Cool Brainiacs: Booktalk 1

[Booktalker: Before you booktalk, put a tab or bookmark the page with the Wright Brothers.]
Leonardo da Vinci -- let's call him Leo -- was one of the greatest minds of all time. He was interested in absolutely everything. He lived hundreds of years ago in Italy, and he loved to take notes: all kinds of notes - notes on inventions, designs, and ideas. You know what's so cool about his notes? He used mirror writing - in order to read the notes, you have to hold them up to a mirror! If you check this book out, get a mirror ready, because there's some mirror writing to decipher. Back to Leo -- he was way, way ahead of his time. Many of his "inventions" only existed in his notes - they never got made into real life prototypes until thousands of years later [showcase page with Wright brothers and Leo's "ornithopter"]. If we look at this picture of the Wright brothers in 1903, and this picture of Leo's "ornithopter," 400 years before that, we see that Leo thought of it first! [Turn the page to the hang gliders]. Leo even thought of hang gliders and drew them up as designs, long before the first successful hang glider was successfully flown. His mind was amazing. His designs were brilliant. This is a fun, fascinating book: Neo Leo: The Ageless Ideas of Leonardo da Vinci by Gene Barretta.