Stories in Stone

 When I was a kid, my dad would take the family out on rock-hunting expeditions. Sometimes we looked for topaz, fossils, and other treasured stones we could bring home. Other times we’d explore the spectacular geological wonders in our backyard: Bryce Canyon, Arches, Zion, the Grand Canyon. Now I live in a place where receding glaciers left moraines and drumlins. So I thought I share two wonderful books about rocks and landforms.

Themes: rocks, geology, erosion

Nature Is a Sculptor: Weathering and Erosion

by Heather Ferranti Kinser
32 pages; ages 5-9
Millbrook Press, 2023

Nature is a sculptor. With water, ice, and wind…

…it etches and scrapes, carves and molds canyons and cliffs, arches and columns. This combination of lyrical writing and spectacular photographs might leave you wanting to head out on a car trip to see whatever rock formations you’ve got nearby.

What I like about this book: I love the photos – you can armchair tour national parks from around the country. There’s back matter, too, that tells more about weathering, erosion, and deposition. Another section describes nature’s tools: wind, water, and ice. And there’s a sculpture gallery that explains more about each type of feature, from hoodoos to half dome.

A Stone Is a Story
by Leslie Barnard Booth; illus. by Marc Martin
40 pages, ages 4-8
Margaret K. McElderry Books, 2023

A stone is not just a stone. A stone is a story.

And it’s an adventure story. Imagine being shot from a volcano, wrenched apart by roots, molded and carved and swept out to sea! This is another take of water, wind, and ice that mold a chunk of rock into something you might tuck in your pocket and take out to tell a story about one day.

What I like about this book: The language is lyrical and captivating, and pulls you under its spell even while it tells a story of geology and the rock cycle. It will make you want to put a pebble in your pocket! Back matter explains rock types (igneous, sedimentary, metamorphic) along with this challenge:

Now go forth and
do what geologists do!
Step outside, look around, and start asking
questions about the rocks and landscapes
in your part of the world.

I always want to know more about how an author comes to their book. Heather was kind enough to answer One Question:
Me: What made you want to write about erosion as a tool for creating beauty?

Heather: Thanks for the question, Sue! I was first inspired by a look through the Next Generation Science Standards for educational topics to write about. The standards for "Earth's Systems" sent me in the direction of weathering and erosion, and I was able to write a lovely ode to rock formations, based on my own admiration for all things stony. But it was my editor at Lerner/Millbrook, Carol Hinz, who nudged me to include more information about weathering and erosion processes within the manuscript. Incorporating a greater level of detail while still maintaining a spare and lyrical text was a tall order. But I'm delighted with the result, and with the way Carol pushed me to ensure that the book would offer teachers a valuable curriculum tie-in.

Leslie shared her story last winter in this blog post

Beyond the Books:

 
Step outside and look around. What questions do you have about the landscape around you? Write them down. Then find the answers. Our big question one year was how did fossils end up on top of our hill?

Explore a place that nature has sculpted. It might be a rocky shore, or a waterfall, sandy dunes or a canyon. Maybe it’s a weird-shaped hill at the far end of town left behind by the last glacier, or some kettle ponds.

When you visit the ocean or a lake or a mountain, keep a lookout for an interesting stone. Something that tells the story of the place. You might even find a wonderful stone while digging in the garden or looking for frogs down at the local stream.

Heather and Leslie are both members of #STEAMTeam2023. You can find out more about them at their websites, www.heatherkinser.com  and www.lesliebarnardbooth.com

Today we’re joining Perfect Picture Book Friday. It’s a wonderful gathering where bloggers share great picture books at Susanna Leonard Hill's website. Review copies provided by the publishers or Edelweiss.

Geology in Action at Fagradalsfjall volcano, Iceland by Leslie Barnard Booth

Most of my ideas for picture books are inspired by questions my children ask. My debut nonfiction picture book, A Stone Is a Story, was inspired by a question my older daughter, then age 7, asked one evening at dinner.

“Where do rocks come from?” 

On its face, this question might seem simple, but it’s not! It led to a fascinating dinnertime conversation about Earth’s formation and structure, the rock cycle, and deep time. In fact, Earth’s rocks have always been here. They have been here since Earth formed. But they don’t stay the same. They are continually transforming. They melt, harden, break apart, and recombine as they move through the rock cycle. 

