2. Sponsored by the ADE this is the 13 th year for the Arkansas Diamond award. This award started in 1998 to encourage students in grades K-3 to read. Students in kindergarten, first, second and third grade who have heard or read at least three of the following books will be eligible to vote for their favorite book in April.

3. 2009-2010 Arkansas Diamond Award Book Winner

4. 2009-2010 Arkansas Diamond Honor Book Winner

5. Frogs By Nic Bishop Accelerated Reader Level: 4.8 Author Nic Bishop has taken pictures of different types of frogs in their natural habitat. He worked several months on this book. He found many frogs while exploring the ponds and swamps near his home. Some of the frogs he even raised since they were babies. Nic also took pictures of frogs while traveling around the world including frogs in beautiful rainforest.

6. Thump, Quack, Moo: A Whacky Adventure By Betsy Lewin Accelerated Reader Level: 2.8 The annual Corn Maze Festival is coming, and every day the chickens, cows, and Duck help Farmer Brown with a few bribes to create a special Statue of Liberty corn maze. Every night Duck is busy creating his own surprise.

7. The Wolves Are Back By Jean Craighead George Accelerated Reader Level: 3.6 This picture book tells the story of how, over a century, wolves were persecuted in the United States and by 1926 they had become extinct in the 48 states.

8. That Book Woman By Heather Henson Accelerated Reader Level: 4.3 A family living in the Appalachian mountains in the 1930’s gets book to read during the regular visits of “That Book Woman”- a librarian who rides a pack horse through the mountains, lending books to the isolated residents.

9. Spuds By Karen Hesse Accelerated Reader Level: 4.0 Maybelle, Jack, and Eddie want to help Ma by putting something extra on the table. So they set out in the dark to take potatoes from a nearby field, but when they arrive home and empty their potato sacks, they are surprised by what they find.

10. Abe Lincoln Crosses a Creek: A Tall Thin Tale By Deborah Hopkinson Accelerated Reader Level: 3.1 In Knob Creek, Kentucky, in 1816, seven year old Abe Lincoln falls into a creek and is rescued by his best friend, Austin Gollaher.

11. How Many Ways Can You Catch A Fly? By Steve Jenkins and Robin Page Accelerated Reader Level: 6.3 In this eye popping picture book readers are asked how six different animals might hatch an egg, use a leaf, eat a clam, or dig a hole. This book is like playing a game.

12. Houdini: The Amazing Caterpillar By Janet Pedersen Accelerated Reader Level: 4.4 A caterpillar does amazing tricks, like making leaves disappear and shedding its skin, and finally it performs the most amazing trick of all. Includes facts about the life cycle of the monarch butterfly.

13. Trout Are Made Of Trees By April Pulley Sayre Looks at trout as part of a vast food chain that begins when leaves fall into streams and rivers. Simple text and art illustrate each step of the food chain throughout the process. Accelerated Reader Level: 3.3

14. Help Me, Mr. Mutt!: Expert Answers For Dogs With People Problems By Janet Stevens and Susan Stevens Crummel Accelerated Reader Level: 3.3 Dogs across the United states write to Mr. Mutt, a people expert, for help with their humans.

15. Duck Soup By Jackie Urbanovic Accelerated Reader Level: 2.0 Maxwell Duck is trying to invent a soup that everyone will remember him for, but when he goes out to look for a missing ingredient and his friends show up, they think he has fallen into the soup.

16. Citations Photos accessed from www.barnesnoble.com and www.amazon.com on June 1, 2010.www.barnesnoble.comwww.amazon.com All summaries taken directly from Overviews of Charlie May Simon Childrens’ Book Award and Arkansas Diamond Primary Book Award 2010- 2011 by Loyd Harris and Cora Ellsworth of Perma-Bound Books.