Tuesday, October 18, 2011

The Park Our Town Built / El parque que nuestro pueblo construyó Wins Bronze Moonbeam Children's Book Award!




Raven Tree Press (McHenry, IL) is proud to announce that the book The Park Our Town Built / El parque nuestro pueblo construyó has won the prestigious Moonbeam Bronze Medal in the "Multicultural Picture Book" category.

Presented by the Jenkins Group and Independent Publisher Online, the Moonbeam Children's Book Awards are intended to bring increased recognition to exemplary children's books and their creators, and to celebrate children's books and life-long reading. Each year's entries are judged by expert panels of youth educators, librarians, booksellers, and book reviewers of all ages. As our society has gotten more complex and growing up has become more complicated, children's book authors and publishers have risen to the occasion, creating books that not only celebrate the joys of childhood, but also help kids and families deal with its challenges. The Moonbeam Awards recognize and reward the best of these books and bring them to the attention of parents, booksellers, librarians, parents and children.

The Park Our Town Built, released May 2011, is available in an English-only edition and an embedded text bilingual English/Spanish edition in which the story is presented mostly in English with keywords in Spanish sprinkled within its context.

Written by Diane Gonzales Bertrand (San Antonio, TX)
Illustrated by Tanja Bauerle (Gilbert, AZ)

Hardcover English only Edition $16.95 ISBN 9781936299140
Hardcover Bilingual Edition $16.95 ISBN 9781936299126

The mayor wants a community park and safe playground for the children. She enlists a group of kids to join her in asking one of the citizens to donate some of his land. When he agrees, he joins all the families and friends who set out to build swings, benches, gardens, and a fountain. There is excitement and a sense of purpose to build the park for all to enjoy. The whole town comes together to create a beautiful park and celebrate with a grand picnic and beautiful fireworks when the job is done.

The narrative text builds line by line and page by page, using repetition and imagery to create a charming story for young readers. Vocabulary recognition and matching pictures to the text help readers gain confidence in both comprehension skills and predicting a sequence of events.

Raven Tree Press is an independent children's picture book publisher specializing in bilingual books in English and Spanish. The publishing house is a division of Delta Systems Co., Inc. of McHenry, IL.

Each 32-page picture book features family-oriented storylines and beautiful illustrations. The hardcover books ($16.95) and paperback books ($7.95) are available at independent and chain bookstores, online booksellers and at the Publisher's website www.raventreepress.com.

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