Page Type: Elementary

If you’re looking for a book you can sink your teeth into, you might want to check out some Newbery and Caldecott Medal winners. Each January, the American Library Association (ALA) gives these prizes to the best children’s book (Newbery) and best picture book (Caldecott) of the previous year. The latest Newbery and Caldecott winners were announced on January 22, 2024, taking their place among some of the greatest kids’ books of all time.

The 2024 Newbery selection is The Eyes and the Impossible by Dave Eggers. The story is about a dog named Johannes who roams freely through a city park. Johannes is both the narrator and the “eyes” of the book. With help from some of the park’s other animal residents, he watches over the park to make sure the balance between people and nature is maintained. When the park is thrown off balance, it looks as if the only home Johannes knows could change forever.

The Caldecott Medal went to Big, by author and illustrator Vashti Harrison. The book explores how the words a young girl hears as she grows up affect the way she feels about herself. Like all Caldecott winners, Big has beautiful illustrations that help tell the story. Some of the pages have no words at all—but the pictures show the young girl’s emotions.

“For me, this story was really about the words we give and share with children, and I wanted to make a story that followed a child on a journey towards self-love,” Harrison told National Public Radio (NPR).

Fifteen-year-old Yolanda Renee King is carrying the message of her grandfather, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., with a new picture book. We Dream a World asks kids to dream of a better world.

Yolanda says the title of the book was inspired by Dr. King’s famous “I Have a Dream” speech, which was inspired by a 1941 poem called “I Dream a World,” by Langston Hughes. Both the speech and the poem imagine a kinder, fairer world for everyone, no matter the color of their skin. Yolanda’s book continues this message, but for a new generation.

“This book really, I guess, challenges everyone to imagine a world without racism and violence and discrimination,” Yolanda told National Public Radio (NPR).

We Dream a World was released on January 2, 2024, just 13 days before what would have been Dr. King’s 95th birthday. Yolanda never knew her grandfather, but she has heard many stories about him, listened to his speeches, and watched videos of him. She knew she wanted to continue his work, and the work of her grandmother, Coretta Scott King, from an early age. Today, Yolanda is not only an author but also a public speaker.

“I am very proud to be their granddaughter,” Yolanda said in a 2023 speech at Clemson University in South Carolina. “Their examples belong to all of us. We are all challenged to carry forth their unfinished work.”

Yolanda told NPR that young people can improve the world around them.

“[People] think that, oh, I have to do a speech, [but] it’s not the only way,” she said. “It can be something like using your talents. So if you’re, for instance, an artist, painting art pieces that really reflect what’s going on. And you could write songs or [join] a local group or [start] a club at school. There are just so many ways.”

When a person gets an eye exam, they’re asked to read letters from a chart—but what about dogs? Since our four-legged friends can’t tell us what they’re experiencing, veterinarians know very little about canine vision. Recently, scientists conducted a study they hope will lead to new information about how well dogs see as they age.

The study from the University of Wisconsin School of Veterinary Medicine was the first step in a larger investigation that uses videos to learn about dog vision. In this early step, scientists wanted to see which videos dogs like best. They asked 1,246 people to observe which videos their dogs paid the closest attention to (a sign that the dogs want to watch) and then answer some questions online. The dog owners also noted their dogs’ breeds and their ages because scientists know that, as with people, dogs’ vision often gets worse as they age.

The study found that dogs enjoy watching videos showing other animals, especially other dogs! They weren’t very interested in watching videos of humans, though. More than 10 percent of the dogs seemed to like cartoons. That could be because, overall, movement on the screen got the dogs’ attention, and cartoons have a lot of that! Scientists noticed that the age and breed of the dog seems to affect how much it’s interested in watching TV.

Now that scientists have this information, they want to do a study that uses video-watching to track vision changes in dogs as they age, veterinary ophthalmologist (eye specialist) Freya Mowat told Spectrum News 1 in Wisconsin.

“The effect of aging and vision changes in dogs is largely unknown,” Mowat said. “Like people, dogs are living longer, and we want to make sure we support a healthier life for them as well.”

Except for a possible afternoon nap, most people get all their sleep overnight. But chinstrap penguins get their rest in a very different way. Scientists say these birds take more than 10,000 naps a day!

Scientists learned about this surprising sleep pattern by studying a group of chinstrap penguins in Antarctica. In addition to filming the birds, scientists placed devices in the neck and brain muscles of 14 penguins so they could record any brain activity related to sleep. They found that the penguins took 10,000 very short sleeping periods called microsleeps. Each little nap was only four seconds long! But all that dozing adds up—chinstrap penguins end up getting 11 hours of sleep every day.

Actor and director LeVar Burton has always loved a good story, and he knows that kids do, too. Burton’s new podcast, Sound Detectives, is a juicy mystery series that has kids listening closely.

In the podcast, Burton is getting ready to open the Museum of Sound, which celebrates all the wonderful sounds in the universe. When he discovers that some sounds have been separated from their sources, he hires Detective Hunch to find them. With help from a giant ear named Audie, Burton and the detective work to track down those sounds…and catch the thief who has been stealing them. 

