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Jo Ann Kairys interviews her son and co-author Daniel Kairys (pronounced care-ease) about the inspiration for their award-winning book Sunbelievable: Connecting Children with Science and Nature  and how it engages young readers.

Interview with Dan.

Daniel shares his experiences as growing up as a young reader in Montana, and how a simple story like Corduroy impacted him and introduced him to "other cultures." Jo Ann shares her memories of Daniel's first dive into reading with The Hobbit. Daniel adds that Chaim Potock was also one of his first real forays into reading.

Both of Daniel's children love to hear him tell stories. Like many busy parents, Daniel doesn't have lots of time to "spare," and Jo Ann asks how he fits reading with his kids into his schedule .... and theirs. Terry also asked Jo Ann a few extra questions.

Terry: Thank you for finding Share a Story, Jo Ann and for sharing such a wonderful interview with your son and co-author. I'm curious. Was Daniel as "into" books then as he is now with his kids?
Jo Ann: You're welcome. I'm glad to be here. It is such a great complement to my new passion: the BRAG project (Bloggers Read Across the Globe).

Daniel was always into books... he loved picture books and started reading before he learned the alphabet because he was so eager to know the actual story on the page. He started sounding out letters by guessing. I helped him with the sounds and then he immediately grew into chapter books. He read The Hobbit on his own in the early part of second grade. Couldn't put it down.

From second through fifth grade, his teachers took him almost daily to the library for a new stack of books. He spent most of his days at the school reading in a corner, loving every minute! He sees similar traits in his children and tries his best to encourage and inspire their reading by engaging them in the experience, sharing impressions of characters in books, talking about their feelings and expressions. They have a lot of fun with reading this way!

Terry: You mentioned the Hobbit, andin your interview, Daniel mentions Chaim Potock. Thinking about the kinds of books he read as a child, and now as a dad, has anything changed?
Jo Ann: He loved me to read aloud from the encyclopedia. When a topic interested Daniel, he'd search for more information during our library visits. A favorite topic at around age 7-8 was WWII--strategy, biography, history, geography. He also loved when I read from the newspaper... especially editorials!

At Dartmouth College he was granted special permission to attend advanced poetry writing classes, with no prior writing experience. I think the s

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