Crawdad Creek

This is a gorgeous book--the illustrations are just marvelous. The writing is also fantastic which is unfortunately not always the case in kids nature books. There is great use of metaphor and simile. The book also gives examples of the children learning about history and biology/ecology from their explorations of the creek. This is a fantastic book for educating both kids who have lots of exposure to nature and kids bringing nature to kids who don't have a lot of access to it. It gives great examples of the kids learning from both talking with their parents and looking up things they don't know--basically teaches how to learn. It also depicts a nice sibling relationship. My 3 year old is completely enthralled by it and I think it could easily be used with older kids as well. I am surprised this book hasn't won some type of children's lit award.

What wonderful book! I bought this book to use for homeschooling my boys ages 4 & 8. We were doing a unit study on creeks and ponds. What I had hoped would be a fun, interesting read turned into so much more! We all fell in love with the amazing illustrations and rhythmic text. You almost feel like you are right there with the characters catching crawdads and finding fossils. Great for any home library. If you are homeschooling, this book offers a lot of opportunities to tie in grammar lessons like simile and personification. The vocabulary is outstanding also. I ended up using this book as my spine and working everything else around it. There are so many different things mentioned that you could easily spend a month or more going in depth with topics from Native Americans and arrowheads to salamanders and frogs and lifecycles to plant life and ecology. This book is my new favorite gift to give for birthdays also.

My 2 and a half year old daughter was fascinated by the illustrations and details in this book. She could make tons of connections with her own experiences near water. I appreciated the way the author talked about the passage of time and the changing of the seasons at the creek. The word choice was great too. There were several excellent opportunities to teach new words with familiar concepts!

Ages 8-10 Accurate information on species present/ habitat and season changes in creek habitat as seen through two young childrens experience over time. Excellent example of factual scientific literature written through fiction window.

"Come discover the treasures of Crawdad Creek" - that is what it says on the back of the dust jacket. It is a simple invitation, but it opens up a wonderful world to children. With today's busy schedules, kids don't have time to just be kids. This book is a reminder of the treasures to be found in the world around us and that we need to let children have the freedom to explore it.The story is sweet and fun, but the beautiful illustrations are what make this book truly remarkable.