The Musical Triumphs of Leonard Bernstein

For years I have loved the music of Leonard Bernstein. Music he composed such as the opera Candide, the ballet Fancy Free, and the shows On the Town, West Side Story, thrill me. And when I hear a recording of Lenny conducting music by another composer like Mahler or Beethoven, I am deeply moved. I feel Lenny’s passion and it enhances my pleasure of the music.

This pleasure was something I wanted to bring to readers in Music Was It: Young Leonard Bernstein. I was astonished to learn that as a boy growing up in Boston, Lenny had to struggle to make a career in music despite his exceptional talent. His father, a Russian immigrant who had successfully established a beauty supply business, opposed the idea. Sam Bernstein, Lenny’s father, believed that it would be impossible for an American Jewish kid to break into the world of classical music, which in the 1930s and 1940s was dominated by Europeans. And he was right. Sam wanted Lenny to take over his beauty supply business. Or, at second best, become a rabbi.

Although Lenny loved his father and was greatly influenced by Judaism, he pursued his dream of a life in music. From the moment when he was ten-years-old and the family received a cast-off piano from Aunt Clara, Lenny knew that “music was 'it'.” “There was no question in my mind,” he recalled, “that my life was to be about music.”

With the encouragement of his mother, younger sister Shirley, supportive teachers and influential mentors, Lenny achieved his goal. The book ends with his triumphant conducting debut at Carnegie Hall when he was just twenty-five. A reporter asked Sam why he had ever objected to Lenny’s desire to be a musician, and Sam replied, “How could I know my son was going to grow up to be Leonard Bernstein?”

Researching and writing this book was a joy. During the process I had the marvelous opportunity to meet and interview two of Lenny’s children, Jamie and Alexander Bernstein. I also talked to Lenny’s brother Burton and his lifelong friend and one of his first piano students, Sid Ramin.

But reading about Lenny is incomplete without listening to his music. I tried to compile a discography for the book but had trouble because Lenny is one of the most recorded conductors in history. With the help of my wonderful editor Emily Mitchell, I decided to list some of the CDs from my personal collection that I listened to over and over as I worked on the book, and I included other recordings that I thought readers would particularly enjoy.

To get a glimpse of Lenny performing as a mature adult, go to YouTube and hear him conduct the overture to Candide. Or see him play the piano solo and conduct the second section of Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue without a score.

As Lenny once said, “Life without music is unthinkable.” So visit YouTube, or borrow CDs and DVDs from the library, and experience the joy of music with Leonard Bernstein.

Posted by Susan Goldman Rubin, author of Music was IT.

Black History Month observance

Calvary Baptist Church and the John Greenleaf Whittier Birthplace collaborate on Anne Broyles' Priscilla and the Hollyhocks, a special musical presentation by fiddler Marie Rawlings and the Youth of Calvary Baptist Church, directed by Joseph Devoe. Admission is free to the performance at 1 p.m. on Saturday, Feb. 19, at the Calvary Baptist Church, 13 Ashland St., Haverhill. Snow date is Monday, Feb. 21. The performance celebrates local poet and abolitionist John Greenleaf Whittier and Haverhill's place as a stop on the Underground Railroad, which helped escaped slaves reach Canada, and freedom.

A Day in the Life of a Book

On the morning of Tuesday, January 12th, 2010, I turned on my favorite radio program and sat down to work on one of the illustrations for my forthcoming book: While You Are Sleeping: A Lift-the-Flap Book of Time Around the World. I was painting a nighttime scene of three children sleeping in Haiti. With a collage of photographs up on my computer screen for reference, I carefully assembled a fictitious image based on visual facts.

Like all the scenes in the book, this one features a clock, showing the time of day and an appropriate sky to match. But I want my book to teach about more than just time zones. I want it to convey something about what life is like in other parts of the world – how it is different, and how it is the same. The three Haitian children in this illustration share a tattered mattress on a floor of packed earth. They sleep in their clothes under bare walls and windows without glass. But despite a standard of living which the average reader of my book will never experience, these children have each other, and they sleep peacefully.

Suddenly, a news report interrupted the morning radio program: Haiti had just been hit by a devastating earthquake. I stopped painting, and considered what would happen in an earthquake to a house such as this, built of mud and concrete. That picture would not be so pretty. Clearly, my depiction of Haiti was scarcely grim enough. Yet I'm glad it's included in the book, among many other scenes showing children engaged in daily activities which may not be familiar to the majority of my readers.