That’s why it was so wonderful, when, in 2021, I got to see rock transform right before my eyes. 

Summer in Iceland

USGS, public domain

That summer, my family traveled to Iceland for my husband’s work. For 3 months, we lived in a small cabin on a wind-whipped hill along a fjord in northern Iceland. During our stay, we learned that the nearby Fagradalsfjall volcano was erupting – and that it was possible to hike to a nearby ridge to see it in action. 

Known for its geothermal pools and bathing culture, Iceland is one of the most volcanically active places in the world. Iceland sits along a seam in Earth’s crust where two tectonic plates meet. These two plates, the Eurasian Plate and the North American plate, are slowly drifting apart, causing magma to well up between them. This magma sometimes erupts at the surface as lava. We decided that before we made the journey home, we had to see this geological phenomenon firsthand.

Fagradalsfjall 

To view the Fagradalsfjall volcano, we drove several hours to the Reykjanes Peninsula. We parked in a roped-off field among many other vehicles. People from all over the world had come to Iceland to see this natural spectacle, and many different languages swirled around us as we walked toward the stark, treeless mountains looming ahead. Together we marched, locals and tourists, young and old, up a ridge marked with stakes by Icelandic authorities. 

photo of Leslie's older daughter standing at the edge of the Fagradalsfjall lava flow. 

photo by Leslie Barnard Booth

We finally came to a fresh lava flow made up of still-steaming black rock, and we thought we must be close! But after several hours of hiking, we still hadn’t glimpsed the volcano. My daughters were getting tired. The mist had thickened around us. We were damp and cold. We kept hiking up, only to hike down, and then straight up again. We started to wonder if the volcano would even be visible today. Maybe it wouldn’t. Maybe the sky wasn’t clear enough. Maybe this whole torturous trek was in vain!

So we sat. And ate lots of Nutella. My younger daughter seemed to perk up. “Let’s go a little farther,” she said. “To where those people are sitting.” She pointed to some people on a ridge in the distance.

A Rock Is Born

Once again, we hiked down, then up again, toward that distant ridge. That’s when we heard the roar of the volcano, and saw its fiery light flashing through the mist.

Fagradalsfjall volcano. photo by Berserkur/Wikimedia Commons

We made it to the place my younger daughter had pointed out. We sat among people from all over the world, and watched as bright orange lava fountained into the air and poured downslope, scabbing black as it snaked into the valley, where it pooled and steamed and hardened, turning to rock.

As we made our way back down the ridge, my older daughter picked up a rock at the edge of the lava flow. Very recently, this rock had been a liquid. It had been magma flowing deep belowground, then lava surging into the air, and now it was a hard gray fragment she could hold and admire. And just like that, she held in her hand the answer to her question.

Photo Credit: Kristal Passy Photography

Leslie Barnard Booth is a member of STEAM Team 2023. Her book, A Stone Is a Story will hit bookstore shelves next summer.  You can learn more about her book – and find educational resources on the rock cycle and geology – at her website, lesliebarnardbooth.com. 

The Stories This Rock Could Tell

 

Every rock has a story.

For this rock, it could be the story about how it used to be a chunk of shiny fool’s gold until it got covered by the gravel from Lake Bonneville. That gravel was heavy, and compressed the rock into a matrix of limestone. Over time, limonite replaced the beautiful pyrite crystals, turning them brown. Eventually the water receded, leaving the rock high and dry, allowing opportunity for wind and rain to erode the limestone.

Or it could be the story about one city car, two cowboys, three girls and their parents, and four stuck tires. A story that begins with dad packing the car for a grand adventure and mom packing sandwiches and kids arguing about who gets to sit where. A story that wonders why a car that had no business being there, found itself stuck in a creek bed that, in drier weather, passed for a road. And honest-to-god cowboys with strong quarter horses and thick ropes who rescued said vehicle and then offered the girls a ride to the quarry because they were heading that way anyway to check on the herd.

