If you can't beat it...appreciate it

I am blogging in my PJs on a weekday afternoon because we had a snow day today.  While I was out shoveling at 6 am, cursing the snow (out loud, I might add), I remembered that I wanted to post the website that I am using with third grade this week, snowflakebentley.com.  While most of us grumble and complain about snow, Wilson Bentley devoted his whole life to documenting the beauty of snowflakes.

A third grade teacher requested a non-fiction book for their lesson this week, so we disucssed nonfiction and biographies.  We read Jacqueline Briggs Martin's Snowflake Bentley, which is not only a gorgeous example of a biography, but it is also a Caldecott medal winner.  We then looked at photographs of his snowflakes online.  His life's work turns something that most of us hate and dread into a mystical work of art. Check out the site, read the book, and think about him the next time you are achy from shoveling and asking yourself why you don't live in sunny California.