Teachers, if you can’t access youtube, try teachertube.
Teachers if you can’t access youtube, please see teachertube.
Teachers and Librarians,
If you’re looking something that you don’t see, please email me with your idea. I’d also like to post any resources that you’ve developed related to my books that you’d like to share. Please contact me at: info@maryamato.com.
Helpful Hint: If you’re looking for resources on a particular book, the best way to find them is to put the title of that book in my website’s search bar (top right) and it will show you all the resources for that book, including references made to that book in my writing blog.
How-to (Write) Handouts
Tips for Keeping a Writer’s Notebook
Tips for Parents to Encourage Creative Writing
Tips for How to Become a Writer
Bookmarks:
Please Write in This Book bookmark
“Write” poem by Mary Amato bookmark
Display Materials:
You can use these to create author centers, bulletin boards, or posters.
High Resolution Display Images (book covers and portrait shot)
Mary Amato’s childhood diaries and notebooks
Book Discussion Guides/Activity Suggestions:
Edgar Allan’s Official Crime Investigation Notebook; Poetry Activities
Please Write in This Book; Interview with Illustrator Eric Brace
The Naked Mole-Rat Letters; Song from The Naked-Mole Rat Letters
Snarf Attack, Underfoodle, and the Secret of Life: The Riot Brothers Tell All
Drooling and Dangerous: The Riot Brothers Return
Stinky and Successful: The Riot Brothers Never Stop
Take the Mummy and Run: The Riot Brothers are on a Roll
Revision Examples to use in the Classroom
From: Snarf Attack, Underfoodle, and the Secret of Life: The Riot Brothers Tell All
From: Invisible Lines
From: The Naked Mole-Rat Letters
From: Edgar Allan’s Official Crime Investigation Notebook
Reader’s Theater Scripts
Vocabulary Lists:
Vocabulary List for Edgar Allan’s Official Crime Investigation Notebook
Videos:
Note: If you can’t access youtube in your classroom, see the teachertube link for each video that is posted with the entry.
Editing and Publishing Process (shows the editing and publishing process for Edgar Allan’s Official Crime Investigation Notebook)
How to Hear a Character’s Voice (gives four tips for writing to hear your character’s voice)
Writing Edgar Allan’s Official Crime Investigation Notebook (explains how one character took over story; shows writer’s notebook in use)
Writing Invisible Lines (shows writing process, including webs, drafts, and revisions for Invisible Lines)
Answers About The Naked Mole Rat Letters
A Message for Kids (about turning off TV)
Mary Amato Books Slideshow (slideshow of all book covers)
How to Make a Dutch Baby (from Riot Brothers)
Mushrooms on Display (shows images of mushrooms that inspired Invisible Lines)
Stinky and Successful Acceptance Speech
Podcasts:
Further Activities:
Poetry Writing Activities (from Edgar Allan’s Official Crime Investigation Notebook)
Mushroom Sculpture (art idea related to Invisible Lines)
How to Make a Spore Print (science/art activity related to Invisible Lines)
How to Go on a Mushroom Foray (science activity related to Invisible Lines)
Mushroom Recipes (related to Invisible Lines)
Dutch Baby Recipe
See also Writing Blog for entries about the writing process.
The characters in Edgar Allan’s Official Crime Investigation Notebook write lots of funny poems. Download this pdf to discover how to write your own humorous poetry:
How to Write a Funny Poem by Mary Amato
Writing fiction requires that you dive into your character’s mind, heart, and soul. Lots of writers talk about the best material coming from a trance state, when you feel as if your character is talking/acting through you.
Choosing music that reflects my character and/or the themes in the book helps me to get into my trance state.
I carefully choose a different soundtrack for every book that I work on. The music that is inspiring me for the novel that I’m writing now (which is about two musicians) is the gorgeous guitar playing of Andy McKee.
The Art of Motion CD is the first thing I turn on when I sit down to work. If you’re out there, Andy…thank you!
When I do workshops on revision, I often share an example from a draft and a revision to illustrate how I work. At the request of teachers, I have created pdf pages that you can download and print (or project onto your classroom screen) to share with students.
Example of Editing and Revising The Naked Mole-Rat Letters
Example of Revising from Invisible Lines
Example of Editing and Revising Snarf Attack, Underfoodle, and the Secret of Life
Example of Editing and Revising Edgar Allan’s Official Crime Investigation Notebook
Sometimes adults ask me if I am conscious about word choice when writing for children: Do I deliberately choose a “small” word so that it doesn’t go over the reader’s head?
I shoot for the best word, no matter how small or large.
I believe that there is an organic process of learning language, which is called exposure. How do we learn “big” words? By hearing or seeing them used in context. I still recall the thrill of learning the word “salutations” when reading Charlotte’s Web. Imagine if E.B. White had deprived me of that thrill?
Kids are remarkable creatures and can handle just about anything.
While walking to the outdoor pool last week, I passed two boys, about seven years old, sitting on a fence, legs dangling. One boy’s flip-flop sandal fell off his foot, and he turned to his friend and said, in absolute deadpan, “I just lost my dignity.”
Spend a full day writing, painstakingly layering in word after word, only to discover that it all needs to go into the trash at the end of the day. The process is agonizing and depressing and … essential.
How do you keep doing it day after day? By accepting the fact that you have to write in order to write. (I’m still working on this.) The great songwriter Leonard Cohen, captured in a documentary by Lian Lunson, said it this way: “You have to write down what you have to abandon. You’ve got to see how it works with the whole thing and then throw it away.”