Though none are as tragic as Haiti, every illustration in While You are Sleeping shows something real. A young girl in England rises early to milk a goat before school. A boy in Thailand climbs a lychee tree and picks the ripe fruit for his afternoon snack. A pre-teen in India carries her baby brother to an outdoor public well, where she pumps water by hand and bathes him in an enamel basin. A Nigerian girl carries a bowl of fruit on her head past neighbors grinding millet in a large wooden mortar. While these places have not gained the world attention the earthquake brought to Haiti, they show children the reality of how other people live even in today's modern world.

The seed idea for While You Are Sleeping had been planted several years earlier while I was signing books at a local elementary school's "Author Day." A teacher who stopped to chat made an offhand comment that not one decent book existed for teaching about time zones. Students understood the turning of the earth and the changing of the seasons. But in this era of international travel and instant world news, there was little to teach how time zones work. The idea came to me to show a single moment all over the globe, with a world map at the back of the book showing the placement of each scene in its respective time zone.

But before the time zone map could be resolved, I had to decide on a day. What time of year would the moment take place? My editor, Alyssa Pusey, and I considered. While it is winter in the northern hemisphere, it's summer in the southern hemisphere. While the sun sets in one place, it rises in another. Some parts of the world are always hot. Fruits ripen in different climates and seasons. Depicting a single moment around the world quickly became a complex jigsaw puzzle of geographic, seasonal, and cultural considerations. There was much more to consider than clocks.

I decided to begin with sunset at the beginning and sunrise at the end of the book. Beginning in Alaska, we moved location dots around the globe like chess pieces, distributing them in as many time zones as possible. I had my heart set on showing cherry blossoms in Japan. That placed the book in spring. But were lychee fruit ripe in Thailand at the same time? Did the sun rise late enough in Brazil for a fisherman and his son to set out at the same time the sky darkened in springtime Alaska? Would nighttime in Mexico City coincide with morning in England? Around and around the world my editor and I went. As our press deadline rapidly approached, Alyssa, despite being eight months pregnant, devoted extra time to the book, and patiently helped research the proper times of "civic twilight" (the period of time before dawn and after dusk when artificial light is no longer/not yet needed), while I combed the Internet for the right shape of houses in Nigeria, fishing huts in Brazil, and where the tree line stops in Alaska. The more we searched, the more we learned . . . and the more the world became a tapestry of interrelationships.

In the end, time and place came together, and March 13th emerged as the perfect day for the book. On that day, everything shown is both possible and probable. With every element happily tucked in, While You Are Sleeping went off to press, and I went on to begin work on my next book. And a few weeks later, my editor gave birth to a beautiful baby boy – born into a world of stunning diversity, far-reaching time zones – and with a little help from books and teachers, ever-increasing global awareness.


Posted by Durga Bernhard, author and illustrator of While You Are Sleeping: A Lift-the-Flap Book of Time Around the World.

The Hall of OddAnimals

Writing and illustrating children's books can be a solitary activity. Sure, there are school, library, and bookstore visits, but much more of my creative time is spent alone at a drawing desk, trying desperately not to be distracted by email, food, or my cat.

That's one of many reasons I'm very excited about my OddAnimals project at the Children's Hospital Boston. Starting this past November and continuing through February of 2011, I will be working with patients, families, and staff of the hospital to create animals that have never been seen before by the human eye. We call them OddAnimals. These newly-discovered species will be displayed in the gallery in the lobby of the hospital. It's being guest-curated by Emily Isenberg and presented by Jessica Finch and her Art for Kool Kids Program.

Anyone can submit their own personal OddAnimal by attending a workshop or filling out an OddAnimal guidebook and dropping it in the mailbox in the Children's Hospital lobby. You, yes you, can even download the guidebook and email your completed form back to me.


"Now, what is an OddAnimal?" you might be asking yourself right about now. Um, I don't know, but through a series of workshops, activities, and conversations, I hope to find out. We've already distributed over 500 guidebooks and have received a bunch of great submissions. I have met incredible kids and awesome families who were excited and willing to help me out with this admittedly weird project.

As always, I am inspired and awed by the imagination of children. In fact, I see my main role in this project as trying not to mess up their perfectly great ideas and drawings. I haven't really even had to explain what an OddAnimal is, and most of the children already have an idea of what theirs will look like as soon as I sit down with them.

