Rosie Revere, Engineer

Inspired by the figure of Rosie the Riveter, a fictional icon of World-War-II-era America which became a symbol of the women on the home-front who pitched in and worked at factories and on farms, in order to aid in the war effort, author Andrea Beaty here spins a tale of a young girl inventor and the great-great aunt who helps her to understand the importance of carrying on in the face of initial setbacks. A born tinkerer and engineer, Rosie Revere liked to spend her nights putting things together in her attic. Shy about sharing her inventions, especially after she misinterpreted an uncle's laughter when he saw the hat she had made him, Rosie eventually came to doubt whether she had what it took to become an engineer. Then her show more Great-Great-Aunt Rose, who was one of those WWII women, came to visit, and inspired her to try again. Would a setback on this second project put an end to Rosie's newly revived ambitions? Not with Aunt Rose around...

After finding author Andrea Beaty and illustrator David Roberts' previous picture-book collaboration, Iggy Peck, Architect, rather unappealing - the artwork didn't speak to me, I found the rhyming text clunky, and I thought the use of the teacher as a convenient punching bag was cliched (not to mention irritating) - I was really quite surprised to find that I enjoyed Rosie Revere, Engineer. Here there was no stodgy stereotype of an authority figure for the young heroine to overcome. Rather, the adults around Rosie are supportive of her dreams, even when she doesn't at first realize it. I liked the messages implicit in this story, from the idea that initial failures should be celebrated as first steps, rather than mourned as the beginning of the end, to the notion that adults and children often perceive the same events in very different lights, leading to unfortunate misunderstandings. I also appreciated the rhyming text, which felt far more natural here than in the previous book, and which would make this an excellent read-aloud. Finally, I enjoyed the multimedia artwork here, and am not sure how to account for the difference in my aesthetic appreciation, between this and the Iggy book, as they are done in the same style. However that may be, I thought David Roberts' quirky illustrations, created in watercolor, pen and ink (with the occasional use of graph paper), suited the story, and captured the frenetic pace of Rosie's inventive process, as well as the intense emotional states through which she passes.

Recommended to anyone who is looking for children's stories featuring young people's inventiveness, inter-generational partnership, and the importance of perseverance in the face of initial failure. show less

This was fun. I was staying with friends and their 6 year old wanted me to read her bedtime story and had selected this. As a scientist, I entirely approved of the content. Rosie Revere is a young girl with an inventive mind, only she suffers a lack of confidence when her first invention is laughed at. She plucks up courage to make another when Great-Great aunt Rose arrives and tells her all sorts of stories. From the images and Rosie's own description, Great Great aunt Rose is supposed to be Rosie the Riveter from the WW2 poster "We can do it!".
see https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/12/We_Can_Do_It%21.jpg/80...
Inspired by the stories, Rosie decided to make her great great aunt's wish come true, only the machine, show more again, fails. However, as is pointed out, in order to have crashed, it did first have to succeed, just not for long enough. All in rhyme, this is clearly designed to read aloud. The illustrations are detailed and technical and really very good, there is lots to look at in here. This is an excellent book for the child engineer, no matter who they may be. show less

Like "Ada Twist, Scientist," this book is - unfortunately - not an informational book. However, I believe that it has just as much to offer student's science education as an informational text. To explain that, I feel I need to share a brief story.

I honestly did not know what an engineer did until high school at the earliest, but I didn't have as strong of an understanding until college. My uncle, as well as many of my dad's family, are engineers. I knew tat my uncle organized things. That was it. The lack of education about engineering I received, in retrospect, is abhorrent.

And that's where Rosie Revere comes in. The story itself focuses around a young girl, Rosie, and her adventures in her desire to build a machine that will allow show more her to fly. However, her attempt was a failure. The book's asset is in how it handles failure. It shows that in the process of developing something and engineering new ideas, you NEED to fail, and it encourages exploration and introduces young students (again, GIRLS) to what engineering really is, which I find to be extremely important.

