What? Who? Now? Yes, if you’re checking the calendar you’ll see that three whole months of 2016 have gone by and you know what that means. Prediction time! But Betsy, you say, that is quite simply the kookiest thing I’ve ever heard. It’s March, for crying out loud. We’ve ten months until the next award […]
Fickle little me. Titles appear. Titles disappear. Many of the books I placed on my Spring 2017 predictions list are gone by June, and what has changed? Aren’t the books as wonderful now as they were when I originally propped them up? Of course they are, but I’ve done enough book discussions in the intervening […]
Inspiring Books for Girls about Extraordinary Women - Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls, Women in Science, Rad Radical Women, Harriet Tubman and more.
Happy Picture Book Month! I am participating in a 2017 Mock Caldecott unit with Mr. Colby Sharp's third graders. We will read, e...
Happy Picture Book Month! I am participating in a 2017 Mock Caldecott unit with Mr. Colby Sharp's third graders. We will read, e...
Fickle little me. Titles appear. Titles disappear. Many of the books I placed on my Spring 2017 predictions list are gone by June, and what has changed? Aren’t the books as wonderful now as they were when I originally propped them up? Of course they are, but I’ve done enough book discussions in the intervening […]
Mock Caldecott is one of my very favourite things to do in the classroom! This year, with a Grade 4 and 5 classroom, I was able to stretch the analysis process further and deeper with my students. …
What? Who? Now? Yes, if you’re checking the calendar you’ll see that three whole months of 2016 have gone by and you know what that means. Prediction time! But Betsy, you say, that is quite simply the kookiest thing I’ve ever heard. It’s March, for crying out loud. We’ve ten months until the next award […]
Fickle little me. Titles appear. Titles disappear. Many of the books I placed on my Spring 2017 predictions list are gone by June, and what has changed? Aren’t the books as wonderful now as they were when I originally propped them up? Of course they are, but I’ve done enough book discussions in the intervening […]
They All Saw a Cat By Brendan Wenzel Chronicle Books $16.99 ISBN: 978-1-4521-5013-0 Ages 4-7 On shelves now It’s funny. Unless you’re a teacher or librarian, a grown adult that does not work or live with children will come into very little contact with picture books. Then, one day, they produce a few kids and […]
Welcome the season with these beautiful books about spring! Each of my seasonal theme packs comes with a list of recommended books to read aloud. We love putting together our book lists! I check out
Happy Picture Book Month! I am participating in a 2017 Mock Caldecott unit with Mr. Colby Sharp's third graders. We will read, e...
Last week, I shared the first half of my favorite picks for this year's Caldecott Award. Today I'll finish up my picks, and by the end of December I hope to have the finalized ballot put together for our school's Mock Caldecott discussion and voting. (Click the 'Caldecott' tag to see previous ballots and winners. Our students have a great track record over the last two years, having previous picked winner/honor books like Finding Winnie, Waiting, and Beekle.) Mock Caldecott 2017 Contenders, part 2 The Princess and the Warrior: a tale of two volcanoes illustrated and written by Duncan Tonatiuh. This classic legend from ancient Mexico has roots in the Aztec and Tlaxcalan cultures, and Duncan has also included a connection to the Mixtec codices which inspired his signature artistic style. The artwork is incredible, and the story reads like a Shakespearean tragedy. This is a wonderful addition to any classroom or library. For more about Duncan Tonatiuh, please read Featured Illustrator: Duncan Tonatiuh, part 1: fictional stories and part 2: biographies. I expect this one to rate highly in our school's Mock Caldecott voting, as Duncan will be visiting our school next month! Return (2016) by Aaron Becker. It's here, it's here! The glorious and satisfying conclusion to the trilogy begun with Journey [a Caldecott Honor book] and continued with Quest. Return brings a new character into the fold - the girl's father, who begins the story by ignoring her kite-flying pleas. I was so pleased with how this story ties the whole series together, and I cannot wait to reread all three of them and analyze the hints and connections within them. (A review copy of the book was provided by the Candlewick Best in Class mailing. All thoughts are my own.) Some Writer! The Story of E. B. White (2016) by Melissa Sweet. I need to write an ode about how much I love Melissa Sweet. Her scrapbooky style of artwork is always so inspiring, and she did an amazing job incorporating so many actual photographs and ephemera from the White family. This biography seems like an instant classic for anyone who loves and appreciates the stories of E. B. White. As a teacher, one of my favorite insights was the inclusion of multiple (wildly different) drafts of the opening page of Charlotte's Web. A mini-lesson in the making. Follow the Moon Home: a tale of one idea, twenty kids, and a hundred sea turtles illustrated by Meilo So and written by Philippe Cousteau and Deborah Hopkinson. Inspired by true