Pat Mora is the June author for the 2021 Author Study Challenge. When I think of Pat Mora books I think of joyful celebrations. I wanted to include at least one author this year who writes Spanish and bilingual stories and she immediately came to mind. Pat Mora has a huge body of work that includes books for children, teens, and adults. If you aren’t already of fan, I am super excited to introduce you to Pat Mora.
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LEARN MORE ABOUT THE 2021 AUTHOR STUDY CHALLENGE
Meet Pat Mora
She is an award-winning author of SO many books for kids, teens and adults. Along with writing she is an advocate of reading and “bookjoy” including “Children’s Day, Book Day” which is a year long celebration of children and motivating them to be readers. There are resources and more information about this celebration of reading on her site.
Pat Mora’s books are bright, engaging, and full of joy. Among her published works, she has several collections of poetry and I think this skill lends itself so well for picture books as well. Her stories are full of beautiful language. For this author study I am focusing on her picture books, many of whom have Spanish editions or bilingual editions.
Learn more about Pat Mora on her site: https://www.patmora.com/
and in this video interview on Reading Rockets.
Picture Books by Pat Mora
Pat Mora has written a massive collection of lovely picture books. Amazingly the list below is not her entire collection of published works, not even all of the picture books she has written. She has many more, including some holiday titles. You can find her full list of picture books on her website. If you are a fan of her work, I highly encourage you to pop over and find more titles to read!
Shop Pat Mora’s Booklist on Bookshop.org to Support Local Bookstores
My Singing Nana
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This is such a loving book about families dealing with Alzheimer’s Disease. I have so much respect for author’s who tackle hard topics like this and Pat Mora does such a tender job.
A Library for Juana
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Many of Pat Mora’s books celebrate reading and books. This is a nonfiction story about Juana Ines de la Cruz who was a nun, reader and poet from Mexico. It is about a thirst for knowledge and a love of books.
I Pledge Allegiance
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A parallel story is told in this book. A little girl is learning The Pledge of Allegiance to lead the class in staying the pledge. Her great aunt is also learning the pledge to recite at a ceremony for becoming a U.S. citizen.
Book Fiesta
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Joyous, this book celebrates and explains the history of Children’s Day/Book Day. Pat Mora is the founder and shares her enthusiasm for this celebration with a bilingual, imaginative words that are paired with cheerful illustrations.
BookJoy, WordJoy
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This is a lovely collection of poems for children all about books and words. We’ve loved reading it during our Poetry Tea Times.
Gracias – Thanks
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Poetry in picture book form. This tells the story of a boy sharing the things in his everyday life for which he feels thankful. A wonderful story for Thanksgiving.
My Family / Mi Familia series
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This is a series of bilingual books for little ones. This one Sweet Dreams Dulces Suenos is about a normal, nighttime routine. A grandmother tucking in grandchildren. The text is repetitive and rhythmic.
Join Hands: The Ways We Celebrate Life
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Illustrated with photographs of children acting out different scenes, there is an energy to this book. I love the repetitive, poetic text.
Marimba! Animales A-Z
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An alphabet book for bilingual learners. Full of lively animals and Mexican American flavor, this book introduces the concept of cognates (words in different languages that are similar) to help make the 26 letters in the English language feel more familiar.
Pablo’s Tree
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This is an adoption story with a lovely tradition. A tree was planted with Pablo was born and each year his grandfather decorates it in different ways. The text wanders a little, but the sentiment and family relationships are wonderful.
The Remembering Day
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Pat Mora adds her personal touch to a Dia de los Muertos story about an imagined origin for the holiday. Facts about Remembering Day are included.
Tomás and the Library Lady
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Tomás is a son of migrant workers in this story about the power of libraries and education. This is based on the true story of Tomás Rivera, the Mexican American author and educator who became the first minority Chancellor in the University of California system. It is full of emotion and warmth.
Water Rolls, Water Rises
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A series of verses in both Spanish and English. This book is about the movement and mood of water and how it affects people and land around the world. A wonderful book to read aloud. The descriptive words encourage movements such as rolls, blows, slithers and the lyrical quality lends itself well to being shared aloud.
Shop Pat Mora’s Booklist on Bookshop.org to Support Local Bookstores
Author Study Activity Ideas
Playing with the books you read, writing and creating based on what you read, imitating an author’s style or aspects of their work is part of the fun of author studies. The options are unlimited. Pat Mora has options for most of her books on her website (https://www.patmora.com/ideas/)
Below are some activity ideas to go with some of our favorite Pat Mora books to get you started.
- Write Poetry. Pat Mora’s writing is poetic even when not specifically poetry. Read a poetry collection and then another one of her more poetic books and try writing a poem of your own.
- Learn about Mexican American traditions. If you are not Mexican American, use Pat Mora’s books as inspiration to learn more about this vibrant culture. Learn more about Day of the Dead or learn to back Mexican American bread. What questions do you have after reading one of her books? What are you curious about? Ask questions and find the answers together.
- Pledge of Allegiance. If you don’t already have it memorized, learn to recite the Pledge of Allegiance like the characters in I Pledge Allegiance.
- Poetry Tea Time. This is one of our favorite homeschool routines that we learned from The Brave Writer Program and Pat Mora’s poetry is perfect to share. It’s super simple and easy to do with multiple ages. Pop over to BraveWriter to learn more about getting started with Poetry Teatime.
- Compose a Pantoum Poem after reading Join Hands. If you’re doing this author study with older kids, imitating the poetic form used in this book can be a fun writing challenge. Here is a Pantoum Worksheet from Teaching English Language Arts.
- Build your Spanish Vocabulary. Many of Pat Mora’s books feature Spanish words and phrases or are bilingual. You can build your Spanish vocabulary more with some fun games. We like this Spanish Bingo Game and the Kloo Spanish Card Games set.
Click Here to Get the Preschool Author Study Pack
#2021authorstudychallenge
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