Counting the Stars: The Story of Katherine Johnson, NASA Mathematician | TheBookSeekers

Counting the Stars: The Story of Katherine Johnson, NASA Mathematician


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No. of pages 32

Published: 2019

Great for age 7-10 years

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A detail-rich picture book. Kirkus Reviews Straightforward and inviting. School Library Journal From award-winning author Lesa Cline-Ransome and acclaimed illustrator Ral Coln comes the sensitive, informative, and inspiring picture book biography of the remarkable mathematician Katherine Johnson, one of the NASA human computers whose work was critical to the first US space launch.Before John Glenn orbited the Earth or astronauts walked on the moon, a group of dedicated female mathematicians known as human computers used their knowledge, pencils, adding machines, and writing paper to calculate the orbital mechanics needed to launch spacecraft. Katherine Johnson was one of these mathematicians who used trajectories and complex equations to chart the space program. Even as Virginias Jim Crow laws were in place in the early 1950s, Katherine worked analyzing data at the NACA (later NASA) Langley laboratory. In 1962, as NASA prepared for the orbital mission of John Glenn, Katherine Johnson was called upon and John Glenn said get the girl (Katherine Johnson) to run the numbers by hand to chart the complexity of the orbital flight. He knew that his flight couldnt work without her unique skills. President Barack Obama awarded Katherine Johnson the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2015 and her incredible life inspired the Oscar-nominated film Hidden Figures. Get to know this incredible and inspirational woman with this beautifully illustrated picture book from an award-winning duo.

 

 

This book is aimed at children in preschool-3rd grade.

This book has been graded for interest at 4-8 years.

There are 32 pages in this book. This book was published in 2019 by Simon & Schuster .

Lesa Cline-Ransome is the author of many award-winning and critically acclaimed nonfiction books for young readers, including Game Changers: The Story of Venus and Serena Williams ; My Story, My Dance: Robert Battle's Journey to Alvin Ailey ; and Before She Was Harriet . She is also the author of the novel Finding Langston , which received a Coretta Scott King Honor Award and five starred reviews . She lives in the Hudson Valley region of New York. Learn more at LesaClineRansome. com

 

Cline-Ransome (Finding Langston, 2018, etc.) traces Johnson's love of math, curiosity about the world, and studiousness from her early entry to school through her help sending a man into space as a human computer at NASA. .... Many biographies of black achievers during segregation focus on society's limits and the subject's determination to reach beyond them. This book takes a subtler approach, mentioning segregation only once (at her new work assignment, "she ignored the stares and the COLORED GIRLS signs on the bathroom door and the segregated cafeteria") and the glass ceiling for women twice in a factual tone as potential obstacles that did not stop Johnson. Her work is described in the context of the space race, which helps to clarify the importance of her role. Colon's signature soft, textured illustrations evoke the time period and Johnson's feeling of wonder about the world, expressed in the refrain, "Why? What? How?" ... A detail-rich picture book best for readers who enjoy nonfiction and are interested in history or science. (Picture book/biography. 9-12)--Kirkus