After my last post where I explained how my students created flip books to illustrate the various text and graphic features of informational texts, I was excited to see that Rourke Educational Media is the publisher spotlight of this week! They have some amazing informational resources that I look forward to sharing with my students this week.
Here are only a few of the high interest informational texts they provide.
Arctic Appetizers: Studying Food Webs in the Arctic
And they have bilingual texts as well! This is a great resource for me as I have many bilingual and ELL students in my classroom.
¡Barcos! ¡Barcos! ¡Barcos! (Boats! Boats! Boats!) (Mis Primeros Descubrimientos)
But it’s their encyclopedias that really caught my eye. They are top notch.
There are 9 Volumes in this series of Science Encyclopedias. There’s a set in English and one in Spanish.
Rourke’s World of Science Encyclopedia, Volume 1: Human Life
Descubre el mundo de las ciencia Enciclopedia (Rourke’s World of Science Encyclopedia) Volume 1
There are 14 Volumes of Encyclopedias focusing on the History of Our Presidents.
Rourke’s Complete History of Our Presidents Encyclopedia, Volume 13
And a set focusing on Native American History and Culture. (10 Volumes)
Rourke’s Native American History and Culture Encyclopedia, Volume 1
These encyclopedias are beautifully laid out and offer great examples of everything from headings and captions to illustrations and diagrams, things we teach our students to look for and study before and during their reading of informational text.
Today, I plan to show my students some of these pages using my computer’s projector as a way to discuss yesterday’s inauguration of President Obama and as a culminating activity to the text and graphic features we have been studying. I know students will be captivated by the digital format of these encyclopedias.
If you haven’t already, please check out this wonderful collection of Rourke Encyclopedias and Informational Texts. There is surely something for every class!
~EMP