Burton first became famous when he played Kunta Kinte, a man who was captured and then enslaved, in the 1977 TV miniseries Roots. Since then, he has had numerous acting roles. Star Trek fans know him as Geordi La Forge in the TV series Star Trek: The Next Generation.

But Burton is equally well known as the host of a kids’ TV series called Reading Rainbow, which ran from 1983 to 2006. In that show, Burton read and recommended fantastic books, inspiring many kids to become enthusiastic readers. Today, many of those same kids (who are now adults) listen to LeVar Burton Reads, a podcast on which Burton reads stories out loud.

Sound Detectives is Burton’s first podcast for kids. He hopes it will take listeners on a great adventure and inspire them to keep exploring.

“[Sound Detectives] appeals to the…curiosity in a child about the world around them,” Burton told the New York Times. “It introduces them to parts of the world that they might not have yet been exposed to.”

For 95 years, Mickey Mouse was owned by only one company—Disney. By law, no one else was allowed to make money selling pictures or movies featuring the famous character. But now that’s changed. Mickey, or at least one version of him, is in the public domain. In other words, he’s basically public property.

To understand what that means, let’s go back to 1928—just over 95 years ago. That year, Walt Disney created Mickey Mouse and made a movie about him called Steamboat Willie. Disney asked the U.S. government to copyright Mickey Mouse, which meant that no one else could copy the character. Anyone who did would be breaking the law. But under U.S. law, some older creative works—including art, books, movies, and fictional characters—can be copyrighted for only 95 years. After that, they enter the public domain, and anyone can copy them. On January 1, 2024, many creative works entered the public domain. Steamboat Willie’s Mickey Mouse was one of them.

A house in Selma, Alabama, where Martin Luther King, Jr., planned a famous civil rights march will soon be open to the public. The house will be moved to Michigan to be part of a history museum called Greenfield Village.

Jawana Jackson, who grew up in the house, sold it to the museum so it could be recognized for its part in the civil rights movement. In 1965, when Jackson was 4 years old, King and other civil rights leaders arrived at the house to plan a march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama.

Jackson’s parents had offered King, an old friend, the use of their home because they knew his work would be important to Jawana’s future.

“[Jawana] and children in this country and all around the world … deserve a better, a more even, a more just society. Whatever we can do to support you, we’re here,” Sullivan Jackson told King, according to the Pensacola News Journal.

Thousands of people took part in three marches from Selma to Montgomery. These events helped lead U.S. lawmakers to pass the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which protected voting rights for Black Americans.

People will be able to visit the home where these marches were planned after it is moved to the museum in Michigan. Jawana Jackson says she wants the public to be able to see where King did some of his most important work.

“It became increasingly clearer to me that the house belonged to the world,” Jackson told the Associated Press.

Greenfield Village is a history museum in Michigan that contains more than 80 historic structures. Soon, the Jackson home will be one of them. Officials are dismantling the home so it can be transported to Michigan, where it will be rebuilt. Once open to the public, the home will contain some of King’s neckties and pants, as well as furnishings dating back to 1965.

The home is expected to open in the next three years.

An artist recently unveiled a statue of legendary candy maker Willie Wonka that’s made entirely of chocolate! The statue was created in honor of the opening of Wonka, a movie about the character as a young man.

Chocolate sculptor Jen Lindsey-Clark spent more than five weeks making the sculpture, which is 6 feet, 2 inches (188 centimeters) tall and weighs 220 pounds (100 kilograms). She crafted everything from chocolate, including the top hat, the buttons, and the shoelaces.

Have you ever noticed that some people are fantastic artists, while others have a way with words? Still others work well with their hands. Why aren’t we all good at the same things? A new book for young readers can help answer that question.

Titled Different Kinds of Minds, the book is about how each person thinks differently. Its author, Temple Grandin, hopes it will inspire kids to explore how they think and figure out the things they’re great at.

Grandin is known for her studies of animal behavior and for designing devices that allowed farm animals to be treated more humanely. She has also spoken and written about her experiences as a person with autism. Growing up, being autistic made her aware that everyone has their own way of taking in information.

In the book, Grandin explains the different ways people think. She is a visual thinker, which means when she has a thought and idea, she pictures it in her mind. Some people are pattern thinkers, which means they may be good at things like math and music. And some people are verbal thinkers, which means they’re good with words and remember information best by reading it or hearing it read to them. Many people can think in more than one way, but there’s probably one way of thinking they do best.

You can read more about types of thinking farther down on this page.

Grandin hopes to encourage young readers to consider how they think best and explore ways to make the most out of their incredible brains.

Have you ever done something funny without even trying? Wild animals do that sometimes, too! The annual Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards capture the hilarious things critters do when they think no one’s looking. This year’s winning snapshot shows a kangaroo that looks like it’s playing air guitar. But the kooky kangaroo didn’t take home the only prize.

The Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards are open to anyone, whether they are a professional photographer or just take photos for fun. The key is to capture an image of wildlife at its wackiest. Winners are chosen in six categories: Creatures of the Land (land animals), Creatures in the Air (flying animals), Underwater, Junior (for photographers who are 18 and younger), Internet Portfolio (for a group of four photos), and Video Clip (for a video of a funny animal). Judges also choose an overall winner, and the public gets to vote on a People’s Choice Award