It could be a story of who, what, when, where, how, and why. For example: why would someone carry that rock across the entire country, twice, when there are other, smoother, prettier rocks to tuck into a pocket? Or a story that has no grounding in our shared reality.

On the other hand, it could be a story about a rock that remembers those cowboys, and the lake, and the time it was new and shiny and had great expectations for the future.

Next time you find a rock, sit down with it and ask its story. You'd be surprised how much a rock has to say.

The Grand Canyon

Grand Canyon
by Jason Chin
56 pages; ages 7-12
Roaring Brook Press, 2017

themes: nonfiction, geology, habitats

Grand Canyon is one of the largest canyons in the world. It is 277 miles long, as much as 18 miles wide, and more than a mile deep, but it's much more than just a big hole in the ground.

When I was a kid I walked down into the Grand Canyon. It was winter at the top, snowy and cold. By the time we reached the bottom we'd hiked through nearly 2 billion years (of rock layers) and it was practically summer.

So I like that Jason Chin begins this book with a family camping at the bottom of the canyon. We follow them up, up, up to the top - and along the way we're introduced to plants and animals living at the different zones. And of course, there are the rocks. Layers and layers of sediment of all different colors.

What I like love about this book: Each page is like a field trip. Margin artwork highlights geology notes, or plants and animals found in the canyon. There are spreads that take us back millions of years to when the area was beneath the sea. Condors sail by; red dust coats our hiking shoes.

I love the pages that open out to reveal a panoramic view of the Grand Canyon. And back matter (of course)! There are back notes about early humans in the canyon, as well as notes about the ecological communities (from river level to 8,200+ feet), and lots of notes about geology, fossils, and how canyons are carved. Want to know more? Then check out the books, websites, and other stuff for further exploration.

Beyond the Book:
Check out the Grand Canyon website. You can go on a virtual archeology tour or watch some videos of night sky or other cool canyon stuff.

Enjoy some armchair tourism by viewing these photos from the National Park Service collection.

Go on a (video) river rafting trip.

Today we're joining the STEM Friday roundup - and we're also joining others over at Perfect Picture Book Friday, an event in which bloggers share great picture books at Susanna Leonard Hill's site. She keeps an ever-growing list of Perfect Picture Books. Review ARC from the publisher.

A Rock Can Be

A Rock Can Be
by Laura Purdie Salas; illus by Violeta Dabija
32 pages; ages 4-7
Millbrook Press, 2015

theme: environment, poetry

A rock is a rock.
It's sand, pebble, stone.
Each rock tells a story,
a tale all its own.

I love Laura Purdie Salas's "can be" series (Water Can Be, A Leaf Can Be) so I was excited to see a new book about rocks. What fun! A rock can be a mountain, a fountain, a skimmer, a trimmer.

What I like love about this book: Laura's lyrical writing. The wonderful examples of what a rock can be. The invitation to go out and see for ourselves, to discover what else a rock can be.

I also love the back matter - four pages in which Salas explains how rocks are used to make fountains and play games, and how rocks are formed deep within the earth and erupt as lava. I love that there's a glossary and further reading (including a Rock and Minerals guide). What fun!

Beyond the Book:

Go on a Rock Hunt. There are rocks everywhere: at the beach, along the roadside, in a river, or in your backyard. Collect a few different kinds and look at them closely. What colors are they? Are they smooth or rough? Do they sparkle? What do they look like when they're wet?

Find out what your state rock - or mineral - is. My state rock is garnet.

Find out more about volcanoes. Here's a video of how volcanoes erupt (by USGS)

Dig for fossils. We often find brachiopods and crinoid stems in our garden. Some, luckier people, find trilobites or bits of dinosaur bone in their back yards.

Take a field trip - to a museum or mineral show. Draw a picture of any interesting rocks you find.

Dance to rock music. This doesn't have anything to do with geology, but your parents will be delighted if you ask them to turn on the radio to their favorite rock station and show you a few cool moves.

Today's review is part of the STEM Friday roundup. Drop by STEM Friday blog for more science books and resources. We're also joining PPBF (perfect picture book Friday), an event in which bloggers share great picture books at Susanna Leonard Hill's site. She keeps an ever-growing list of Perfect Picture Books.  Review copy from publisher.