To introduce myself to the population of the hospital, we have installed a wall's worth of my artwork, including 2 pages from my Charlesbridge book, A Call for A New Alphabet, as well as pages from some of my other books and some cool, big wall stickers of the letter X and his friends.

Here are a few examples of the work we've created so far:

The Chale by Kaleb
"The Chale is a joyful, ocean-dwelling creature. Its slimy, elephant-sized body resembles that of a killer whale, but its head is closer to that of a cheetah. This playful animal feeds on penguins, krill, shark, cuttlefish, octopus, and squid, and is known for its ability to swim up to 500 miles per hour."

The Hugo by Kelsey

"The Hugo is a magical animal that is roughly the size of an elephant. Its green, purple, yellow, red, blue, orange, and black scales derive their color from the jelly beans that make up its diet. Its main activity is snooping around its mountain habitat in search of other animals to play with."

The Night Night by Brice

"The Night Night is a dinosaur-sized creature that lives in the mountains. Despite its angry nature, this sleepy animal is an herbivore, eating only leaves. It has fuzzy, green skin with blue spots."

Willy by Lily

"Willy is a horse-sized creature that playfully roams the forest in search of blueberries, which it eats with an extremely long tongue. It has fuzzy black and white fur."

And here is what Willy sounds like.

And my interpretation of him:

You can see some more OddAnimals on our Tumblr page or my Facebook page. Or, better yet, come by the Children's Hospital Boston to see the ever-evolving Hall of OddAnimals!

And here's the link to the book trailer for my new book, A Call for a New Alphabet!

Posted by Jef Czekaj, author and illustrator of A Call for a New Alphabet, due out February 2011.

Hangin’ Out with Uncle Wiggly Wings: Researching and Writing Candy Bomber: The Story of the Berlin Airlift’s “Chocolate Pilot”

It seems I have a fascination for true stories about children who endure tumultuous events in history, as I tend to write about them (The Children of Topaz; Brothers in Valor). So when I ran onto the story of the Berlin Candy Bomber, it was a natural fit, for it concerned children who suffered through years of war—some young enough to have only known a life of hunger and fear. The candy-laden handkerchief parachutes dropped over West Berlin by Gail Halvorsen, a young American pilot, lit up a dark world for kids who hadn’t tasted chocolate in years. But the mere gesture of kindness also offered those children both healing and hope amidst the rubble of WW II. Forevermore, those kids remembered Halvorsen as Uncle Wiggly Wings (because he wiggled the wings of his plane to signal a candy drop), the Chocolate Pilot or Chocolate Uncle, and, of course, the Candy Bomber. In the photograph above, you see Halvorsen sitting on his cot reading letters from grateful West Berlin children (note the boxes of Hershey bars behind him).

As you know, writers, particularly of nonfiction, must do their homework--in other words: research, research, research. When writing about history, we spend lots of time checking secondary sources—books, magazines articles, etc. But we really get excited about primary source materials, such as letters, diaries, or (better yet) living people who were “there.” Of course, most historical events happened so long ago that finding and talking to folks who experienced those events is impossible (unless you know a good medium who can help you talk to the dead).

The World War II era (and its immediate aftermath) is now far enough in the past that we are beginning to run short of war veterans who can tell us first hand about that great and terrible conflict. Gail Halvorsen, the focus of my book, was a WW II pilot who was sent to Germany three years after the war ended to fly supplies into West Berlin. Our former ally, the Soviet Union (Russia), had turned against us and blockaded the surface routes into the American, British, and French sectors of the former capital city. To keep the West Berliners from starving, we flew in enough food and fuel to keep two million people alive for more than a year. Most of the flyers during what was known as the Berlin Airlift had been pilots during WW II, and not many of them are around anymore. So, to discover that Halvorsen was not only alive but also vibrant—and to realize he lived close to me—was more than exciting. It was exhilarating!

Meeting and getting to know Gail Halvorsen (who just turned ninety this year and is still qualified to fly C-54 cargo planes!) left no doubt this was a book I wanted to write. I discovered he is in constant, worldwide demand to tell his story, and so he travels a great deal. He goes to Germany often, where the children of 1948 still remember and love him, and he is regularly invited to present to school children, church groups, community organizations, and so. As a result of these ongoing appearances, he put together a short video presentation about the origins of the Berlin Airlift and about the implementation of his idea to parachute candy to the children. Here is the link to that presentation (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-4vE6DCLeU). Click on it, and you’ll hear Gail’s voice narrating. You’ll also see some of the 8mm movie clips he shot of the Berlin Airlift in progress, as well as his “candy bombing” operations. I must say, it’s educational and inspiring.