events, this picture book tells the story of a classroom of activists who use their observational skills to identify a problem in their sea-side town: baby sea turtles mistaking house lights for the moon and dying before making it to the ocean. This is a great one for teachers to inspire their own activists - and their own towns! Adding this to my list of wonderful books illustrated by Meilo So. Ada's Violin: the story of the recycled orchestra of Paraguay, illustrated by Sally Wern Comport and written by Susan Hood. This book is based on the inspiring true story of the origins of the "recycled orchestra" and its impact on the lives of the kids in it. The illustrations do a fascinating job of using mixed media to tell the visual side of the story, and the backmatter provides more details and photographs of the actual orchestra. Child of Books written and illustrated by Oliver Jeffers and Sam Winston. This one is a fabulous meta-journey about the power of books and being a book reader. The illustrations incorporate lines and pages from famous "classic" books, whose titles and authors appear in the endpapers. My one nitpick with this book is the lack of diversity (both in the books chosen and in the fact that the same books are used repeatedly). Why not branch out? Are We There Yet? written and illustrated by Dan Santat. This story is a visual delight - our poor main character is stuck on a never-ending car ride to his grandmothers, which forces him to get ... creative. Kids will enjoy the interesting twists and turns of this book (literally). And have a phone with a QR code reader handy, just sayin'. Whoosh! Lonnie Johnson's Super-Soaking Stream of Inventions illustrated by Dan Tate and written by Chris Barton. I love this new nonfiction biography of Lonnie Johnson, and I wish it had been published before my students started their Passion Projects this spring. The book does a great job of connecting Lonnie's interests as a kid to his future plans, as well as showing the ups and downs of a real career. Definitely a book I will use with kids in the future! A Hungry Lion or a Dwindling Assortment of Animals illustrated and written by Lucy Ruth Cummings. Sarcastic irreverent picture books have almost become a genre in themselves (I Want My Hat Back, This is Not My Hat, Carnivores, and more). This book plays on that idea, as the title sets you up immediately, but perhaps this book is not what you are expecting. Or is it? (This one is a bit of a wildcard pick but one that I think will appeal to my middle schoolers.) Stay tuned for the final ballot and the results of our school's Mock Caldecott. (Click the 'Caldecott' tag to see previous ballots and winners.) Which books are your favorites? Share in the comments below!
Fickle little me. Titles appear. Titles disappear. Many of the books I placed on my Spring 2017 predictions list are gone by June, and what has changed? Aren’t the books as wonderful now as they were when I originally propped them up? Of course they are, but I’ve done enough book discussions in the intervening […]
Fickle little me. Titles appear. Titles disappear. Many of the books I placed on my Spring 2017 predictions list are gone by June, and what has changed? Aren’t the books as wonderful now as they were when I originally propped them up? Of course they are, but I’ve done enough book discussions in the intervening […]
Every now and then I like to check out the latest Mock Newbery and Caldecott lists on Goodreads. Are they official guides to the books that are under discussion/might win? No. Just some lists voted on by interested readers. They are often pretty predictive, however. For instance, take a look at the top two books […]
Next up in our countdown of the top posts of 2016 on The Logonauts: the most-read book review and book recommendation posts from this year! Click here for more Top Posts of 2016 or click here for more book recommendations. Top 5 Book Review Posts of 2016 #5: Wordless Wonders: Picture Books to Ponder This post highlights some of my favorite wordless (and nearly wordless) pictures books published in the last few years. These are fabulous books for readers and nonreaders of all ages! #4: New Book Alert: The Girl Who Drank the Moon (Definitely near the top of my list for our school's Mock Newbery as well! I love this book.) #3: Great Graphic Novels for Middle School (part 1: realistic, part 2: fantasy) This two-part series covers some of my must-have graphic novels as I was assembling my classroom library for middle school. These titles have proven to be quite popular with my students as well. #2: Mock Caldecott 2017 (part 1 and part 2) Counting down the days until our school will vote in our own Mock Caldecott. These two posts lay out my favorites. Which are yours? #1: Malala Yousafzai: Warriors With Words #ReadYourWorld I received a copy of this book to review for last January's Multicultural Children's Book Day. If you are interested in finding out more about the wonderful one-day event, click here for details and mark your calendar for January 27, 2017. What are your favorite book review posts? Click here for more book recommendations or click here for more Top Posts of 2016.
Happy Picture Book Month! I am participating in a 2017 Mock Caldecott unit with Mr. Colby Sharp's third graders. We will read, e...
