Andrew Clements was born in Camden, New Jersey in 1949. He moved to Oaklyn and Cherryhill till sixth grade. Then, he moved to Springfield, Illinois.
Clements loved to read when he was young, and loved to observe things around him. He never woke up thinking he would be an author when he grew up, though. He thinks the only reason he is an author is because he loved to read and observe.
In high school, he had to work hard on writing. His teacher told him he was good at writing. That made a big impression on him. In college, he started writing a little for fun.
He took an extra year of studying, because he wanted to be a teacher when he grew up. He stopped teaching for two years after seven years of teaching. After those two years, he worked in the publishing business. Little by little writing became important to him. One day, he was asked to write a picture book about something that happens underwater for an illustrator named Yoshi, so he wrote a story called Big Al in 1987.
Then in 1990, he wrote the book Frindle. It got published in 1996, it was popular. He started writing more stories after that.
Now he lives in New York.
(This is primary, because it's an autobiography and autobiographies are not written by the person in the story)
11/2010
