We Like to Invent Author:Bandhu Scott Dunham This colorful, easy-to-read picture book for children ages 5-9 is designed to spark their ingenuity, stimulate creative play, and encourage problem-solving skills. Using common and inexpensive materials, the book suggests easy craft-projects that demonstrate the working of simple machines. The author is a glass artist and a designer of whimsical... more » kinetic glass sculptures. His work is included in the permanent collections of several U.S. museums, including the Corning Museum or Glass, and at locations in Germany and Japan. The inventiveness of our children may be the most valuable resource we have. Today, our society needs creative ways to supply clean energy sources and other green technologies. This book: * encourages children from all economic and ethnic backgrounds to pursue whatever natural talents they have for science and engineering * reminds children and their parents of their inborn sense of curiosity and innovation and innate knowledge of how things work * communicates the enjoyment, satisfaction and excitement of discovering new ways to achieve practical goals * empowers children with the "can do" spirit that is essential to self-esteem. * creates opportunities for rewarding interactions between children and adults. Many of the activities in this entertaining little book can be expanded into more elaborate adventures as children's interest and understanding deepen. In this way, the projects depicted have a long-lasting impact without requiring extensive resources to keep a child's interest high. When children learn how to satisfy their natural curiosity and healthy desire to solve problems, their creative skills develop a momentum of their own that can carry a child forward into other successes and other interests. Sharing these discoveries with friends and classmates is also a valuable social experience and helps contribute to a child's growing set of skills for working together.« less