Stephanie Gwyn Brown

What do a classic Aesop’s fable and the scientific method have in common? Apparently more than you might think. Stephanie Gwyn Brown weaves the two together in a seamless combination of text, diagrams, illustrations, and ingenuity in her debut book, Professor Aesop’s the Crow and the Pitcher.

Aesop fables are well known for teaching life lessons, but with a little creativity and some clever illustrations, Stephanie Brown manages to literally draw more from the original fable than an important moral. Aesop’s original story remains for the most part intact, while some unique illustrations add a scientific twist to this well-worn tale. When a thirsty crow luckily happens upon a pitcher of water in the scorching hot desert, he’s confronted with a problem: his beak is simply too short to drink. However, this clever crow applies a little scientific reasoning to confront his dilemma. Apart from the colorful and vivid main illustrations, devices such as the “Thirst-o-meter” and a “Determination Gauge” are drawn on the side to measure just how thirsty and determined the crow is as the story progress. Detailed blueprints help illustrate the problem more clearly and an x-ray photo helps the reader examine the crow’s solution a little more closely. To tie it all together, professor crow sports a white lab coat and walks us through the steps of his scientific method with the aid of some chalk, a blackboard, and a few catchy rhymes.

Stephanie Brown manages to turn a simple fable into a lesson in scientific reasoning in Professor Aesop’s the Crow and the Pitcher. Moral of the story: You can teach old tale new tricks. To learn how, check out this book from the new book section of our children’s library.

Reviewed by Shaun… (més)