As a result of his travel schedule, I usually met with Halvorsen between trips while I was working on the book. That’s when I’d drive out to his small ranch, which lies about 20 miles south of my house in Orem, Utah. It has a beautiful setting, as you can see from the photograph of Gail and me with the mountains in the background. Gail allowed me access to his files, and therefore I was able to scan over 300 of his photos (many of which appear in the book). Of course, we had many long conversations, and he was always available, if not in person then by phone or email, to answer my endless questions, verify facts, or simply to visit. I think it’s safe to say that we became friends, which was the very best outcome of my writing project.

Gail Halvorsen lives in Arizona these days, though he still owns and maintains his place in Utah (which, by the way, is his home state). Therefore, I seldom see him now—only when he blows into town to check on the ranch or visit family. But we still keep in contact, mostly via email. The last time I saw Gail was in early October (2010) when I received a call from him letting me know he’d be in Utah during the next few days. Of course, he was leaving soon after his arrival for far-flung spots—he’s still a veritable globetrotter and was heading to Germany again and then to Afghanistan, where the U.S. Air Force had invited him to participate in an airlift mission. Amazing! At any rate, he came by my house to pick up a half dozen copies of Candy Bomber, as he’d run low on them and needed some for some an upcoming event. Of course, Gail has written his own book for adults titled The Berlin Candy Bomber, and he sells a lot of them everywhere he goes. But he’s also very good at promoting my book during his travels, as well as Margot Theis Raven’s picture book, Mercedes and the Chocolate Pilot.

Speaking of Mercedes, one of the best vignettes in Candy Bomber is about her. She was a seven-year-old girl living in an apartment building near Templehof Airport, where the American cargo planes landed every few minutes. She wrote Lt. Halvorsen a letter chiding him (and the other pilots, of course) for flying so low over her place in his approach to Templehof that her chickens were afraid and had stopped laying eggs—but the pain of it all might be alleviated if he were to manage a candy drop nearby. Mercedes ended her letter with these words: “When you see the white chickens please drop it there, all will be OK.” As it turned out, Mercedes and her husband, Peter Wild, were primary sources for me, as well. One important item they provided was a high-resolution photo of Mercedes at age seven. Note that she is wearing black market shoes, which were often mismatched. As you can see, these shoes are not the same size, a detail Mercedes and Peter pointed out to me.

The other vignette that I found most delightful was about Peter Zimmerman, who sent Halvorsen a letter with a map to guide the lieutenant’s plane to his backyard. “Drop the chocolate there,” he wrote. Gail attempted to find Peter’s place and did make a drop—but not close enough, apparently. Another letter from Peter complained that because Halvorsen had missed his yard, bigger kids had beaten him to the candy. A drawing accompanying the letter showed a cargo plane with the words “No chocolate yet” on the tailfin. Finally, in frustration, Peter wrote this: “You are a pilot? I gave you a map. How did you guys win the war?” Drops to Mercedes and Peter were never successful, so Gail mailed packages filled with sweets to both children.

One of the most salient historical concepts is people’s capacity for inhumanity. In fact, our wars often are the events around which we organize the recounting of our history. I suppose one of the things I liked best about writing Candy Bomber was that this little slice of history reveals, instead, our capacity for compassion and love—even for our recent enemies.

Halvorsen at the end of the airfield with German children.

Halvorsen leading German athletes into the stadium during the Salt Lake City Winter Olympics.

Posted by Michael O. Tunnell, author of Candy Bomber: The Story of the Berlin Airlift's "Chocolate Pilot".

Starting at the top . . . with M&M's®

My 1994 The M & M’s® Counting Book started as a lesson plan. I certainly wasn’t the only teacher with a sweet-tooth and a little creativity. Teachers everywhere were embracing hands-on math activities with everything from Goldfish crackers to peanuts…because it made learning fun. Little, colorful candies that every student from ages 3 on up instantly recognized as yummy engaged them instantly in any math task at hand...in hand...and maybe as a special treat...in mouth.