As the weather turns and the year winds down, it's time to start speculating about book awards! This year, my seventh graders and I will be conducting a multi-week Mock Caldecott. Our school librarian and I have been digging through the piles of amazing picture books published this year to narrow down our top choices. This is the first of two posts laying out some of my top picks, and we hope to have our actual ballot finalized before winter break. You can check out part 2 here. (Click the 'Caldecott' tag to see previous ballots and winners. Our students have a great track record the last two years, having previous picked winner/honor books like Finding Winnie, Waiting, and Beekle.) Mock Caldecott 2017 Contenders, part 1 The Water Princess, illustrated by Peter H. Reynolds, written by Susan Verde, and based on the childhood experience of Georgie Badiel. This is a charming story about a young girl's life and the difficulties of not having ready access to water. The book also contains detailed backmatter about the issues and the actual life (and childhood) of Burkina Faso native Georgie Badiel. Reynolds uses a vibrant palette to bring this book to life, as well as his signature sense of fun and use of loose lines. First Light, First Life: a worldwide creation story illustrated by Julie Paschkis and written by Paul Fleishman. I was so thrilled to hear about this new "sequel" to Glass Slipper, Gold Sandal: a worldwide Cinderella. The concept is so powerful - telling the common stories of the world as one, highlighting both commonalities and differences, complemented by the folk art styles of Julie Paschkis. Awe-inspiring. The Cat from Hunger Mountain illustrated and written by Ed Young. This is another incredible picture book offering from master illustrator Ed Young. Done in (torn) paper collage, the illustrations are a fascinating experiment in layering and composition, taking what he started in Wabi Sabi and bringing a little more abstraction and interpretation to it. The story itself is in the style of a legend with a demanding ruler and his constant need to need. Definitely a potential Caldecott contender. Ideas Are All Around written and illustrated by Philip C. Stead. I immensely enjoyed this meta-take on inspiration and picture books. A bit long and wordy for a read aloud, but I did read sections of it with my middle schoolers about finding ideas and inspiration in the little things in like that are "all around." It would also be interesting to use as part of an author study of Philip C. Stead to see if there are references to ideas/inspirations for some of his other published works ... Last Friday, our school's librarian came bursting into the study hall I was overseeing to let me know that a package had arrived from Penguin (Candlewick) with a sticker outside identifying the content as books to be published on Oct. 11th. We ripped in hopefully and were rewarded with an advanced copy of We Found a Hat by Jon Klassen! Of course, we read it immediately. Fans of Jon Klassen's now-classic Caldecott Honor-winning I Want My Hat Back and Caldecott-winning This is Not My Hat will be truly delighted with the conclusion of this trilogy. Every detail is as perfectly-done as its predecessors. (Truly, I think an entire dissertation could be written analyzing Klassen's use of eyes to convey emotions across these three books.) I don't want to say too much or ruin the joy of reading this one for yourself. Can he complete a Caldecott trifecta? He's got my vote! (A review copy of the book was provided by publisher. All thoughts are my own.) School's First Day of School illustrated by Christian Robinson and written by Adam Rex. This is a must-have book for back to school - and for talking about perspective and point-of-view. School has just been built and soon discovers exactly what his new mission entails ... with both heart-warming and laugh-out-loud moments on his first day of being a school. Even my seventh graders couldn't help but enjoy this one. They All Saw a Cat illustrated and written by Brendan Wenzel is an incredible take on the idea of perspective and multiple points of view, and I love the different styles and feelings of the artwork throughout this book. I am very curious to discuss this one with my students! (I've been holding off until our Mock Caldecott discussions.) Ida, Always illustrated by Charles Santoso and written by Caron Levis is a powerful story about death, both impending death and the grief that follows. Having lost a close family member this summer, this book hit my hard, but it was very beautifully done. I did manage to make it through without crying while reading it aloud to my students, but you could have heard a pin drop in the room when we finished. Powerful. Stay tuned for next week and part two of my Caldecott 2017 predictions! (Click the 'Caldecott' tag to see previous ballots and winners.) Which books are your favorites? Share in the comments below!
Portis, Antoinette. Now. New York: Roaring Brook Press, 2017. Antoinette Portis is one of my favorite author/illustrators of child’s books. Her new book Now deals with a topic that is common …
Announcing the children’s Newbery book award winner and and Caldecott Medal award for 2017 and the honor winners for each!! This year, the The Newbery for...
Radiant Child: The Story of Young Artist Jean-Michel Basquiat By Javaka Steptoe Little, Brown & Co. $17.99 ISBN: 978-0-316-21388-2 Ages 5 and up On shelves October 25th True Story: I’m working the children’s reference desk of the Children’s Room at 42nd Street of New York Public Library a couple years ago and a family walks […]
