Education Fun

educational stories one book at a time

Mary Sparks

Books. The window into another world. A world that gives you life, education, entertainment, joy, and love. Books come in all shapes and sizes, in all genres and themes. Books will always be by your side when you need help. Books will always educate you whether you realize it or not.

Most people hearing the word, educational books’ minds immediately go to classroom textbooks, but most books are educational no matter the story. They can teach you anything.

Kay Gooch is a retired elementary librarian from Gullett elementary school. Gooch spent countless years recommending books to young students and watching them learn from the stories. She knows about many different books that are educational and enjoyable to all students, “If you want a book on acceptance, you know, you’ve got a child who isn’t quite sure on the gender thing, there’s a ton of books out there that you can leave to say, there’s a book called Julian is a Mermaid, and it’s about a little boy who dresses like a mermaid. So there’s books for you. Even though they’re not factual, they could be used as lessons in an elementary, in a high school classroom.” Any fiction book has themes and the themes and morals of the book can lead to education. “They are historical and cultural and they have lots and lots of educational meaning behind them, but they are portrayed as books for fun. You know, so most fiction books they’re not written so that they feel like they’re educational, even though they have underlying tones,” Gooch stated. So despite what so many believe all books are educational in one way or another.

Besides books that have educational underlying themes there is also a world of books that are solely educational but still are interesting to read. Brian Anderson, a professor at the University of Texas Austin is the author of the Space Dictionary for Kids and the Zach Proton book series. Zach Proton is a comedy series about a kid in space searching for his lost ship. The Space Dictionary for Kids is a helpful book of space terms with added funny bits to entertain children. When asked about writing his educational book he observed that, “Writing non-fiction science is a lot easier because you have sources you can go to, and then there’s many sources, especially with the internet and the UT libraries, one of the biggest libraries in the world, and so biggest university libraries.”

Anderson wrote the book with the help of his daughter Amy Anderson who had studied astrophysics in a summer study at college. Anderson describes writing fiction is “like feeling around in the dark, looking for the best story, but you never know when you found the best. Some people say that a novel or a screenplay or something like that is never finished. It’s just abandoned. Just at some point you have to say, this is it and stop revising.” Compared to a fully educational book it is much harder to end.

In between the educational undertones and fully educational there is educational fiction. An amazing example of this is the Kate The Chemist books written by Kate Biberdorf. Biberdorf, like Anderson, is a professor at UT. Biberdorf has written numerous books such as the Kate The Chemist series, two books of experiments, and one adult chemistry book. She says, “In high school I hated writing everything. I didn’t enjoy those classes at all. But this was fun because I like chemistry. And in the fiction series I could lie, we can’t do that ever. And I can make up stuff like this happens and this happens and it just happens.” After finally getting to write what she wanted Biberdorf has in total written eight books.

In books with educational purposes in mind well writing there are different methods to writing it then plain fiction books “a lot of what I was doing was taking information and kind of presenting it in a different,to make it more engaging to younger kids because when the publisher wanted the book, they said they want something from third to sixth grade, and I thought, well, there’s a lot of younger kids than that who are interested in science and a lot of older kids than that.” Anderson explains. With writing books for a wide variety of people you need to make it so everyone can understand. But you can talk and write differently for different groups of people. Biberdorf uses a very similar method to this when asked to talk at schools or other places. “With the people who have PhDs in the audience I can talk about the molecules and the energy. I can get really deep into it. Kids have no idea what molecules are, right? And so you just explain the same thing by saying, oh, A plus B gives me C. And it’s the same idea, but it’s just how you talk about science.”

When writing one of these books also especially for children you have to pick and choose what to teach. Everyone only has so much room in their brain to learn without getting bored. “I tried to pick my most important terms and try to teach those. So for example, in this, The fiction series at the beginning of every single chapter. I have a chemistry definition at the top and it’s part of the story, but it’s like a goofy definition, so you’re not gonna hear any big words.” Biberdorf explained. Everyone, even adults will get bored at some point so it is good to have fun through the information.

With all types of educational books there are still mainly thoughts of those same old dusty textbooks sitting in the corner that everyone had to use at school. Even with being a librarian at an elementary school library Gooch still thinks of, “ early reader books and things like that. And you know, there always has to be the prescribed books that you have to read and then there’s the reading for pleasure. And a lot of times you can sneak a lot of educational books in with the pleasure.”

Books of all thicknesses. Books of fact and fiction. Books that are insightful, hilarious, gripping, and romantic. Scary, mystical, tragic, and comforting. Books that are for toddlers, adults, kids, tenagers, and elderly. All have hidden messages. All are educational.

By: Mary Sparks