Module 5 – American Born Chinese

image from www.amazon.com

Yang, G.L. (2006) American Born Chinese. New York, NY: First Second Books.

Summary –

American Born Chinese, a graphic novel by Gene Luen Yang, and winner of the Printz Award and Eisner Award, interweaves three major story arc into one.  First of all, it tells the story of the Monkey King, a character of Chinese folk tales, who is determined to prove to all the other deities that he is The Great Sage, and Equal of Heaven. His hubris attracts the attention of Tze-You-Tzuh, “He who is”, the master of all and creator of the universe.  Imprisoned under a mountain of rocks for 500 years, the Monkey King eventual learns to accept his nature and be happy to live as a monkey. After he accepts his role in life, he becomes the disciple of an itinerant monk named Wong Lai-Tsao. Secondly, it tells the story of Jin Wang, a second generation Chinese immigrant trying to fit in at a middle school in the suburbs, where the only other Asian kid in his class is Suzy Nakamura. Eventually, another boy from Taiwan, Wie-Chen Sun, joins his class and the two slowly become best friends. The third story is that of Danny and Cousin Chin-Kee. Danny is a blond haired, blue eyed American teen, and his cousin Chin-Kee is portrayed using every possible horrible racist stereotype of a Chinese immigrant.  Chin-Kee’s crazy antics embarrass Danny so much that he’s had to move from school to school to avoid all the taunts from his fellow classmates. The three stories finally intersect at the end in an interesting plot twist (which I hate to reveal for those who have not read the book). But in all, the story is a great lesson in learning to accept yourself for what you are, regardless of what others may think of you.

Lucien’s thoughts –

Ever since this book won an Eisner Award, it’s been on my to-do list.  I’m glad this class gave me the opportunity to read it, since it is a lovely book.  The three parallel story lines (each a slightly different genre: folk-tale, realistic fiction, and satire) are all told in simple language and beautifully illustrated.  The writing is clear and engaging, and the main story of Jin Wang’s struggles fitting in at school are universal: he has to deal with bullies, his feelings for a girl in his class, and his desire to fit in.  While the novel is particularly interesting for immigrant readers for its intriguing exploration into the challenges of cultural assimilation, it’s a story that all can enjoy and learn from.  The story of the Monkey King is told mostly as a parable for learning to accept yourself, although I found the message to be a bit didactic. Nevertheless, I enjoyed the book quite a bit and think this graphic novel belongs in every library that services an ESL population.  Yang’s novel of self-acceptance and the power of friendship is well worth a read.

Librarian’s use –

This is a graphic novel that talks about the value of friendship.  One activity that comes to mind is asking help from a school’s art teacher to have the audience make a comic book illustrating how they met their best friend. Two things that can be highlighted are the conventions of using square boxes to provide narrator’s voice and word balloons to give the characters' speech. They can then tell a story in their own words and pictures about their best friend, focusing on what text belongs in a narrator’s box and what text belongs as characters' speech.

Other reviews –

Blasingame, J. (2007). American born Chinese. English journal , 97 (1), 99.

Yang's book is a seamless blend of three genres: a Chinese fable, a realistic/problem novel, and a parody/satire. That a graphic novel can successfully envelop three distinct genres proves the point Kristin Fletcher-Spear, Merideth Jenson-Benjamin, and Teresa Copeland make in their ALAN Review article "The Truth about Graphic Novels: A Format, Not a Genre" (32.2: 37-44). By using facial expressions and body gestures, and by varying the angle of perspective, Yang provides information that goes beyond what the print text can offer. The format allows for visual clues such as hairstyles: When Jin Wang's social ostracism becomes nearly unbearable, he adopts the hairstyle of his school's alpha male, Greg. Danny has the same hairstyle, which is a subtle suggestion of his true identity, revealed at the novel's end.

American Born Chinese is both comical and heart-wrenching. Yang successfully pokes fun at ignorant teachers who cannot get Asian students' names right, who assume that Chinese social customs entail all kinds of bizarre practices, and who think anyone with an Asian name must be a newly arrived immigrant. Much of the story illustrates the hurt and harm done to kids who are from minority ethnic backgrounds and cultural heritages. Jin's classmates are forever making racial jokes and figuratively and literally slipping in ethnic slurs.