I would like to say I acted on a good idea. I didn’t. I only did the creative part. The creative part is not a big deal in publishing. Millions of people have great ideas for children’s stories and picture books. If you think you have had an original idea the odds are overwhelming that someone somewhere has had that same idea. But, if you have the patience, persistence, or perhaps a husband on a mission, a friend of a friend, right place, right time...you can get it done. It’s not easy.

As most good ideas often do, it spawned from boredom. One evening I brought a package of M & M’s® to our basement. I was hiding from my mother-in-law who was living with us at the time. I settled on the couch to try to think of a different lesson to teach “colors” to my class of 4 and 5 year olds. Nothing. So, while thinking of nothing I spilled the candy out on the coffee table and started playing with them. I counted the colors and paired them up. Suddenly I saw. I wrote. I ate. Then, being a teacher, I laminated. Large construction paper M & M’s®. I brought the poem and my home-made manipulatives to class.

Suddenly 3 and four year olds could sit long enough to get the concept of colors, graphing, greater than, less then, addition, subtraction, etc. The amazing thing--no chocolate needed. Even back in the 80’s teachers knew that you couldn’t feed any amount of sweets to children without wiggly repercussions. It wasn’t and still isn’t necessary. Paper images of the candies were just fine--as long as they had the white “M’s” on them. Children chose their “favorite” color. When they chose the giant plastic image the question followed, “What color is that?” The questions and comparisons were endless. The learning was exciting and contemporary.

As far as me going on to find a publisher and really believing that this idea would become a piece of children’s literature--no. I did nothing. It involved licensing - permission to use a world-wide product and their famous brand icon. There were phone calls and contracts. I had a baby and a toddler, and I was very happy teaching.

It was my husband who read the poem and said, “This would make a great book”. It became his hobby. On first approach to M & M Mars (now Masterfoods, Inc.), the answer was “no.” They liked the book very much, since it promoted their product for education, but the company did not have an “avenue - licensing division” in place. In fact, the same year we applied for permission was the same year Steven Spielberg applied to use M & M’s® in the movie, ET. They said “no” to him, too! So that was my claim to fame...Steven Spielberg and I got refused by Masterfoods. And that was fine with me. Mr. Spielberg went on to use Reece’s Pieces and my husband simply waited. Eight years later...Masterfoods opened their licensing division and he got permission to publish. He then set out to find a publisher who also believed the book was a great idea. Thirty-five rejection letters and two years later...he found one! Many publishers were scared off, ironically, by the licensing contracts--they had never seen a book of this type before. There weren’t any. The M &M’s® Counting Book started a new genre of children’s books: Snack Food Books. The year it was finally released it made the Publisher’s Weekly Bestseller List and won The Teacher’s Choice Award from Learning Magazine. Math programs embraced it and college professors used it to teach perspective teachers how to teach. The first review was horrible, to which my husband said, “Well, they spelled your name right.”

The manuscript spent 2 years in production at Charlesbridge. From the time I wrote the poem to publication...twelve years had passed. And in those early years we were dealing with a major corporation who knew as little about publishing as we did about licensing. It was a learning experience in itself.
I felt appreciative that the book was the first “licensed product” from this huge family-owned company. It was a humbling opportunity. But I must confess I never felt the love. I never had a problem paying for use to their trademark. The book would not be the same without the “M.” And children love those M & M’s® TV characters with attitude. It’s what sells their product and mine. As licensing fees and royalty percentages increased, we tried to explain that this was children’s literature, not a mug or a t-shirt. It didn’t matter--corporate policy. Yet, I was bringing their product brand name in to places where they couldn’t get it--to schools. I ask Masterfoods to sponsor my school visits to inner city schools that could not afford to bring in an author as a literacy enrichment program. “No. We are giving to breast cancer this year,” which is of course, commendable. My response: “I’m sure you can do both.” But that corporate policy plagued me. It was frustrating for all involved.


For years, during the talk of “advertising to children” controversy, The M & M’s® Book remained “under the radar” because it’s merit seemed to outweighed the controversy. To learn to love to read, you need to get children to turn the page. Maybe people were just being polite, but when I visited schools, I never heard a negative comment, and teachers usually don’t hold anything back. One special education teacher in South Carolina told me because of The M&M’s® Book, her class had reached their goal of counting to ten, 6 months early. I choked back tears. While signing books at a reading conference, a recently retired teacher told me her colleague had died the month before and requested to be buried with my book. I had no words. One middle school student in New Jersey told me she wanted to become a math teacher because of the book. She said she slept with it when she was little.

