Dear Michelle, Sharon, and Mindy:

Numbers 1–10 get all the attention, but in this beach-themed rhyme, 11–19 are the stars!

TEN JUST WANTS TO HAVE FUN is my 350-word rhyming picture book, where children ages 3–6 get to follow Ten on an adventure to create new numbers. It’s Chicka Chicka Boom Boom meets 1, 2, 3… by the Sea.

I was inspired to write this story based on the follow article: https://www.wsj.com/amp/articles/the-best-language-for-math-1410304008. It details that the unique names given to the English numbers 11–19 can confuse children and become detrimental to their ability to be successful in math. To abate this confusion, TEN JUST WANTS TO HAVE FUN presents the numbers 11–19 as the composition of ten and a digit. This is a key standard for early grades in Common Core Math. It is also a fun way to help children understand the numbers by relating them to the digits they already know and love.

I am an active member of SCBWI and multiple author critique groups. I have attended various writing conferences and received professional critiques from Ariel Richardson, Diana Murray, Jess Carroll, Hannah Holt, and Ellen Leventhal. This manuscript, TEN JUST WANTS TO HAVE FUN, earned an honorable mention from Diana Murray in the 2019 Writing With the Stars Contest, and my story THE UMBRELLA earned an honorable mention from Susanna Hill in her 2018 Halloweensie Contest. I host a blog where I connect everything to math; it’s filled with author interviews and my own writing. I am also the co-creator and co-host of this year’s Spring Fling Writing Contest. I live with my husband and daughter in the Central Valley of California where I teach high school math.

Thank you for your time and consideration and for hosting such an awesome event.

Numbers love to have some fun.
Check out ten—she’s on the run!

Off she goes around the bend
in search of One, her smallest friend.

Yes! She found the number one,
soaking in the morning sun.

The numbers touch, and poof! behold:
they make a number new and bold.