The pacing has the quickness afforded by a graphic format, facilitating and adding to the reading. Yang is not only a brilliant storyteller but also a gifted cartoonist, and the synergy of these two talents makes American Born Chinese more than it could have been as just a print-text book.

Fu, B. (2007). American born Chinese, by Gene Luen Yang. MELUS, 32 (3), 274-276.

Nominated for the 2006 National Book Award in the Young People's Literature category, American Born Chinese is mature in artistic design and visually engaging. Yet what makes it especially appealing to both young and mature readers is its narrative depth. Juxtaposing three seemingly unrelated story lines, the novel opens with a retelling of the story of the Monkey King, the renowned mythic hero in Chinese folklore. The second tale, a Bildungsroman, illustrates how Jin Wang... struggles to survive exclusion and racist bullying in his search for an identity in a predominantly white suburban school. In the third narrative thread, Chin-Kee, a deluxe combo of the worst racial stereotypes involving Asian Americans, pays an annual visit to his cousin Danny in America, turning the latter's school life into a nightmare. By the end of the novel, however, the three separate tales are cleverly woven together in a dramatic climax, highlighting the work's focus on ethnic self-acceptance and empowerment...

If the Monkey King serves as a source of cultural empowerment in Jin Wang's personal development, Chin-Kee's character appears to be the monkey's evil double. He is provocatively repulsive and hilariously funny at the same time. An intruder into the American classroom, he sings "She Bang, She Bang" (a la the well-known American Idol contestant William Hung) while dancing grotesquely in a traditional Chinese dress on a desk. His spittle which is rumored to have spread SARS around the school-and his home-made "Clispy Flied Cat Gizzards wiff Noodle" (114) make him an ultimate spectacle of racial degradation. Yet he is also wickedly smart and subversive, reminding the reader of the Monkey King himself. The blatant racial stereotype that Chin-Kee stands for has long denied Asians a place in American culture. Yet, in Yang's novel, when Chin-Kee finally reveals his true identity, he emerges as the epitome of transformation and subversion.

Song, M. H. (2010). “How good it is to be a monkey”: Comics, racial formation, and American Born Chinese. Mosaic: A journal for the interdisciplinary study of literature, 43 (1), 73-92.

Gene Luen Yang's American Born Chinese demonstrates the difficulty of following the development of Asian American racial formations. It does so through the skillful use of its medium, comics, prompting readers to consider how much the meaning of race has changed, in what ways, and where this change might lead.

More than any other racial minority in the United States, Asian Americans have found their status as a racial minority complicated by claims of their many apparent economic successes. At the same time, they remain battered by perceptions that they are somehow alien to the nation… Gene Luen Yang's American Born Chinese stands out as particularly focused on this problem. In this work, past and present ways of thinking about Asian Americans collapse into each other. As a result, readers are encouraged to ponder how much race thinking has changed, in what ways, and where this change might be leading. American Born Chinese prompts such a response by employing the unique qualities of its medium, comics, to reflect back to the reader the difficulty of following the development of Asian American racial formations... Yang stands out for his willingness to bend the conventions of genre storytelling to contribute to his realist aspirations. Yang's work is thus situated between the twin poles of realism and genre fiction that currently seem to divide creative work in this medium in the United States, resulting in narratives that appeal to, and are suitable for, both mature and young adult readers. At the same time, because his works are longer, they have more room to tell fairly involved stories and to develop a theme at length

Module 4 – A Wrinkle in Time

image from www.amazon.com

L’Engle, M. (1962). A wrinkle in time. New York, NY: Farrar, Strauss, and Giroux.