I am blessed to have countless boxes of fan mail about this book. I traveled nation-wide to show the writing process, to inspire children to read and write, and to tell them that when they have to correct or change something they aren’t making “mistakes,” they are making a “change” which is part of the process...and though I have many books in fiction and non-fiction I still show The M & M’s® Counting Book. It’s fun.

Over the years The M & M’s® Book went on to sell over a million copies. I heard it saved the trade division of Charlesbridge Publishing, which made me happy and proud. It opened doors for them in sales in places like Walmart and Target. Not bad for a smaller publishing house. They took a chance and won big. As far as the writer,I will answer the question: I didn’t build an empire and make a million dollars. Not even close. The formula is that a children’s author would need 12 books on the market at the same time--all selling briskly to make a living off royalties. Dr. Seuss made a living from sales. The shelf life of a children’s picture book is maybe 2 years before it’s out-of-print.

My M & M’s® Book had a great run of ten years. Because it’s “off the shelf,” I can’t afford the price it now sells for on Amazon!

The key to every problem our country needs to solve is education. When an issue such as nutrition and obesity in children was being legitimately addressed, we saw the problem, raised awareness, then did what we always do: take the extreme--stop everything. No cupcakes for birthdays, no soda in high schools, no trail mix. I fear we might be creating “forbidden fruit” hoping for a quick fix. It is destined to be a failed solution. Eventually, the pendulum swings to the middle and we get the correct solution. We teach. We educate children to make good choices. It’s a lasting solution. That’s where we are now.

But it wasn’t the nutrition issue that made Masterfoods decide to revoke the license to use their product. It was the “advertising to children” issue. All food companies did. No more books that advertise any food products, including my Cheerios Book. And what have we gained? Nothing. What have we lost? Certainly not weight. We lost a fun teaching tool that tied math to literature. Do children still know what M & M’s® are? “Yes.” Do they know the characters? “Yes.” Does it matter? “No.” It’s like School Snack Prohibition.

As far as the “advertising to children” issue. We ask these large food companies to give to education--and they do, millions of dollars--yet we ask them to do it quietly and specifically. They can’t give the donation of bookmarks or book covers or rulers with their brand on it or hang a banner at a book fair they have sponsored. I don’t know how I even feel about that. Maybe schools shouldn’t ask them for money. I do know these American snack foods and their brand icons are not going away. Thank goodness. I need a few M & M’s around mid afternoon. And, I confess that I even love those M & M® characters on TV. They are a riot--throwing the bread at the man’s head when he says, “Get in the bowl!” How funny is that?!

Regarding obesity and nutrition: I feel in actuality, M & M’s® and similar snack food products, in pieces, are the perfect tool to teach children good nutrition. Why? Because they are little. You don’t have to eat the whole bag. You set a good example by eating a few--another good example by sharing a few. I dare say, in my opinion, a childhood without a few M & M’s® is a little sad. School lessons can not be fun all the time. Those multiplication facts have to be memorized. But, once in a while it needs to be fun. Those fun lessons are remembered for a lifetime. This gives children a general good feeling about school and education and in turn they pass that down to their children. It’s an important process. I don’t remember specifically learning how to read. But I do remember how much fun Friday Spelling Bees were--the winner got a Hershey Bar (I never won). I remember a very hot June day, when my kindergarten teacher took the whole class on a walk to the little market down the street and bought us all popsicles. I remember how special I felt when I passed out my birthday cupcakes. What are we losing?

The M & M’s® Counting Book opened doors for me as well--allowed me to travel and teach, which I love. I have been so fortunate in a very tough, competitive industry. People ask me about publishing all the time. I still don’t understand it and I’ve been in it for over 30 titles and 18 years. And I still get “rejected” manuscripts! Recently I’ve worked with Charlesbridge editors to rewrite the M & M’s® series: McGrath Math: Teddy Bear Counting Book is a new release. I used another popular class manipulative: little plastic teddy bears. The books are adorable. Illustrated by Tim Nihoff. I hope children don’t try to eat those bears.

When I become a grandparent I want you all to know I will be armed with M & M’s® - and the first edition copy of The M & M’s® Counting Book!

Happy trails and trail mixes to all! Thank you for your continued interest in my work.





Posted by Barbara Barbeiri McGrath, author of several books for children, including Teddy Bear Counting and The Little Red Elf.