Menifee teacher spreads love with 'Chicken Girl' book
By Tommie Brown, Staff Writer One of the most infamous phases a child goes through in adolescence is the desperate desire to own a pet. Fr...
http://www.menifee247.com/2019/05/menifee-teacher-spreads-love-with-chicken-girl-book.html
By Tommie Brown, Staff Writer
One of the most infamous phases a child goes through in adolescence is the desperate desire to own a pet. From dogs to cats, to hamsters to fish, seldom children reach adulthood without having had their own experience with that deep call to ownership.
For Bonnie Tribbett Rosario, however, the form of that calling came as her very own pet chickens.
In her newly published book, “Chicken Girl,” Rosario takes readers through her true life experience as a young chicken owner and the road it took to get there.
Bonnie -- the red-headed pigtailed girl who can be spotted on the cover, striking resemblance to Bonnie herself as a child -- submerges herself in learning about and how to care for chickens. Visits to her school library fill her days, constant chatter about the birds fill her home, so much so that her family coined her nickname, “Chicken Girl.”
While chickens were young Bonnie’s passion, writing a children’s book has always been adult Bonnie’s dream.
A teacher of 25 years, Rosario has focused her time on teaching grade levels 1st, 2nd, and now kindergarten, currently calling Ridgemoor Elementary School home. But after a long time coming, Rosario gave in to her literary calling.
“I sent in my manuscript to a few big name publishers,” says Rosario, “but the rejection letters kept reading that they didn’t want rhyming books. I couldn’t understand that. I teach kindergarten and they love rhyming books, so I wasn’t going to back down from that.”
That is when Rosario turned to self-publishing. Through Mascot Books Publishing Company, Rosario was paired with an illustrator – Cheryl Crouthamel -- along with an editor, printing responsibilities, and all the information and resources she would need to tackle the daunting goal of publishing a book.
“In a way, I feel really blessed to have gone with Mascot Books,” says Rosario, “because this way I had complete say. The white dog seen on the cover and reccurring throughout the pages is my real childhood dog, Max. I wanted him to be a reccurring character, and being able to work hands-on with the illustrator allowed that to happen.”
And while the book pays clear homage to Rosario’s childhood, the work is riddled with aspects of Bonnie’s adult life and interests.
“The whole thing of the book is that I would rent books about chickens from the library and take them home to take notes on sticky notes of what I was learning,” says Rosario. “So the teacher in me needed to include something in the book about the importance of learning about the pet and the facts that go along with it.”
In the last section of the book, readers will find a corkboard-like display littered with facts about chickens and their care process written on note pads, paired with photos of Rosario’s actual chickens in the past.
The photos of chickens and Max, the white fluffy dog, are not the only personal add-ins that can be found within the text. The librarian, Mrs. Whitefield, was Rosario’s actual librarian in elementary school. And the United States map on the wall of Bonnie’s school hallway features star points of all the schools Rosario has taught at throughout the years; Ridgemoor Elementary can be spotted among them.
“I am first and foremost a teacher,” says Rosario, “so I wanted this book to still align with classrooms. Common Core is very much about pairing fiction with non-fiction texts, and how do they compare and contrast. The teacher in me said I need to do something like this.”
The quick success of “Chicken Girl” among the elementary schools Rosario has taught at sings of success for the book’s academic undertone.
With Rosario appearing at Author Assemblies at multiple school locations around the country, telling her story to the students and throwing in a rooster crowing contest here and there, “Chicken Girl” has been welcomed with open arms.
Financial profit isn’t the main focus for Rosario when it comes to her publication.
Coming from a military family, Rosario mixed her love of chickens and her respect for the military by donating a portion of all proceeds to the Coops for Troops foundation.
Known to be therapeutic for veterans suffering from PTSD, the Coops for Troops foundation provides chickens, a coop, a starter pack of feed and supplies for returning veterans, families of deployed military personnel, and VA hospitals and retirement homes.
“I have to say, this is what I’m most proud of,” says Rosario. “My husband retired from the Navy, and now we help out a lot at March Air Force Base. We do things like go once a month and feed the veterans, so just giving back to the veterans is very important to my family. I wanted to make sure each book gave back.”
Rosario has already donated over $700 to Coops for Troops just from her book launch in March of this year.
Now that the book is written, Rosario wants to focus any free time she has outside of teaching to showing her book to a wider audience.
“My job is to be a teacher,” says Rosario. “This book is not my priority, my students are. So getting it out there has been a challenge.”
Time constraints, aren't holding Rosario back. Having already visited her hometown in Pennsylvania and various locations around California, Rosario is now focusing in more closely within Menifee’s community.
Looking to do read aloud's in local libraries during the summer, grabbing the attention of Menifee 24/7, and selling books within local vendors are a few of the first steps Rosario is taking in letting word spread about “Chicken Girl.”
“Every student I’ve had has heard about me and my chickens,” laughs Rosario. “I’ve been talking about and teaching to my students what’s in “Chicken Girl” for years. I finally just put it on paper and got it out of me. Now I want to get it out to others.”
Menifee residents can find Rosario personally selling and signing copies of “Chicken Girl” May 24 at Wickerd Farm’s Artisan Market, weather permitting. Her book and bio can also be found on her website at https://bonnietribbettrosario.com.
