions.

You know what? My daughter, 23 months, LOVES this book. Gargoyle (or rather, "ga-goyle") has become one of her favorite words. She asks for this book by name frequently, and excitedly points out gargoyles she sees on local buildings in Chicago. This is a pleasant change of pace from the usual childhood fare.

"Gargoyles: Monsters in Stone" is a fine educational book by young readers. Jennifer Dussling's text is accompanied by Peter Church's charming full-color illustrations. Together, these collaborators explain the story behind the stone gargoyles that can be seen high up on many buildings.

The book explains the practical function of the gargoyles (to drain water from buildings). The book also explains how a stone carver creates a gargoyle, and illustrates various types of gargoyles. The illustrations are particularly pleasing, as are the Celtic-looking design borders that are used on the pages. A must-have for kids with an interest in the topic.

Children will walk away from this easy reader with a wealth of knowledge about gargoyles! The illustrations complement the rich and accessible text by giving a medieval feel! A great read aloud! A great independent read!

This book truely is an encyclopedia of great ideas to use in the classroom. It is laid out in a very reader friendly format, listing ages, materials needed, and related books and songs. It has an extensive table of contents with clear headings. I can see myself using this throughout the years.

great resource book for cirlce time ideas. lots of fun activities for preschoolers!

This book is full of new, interesting and original tips and ideas that are VERY EASY to use in any teacher's class. It enables the teacher with many resorses to use during circle time without having to bother about looking for extraordinary material; in fact most of the activities won't require any material at all. The classroom resourses will work for any kind of classroom regardeless of size, age (3-6) or even subject.

A captivating story, with a little bit of "where's waldo" thrown in. After the pigs escape, the children can carefully look at the picture and find the missing pigs hiding or dressed up. "There's one right there!" my preschool class shouts. This book is always a fun one to read.

This book is first-rate in entertaining children 3-8. Children will enjoy following the story of Bert & Ethel, who raise some very intelligent pigs and decide it's time to sell them at the market in the morning. The pigs overhear this, and the trouble--or the fun--begins. The smart pigs escape, using clever disguises borrowed from local townspeople, and are missing untill the end of the story.

The illustrations are great and the story moves along smoothly. Your children will really like this one!

Get ready to be taken for a hilarious ride by a passel of precocious pigs! Farmers Bert and Ethel decide to take a break from growing turnips to try their hand at pigs. It's time to load up their lard and take them to market, but these savvy swine have other ideas. Our feckless farmers are unaware that their cargo has disappeared until it's too late, but you won't be if you pay attention to the pictures. Christelow combines unassuming text with not-so-unassuming illustrations in this porcine plot that is sure to tickle your spareribs and convince you that these pigs are smarter than your average root vegetable. Recommended reading for preschoolers on up, The Great Pig Escape is sure to make you chuckle if not bust your chops laughing.