This article gives a brief biography of author Karen Cushman, best known for the attention to detail and thorough research that goes into her historical novels. Her first two novels, "Catherine, Called Birdy" and "The Midwife's Apprentice" were both Newbery Medal winners. A selected bibliography, as well as a list of related resources, is also…

This article gives a brief biography of William Steig, one of America's best-known cartoonists and, later in life, a beloved children's author and illustrator. A major motion picture based on Steig's picture book "Shrek!" won the first Oscar in the category of best animated feature film in 2002. Steig passed away at the age of 95 in October, 2003.…

This article give a brief biography of Mercer Mayer, best known for the Little Critter books, which have a long history as bestsellers in the children's book publishing field. A selected bibliography, as well as a list of related resources, is also provided.

This column shares a host of websites that feature resources about women in history, famous women, and women's contributions. These websites can be used all year long, as well as in conjunction with Women's History Month in March,

This article presents a brief biography of author Arnold Lobel, perhaps best known for giving the world Frog and Toad. Arnold Lobel was born in Los Angeles, California, on May 22, 1933, and was raised by his grandparents in New York. He loved checking out books from the library when he was a little boy and sharing with his classmates the stories…

This column presents a brief biography of author Jan Brett. According to Jan Brett's official webpage, there have been more than twenty-eight million of her books printed. Her titles can always be found on the best-selling children's book author/illustrator lists. Brett is one of the most beloved and recognized children's book illustrators and is…

This article describes poet and writer David L. Harrison. A former School Board Chairman from Springfield, MO, David was responsible for beginning an annual "Teacher Appreciation Banquet" and for launching the "Sky High for Reading" program. The "Sky High for Reading" program encourages children in Springfield to read enough books so that, if…

When the first career test, back in high school, pointed to librarianship, Miguel Figueroa "just blew it off." But when a similar test in the senior year of college produced the same result, Figueroa, like the librarian and editor that he is today, did his research and called three libraries (a public, an academic, and a school media…

The relationship between leisure activities and development of cognitive impairment in aging has been the subject of recent research. We examined television viewing in association with risk of developing Alzheimer's disease (AD) in a case-control study. Given recent focus on the importance of intellectually stimulating activities as preventive…

Biographies of great achievers, in science as well as other disciplines, suggest that those of genius caliber possess, in addition to their intellectual gift or gifts, an extraordinary abundance of mental energy. They can focus their attention on some task for long periods without tiring or becoming distracted from the problem at hand. It is…

Provides the biography of Richard M. Shiffrin and announces that he has received the APA Award for Distinguished Scientific Contributions (2004) for his brilliant development of formal models of memory and forgetting; for his ingenious empirical investigations into the nature of memory and attention; and for his unified accounts of attention and…

Troubled children need models of hope to transcend adversity. This article provides sketches of individuals who have overcome turbulent backgrounds to make notable contributions to humanity.

In this article, the author shares some of the background material that did not make it into his biography of Charles Darwin, "The Tree of Life." Specifically, he discusses the important role that teachers played in Darwin's life, from his demanding father (Dr. Darwin) to zoologist Dr. Robert Grant and taxidermist John Edmonstone (a freed slave).

Although we may claim our students are developing a sociological imagination, it is quite another to realize this in our teaching and our students' performances. Through a professional move from teaching in Chicago to Maine, I was led to rethink how I teach the sociological imagination. I argue that if we are to teach the sociological imagination,…

The path to quality education for African Americans has been rough and fraught with resistance from the time that they were denied any education to "separate" education to even "no child left behind" education. Any significant achievement for them in the American educational system required blood, sweat and tears on the part of…