And for readers who are curious about how the real life Bonnie’s chicken journey ended up, Rosario raises class chickens each spring, and has a class renowned rabbit at home named Bunny Foo. She no longer raises chickens at home, but wholeheartedly believes she will one day own a coop again, living on as her rightful nickname, Chicken Girl.
One of the most infamous phases a child goes through in adolescence is the desperate desire to own a pet. From dogs to cats, to hamsters to fish, seldom children reach adulthood without having had their own experience with that deep call to ownership.
For Bonnie Tribbett Rosario, however, the form of that calling came as her very own pet chickens.
In her newly published book, “Chicken Girl,” Rosario takes readers through her true life experience as a young chicken owner and the road it took to get there.
Bonnie -- the red-headed pigtailed girl who can be spotted on the cover, striking resemblance to Bonnie herself as a child -- submerges herself in learning about and how to care for chickens. Visits to her school library fill her days, constant chatter about the birds fill her home, so much so that her family coined her nickname, “Chicken Girl.” While chickens were young Bonnie’s passion, writing a children’s book has always been adult Bonnie’s dream.
A teacher of 25 years, Rosario has focused her time on teaching grade levels 1st, 2nd, and now kindergarten, currently calling Ridgemoor Elementary School home. But after a long time coming, Rosario gave in to her literary calling.
“I sent in my manuscript to a few big name publishers,” says Rosario, “but the rejection letters kept reading that they didn’t want rhyming books. I couldn’t understand that. I teach kindergarten and they love rhyming books, so I wasn’t going to back down from that.”
That is when Rosario turned to self-publishing. Through Mascot Books Publishing Company, Rosario was paired with an illustrator – Cheryl Crouthamel -- along with an editor, printing responsibilities, and all the information and resources she would need to tackle the daunting goal of publishing a book.
“In a way, I feel really blessed to have gone with Mascot Books,” says Rosario, “because this way I had complete say. The white dog seen on the cover and reccurring throughout the pages is my real childhood dog, Max. I wanted him to be a reccurring character, and being able to work hands-on with the illustrator allowed that to happen.”
And while the book pays clear homage to Rosario’s childhood, the work is riddled with aspects of Bonnie’s adult life and interests.
“The whole thing of the book is that I would rent books about chickens from the library and take them home to take notes on sticky notes of what I was learning,” says Rosario. “So the teacher in me needed to include something in the book about the importance of learning about the pet and the facts that go along with it.”
In the last section of the book, readers will find a corkboard-like display littered with facts about chickens and their care process written on note pads, paired with photos of Rosario’s actual chickens in the past. The photos of chickens and Max, the white fluffy dog, are not the only personal add-ins that can be found within the text. The librarian, Mrs. Whitefield, was Rosario’s actual librarian in elementary school. And the United States map on the wall of Bonnie’s school hallway features star points of all the schools Rosario has taught at throughout the years; Ridgemoor Elementary can be spotted among them.
“I am first and foremost a teacher,” says Rosario, “so I wanted this book to still align with classrooms. Common Core is very much about pairing fiction with non-fiction texts, and how do they compare and contrast. The teacher in me said I need to do something like this.”
The quick success of “Chicken Girl” among the elementary schools Rosario has taught at sings of success for the book’s academic undertone.
With Rosario appearing at Author Assemblies at multiple school locations around the country, telling her story to the students and throwing in a rooster crowing contest here and there, “Chicken Girl” has been welcomed with open arms.
Financial profit isn’t the main focus for Rosario when it comes to her publication.
Coming from a military family, Rosario mixed her love of chickens and her respect for the military by donating a portion of all proceeds to the Coops for Troops foundation.
Known to be therapeutic for veterans suffering from PTSD, the Coops for Troops foundation provides chickens, a coop, a starter pack of feed and supplies for returning veterans, families of deployed military personnel, and VA hospitals and retirement homes.
“I have to say, this is what I’m most proud of,” says Rosario. “My husband retired from the Navy, and now we help out a lot at March Air Force Base. We do things like go once a month and feed the veterans, so just giving back to the veterans is very important to my family. I wanted to make sure each book gave back.”
Rosario has already donated over $700 to Coops for Troops just from her book launch in March of this year. Now that the book is written, Rosario wants to focus any free time she has outside of teaching to showing her book to a wider audience.
“My job is to be a teacher,” says Rosario. “This book is not my priority, my students are. So getting it out there has been a challenge.”
Time constraints, aren't holding Rosario back. Having already visited her hometown in Pennsylvania and various locations around California, Rosario is now focusing in more closely within Menifee’s community.
Looking to do read aloud's in local libraries during the summer, grabbing the attention of Menifee 24/7, and selling books within local vendors are a few of the first steps Rosario is taking in letting word spread about “Chicken Girl.”
“Every student I’ve had has heard about me and my chickens,” laughs Rosario. “I’ve been talking about and teaching to my students what’s in “Chicken Girl” for years. I finally just put it on paper and got it out of me. Now I want to get it out to others.”
Menifee residents can find Rosario personally selling and signing copies of “Chicken Girl” May 24 at Wickerd Farm’s Artisan Market, weather permitting. Her book and bio can also be found on her website at https://bonnietribbettrosario.com.
And for readers who are curious about how the real life Bonnie’s chicken journey ended up, Rosario raises class chickens each spring, and has a class renowned rabbit at home named Bunny Foo. She no longer raises chickens at home, but wholeheartedly believes she will one day own a coop again, living on as her rightful nickname, Chicken Girl.