The representation of women and the exposure of the creative process of engineers makes Rosie Revere an extremely important book for children to be exposed to. show less

I loved this book for a few reasons, I really loved the main idea that the author was trying to get off, which was that just because you fail at something once, doesn't mean that you should quit doing something you love doing. Which is one of the reasons as to why I love this book because it pushes readers to think about tough situations like failure and how to accept failure as a learning experience that can only help you in the future. When Rosie's machines don't work out the way she had hoped and she is laughed at, she thinks about quitting and wants to stop being an engineer even though it is something she loves to do. So she decides to push past her bad thoughts and realizes that she is supposed to have failures in order to grow show more and have successes. Which then brings me to the characters that I like as well because I like how they made Rosie because I feel that she is so believable since I'm sure every person has been at that situation where we want to quit doing something because we failed once. As well as Rosie's aunt who persuaded her to never give up like a family member should want their niece to follow their dreams and how to learn how to constructively take failure. show less

In Rosie Revere, Engineer, author Andrea Beatty and illustrator David Roberts teach children the value of pursuing what you love, no matter what others say and no matter how hard it is.

Rosie loves to invent. She loves to fiddle and tweak and dink around and engineer things. She makes things that are useful. One day after making a hat to keep snakes away for her beloved uncle, he laughs so hard that he gets tears in his eyes. This affects her profoundly and thinking that he is laughing at her or her work, she decides to hide her love for engineering and to stop altogether. She hides her work in a closet and feels ashamed. An older aunt of hers, Aunt Rosie (assumably her namesake) that used to work on airplanes came over to her house and show more expressed her regret that she never got to fly herself. Rosie got the idea to help her aunt by creating a flying machine for her, but quickly dismissed the idea. "But questions are tricky, and some hold on tight..."

Rosie resurrects her materials and her ideas and builds a helicopter that ends up crashing. She feels discouraged and horrified! But Aunt Rose was impressed and made Rosie realize that before it crashed, "it did just what it needed to do".

This is a feel good story for children to teach them to persevere through the hard times and keep trying. I would include this book with my students when we are doing lessons on growth mindset: "Life might have its failures, but this was not it. The only true failure can come if you quit."

I love this book. I think it is so important for girls, especially, to read this book. It is SO true that one little laugh from someone you adore can totally change how you view yourself. This happens to young girls all the time. And it can be especially harmful to discourage girls from science fields. So this book is an important read for little girls who have any remote interest in science or building or engineering--problem solving in general. show less

Young Rosie Revere is so eager to invent and create amazing contraptions. But she doesn't exactly have a role model, or a cheerleader, for her engineering dreams, so when her first few contraptions fail, Rosie Revere becomes very discouraged. Thanks to Rosie Revere's great-great-aunt Rose, Rosie Revere finds someone who believes in her and teaches her that failure is all part of the process.

I love that this book presents a child with a dream in a very realistic way - Rosie Revere does not want to be an engineer when she grows up! She wants to be an engineer now! Though imagination and creativity might not be lacking in any child, finding the determination and motivation to pursue one's dreams as a child is harder. I love how famous show more pilots were nodded to in the illustrations, like Bessie Coleman and Amelia Earhart. I would have loved to see more scenes of Rosie actually building her contraptions, rather than them just appearing. I listened and watched this book be read aloud in a Space Station read-aloud video done by astronaut Kate Rubins. It was very inspiring to see a woman astronaut read this book! show less

This is an incredible book about empowering kids not to give up while teaching about some of the great female engineers. Trail and error is necessary, and as the book says "the only true failure can come if you quit". Through her experiences, Rosie learns that despite what others think, and how they react, you should keep working hard to follow your dreams. I love this book because it has a female main character in a book which subject is a career that is predominantly filled with men. It also shows the essence of engineering, which is to build and create things creatively to solve a problem. In this case, the problem was that Rosie's great-great-aunt wanted to fly. On top of the great story, the illustrations are so fun and detailed. show more Awesome book! show less