Summary —

The Newbery Award-winning novel by Madeleine L’Engle tells the tale of Meg Murry, little brother Charles Wallace, and classmate Calvin O’Keefe as they travel through space and time to rescue Meg’s missing father, physicist Dr. Murry.  The three children are aided by what first appear to be three witches, Mrs. Whatsit, Mrs. Who, and Mrs. Which, who later reveal themselves to be angelic creatures of untold age who have simply taken human form for the sake of interacting with the children.  Through a folding of space/time, which the novels calls a tesseract, the three children are first taken to a planet Uriel, filled with centaur-like beings of incredible beauty, where the three ladies revel that there is a dark being who battles goodness and light, and that their father is to be found in a planet that is under the control of The Black Thing.  They learn that Earth is planet that is partly covered by this dark cloud, but luminaries from Earth’s philosophers, artists, and great religious figures have all struggled against it.  The three children then travel via tesseract to Camazotz in search of Dr. Murry.  There, they discover a dystopian world where all inhabitants live and work in perfect harmony with the mind which controls everything on the planet and which completely stomps out all things which are not in harmony with the hive mind. At the center of the capitol is CENTRAL Central intelligence, where the three children meet a man with red eyes, a human emissary for the mind in control of the planet.  Charles Wallace then allows himself to be taken over by this external force, and under its power takes Meg and Calvin to where Dr, Murry is held captive. Meg is able to rescue her father, and all of them follow Charles Wallace to meet the source of the mind control, a large disembodied brain called IT. Dr. Murry is able to tesseract with Meg and Calvin in tow, but they leave Charles Wallace behind, because ripping him out of control from IT would have done him mental harm.  The three land in a neighboring planet, Ixchel, where the inhabitants are sightless, tentacle beasts who prove to be wise and welcoming of the wayward humans.  One of them, which Meg calls Aunt Beast, nurtures her back to health, since she was frozen and nearly killed by the darkness which engulfs planet Camazotz.  Mr. Whatsit, Mrs. Who, and Mrs. Which arrive on Ixchel and task Meg with rescuing her brother from the dark grip of IT.  She comes armed with the one thing IT doesn’t have, love.  Once Meg realizes that she still has her love of her little brother, she focuses on all her love for Charles Wallace, and breaks his connection with the darkness. Once Charles Wallace is free, Mrs. Whatsit tesseracts all four humans back to Earth, where Dr. Murray is reunited with his family.

Lucien’s thoughts —

This was a book that I loved reading when I was a child, and have only recently re-read for this class.  Now, as an adult, I think I can explain why this book was so influential, to me and to so many others.  First of all, it’s protagonist is a child who is struggling to find out who she is; Meg is beset by self-doubt and feelings of being an outsider, not quite as smart as her genius younger brother Charles Wallace nor as able to blend in as her more normal twin brothers Sandy and Dennys.  She perfectly captures that awkward no-man-land that is so common a feeling at that age, beset by anger and stubbornness and a general emotional immaturity.  She has started to lose the innocence of youth, but doesn’t quite yet have the maturity and self-confidence of young adulthood.  She misses her father and is quite aware of the various rumors that surround his disappearance. Though rather bright, she doesn’t do very well in school, where her nonconformist ways keep getting her in trouble.  She is an all-too-relatable character for a young reader, and through her, L’Engle is able to make the reader invested in the novel’s adventures to rescue her father.  Later, when Meg is recovering from her brush with the darkness, she is filled with anger and resentment that Dr. Murry was unable to save her little brother, Charles Wallace.  It’s obvious that some of her negative feelings are lingering effects of her contact with evil.  But nevertheless, she voices the fears and frustrations that accompany readers of that age, as they are starting to have conflicts with their own parents and starting to become aware that they are flawed and imperfect human beings.  Meg engages the reader, and provides a platform for L’Engle to connect with her audience. Thus we celebrate when Meg is able to take all her flaws and strength to defeat the darkness with something as simple as love for her sibling.  She is able to remember the love that she has felt from all her relationships (Mother, Father, Mrs. Whatsit, Aunt Beast, etc.) and focus it on pulling back her little brother from the grips of IT. L’Engles book is a celebration of all the things that make us unique, yet still embraces our common struggle against the dark that surrounds us.

Librarian’s use —

Some of the most memorable parts of A Wrinkle in Time are the otherworldly characters introduced: the centaur creatures of Uriel, the tentacle beasts of Ixchel, the red-eyed man at CENTRAL Central intelligence, and the horrible disembodied brain IT. Ask the students to draw their favorite non-human character using the descriptions found in the text of the book.  Display all the different interpretations of the creatures illustrated.

Another possible idea is to use A Wrinkle in Time to explore astronomy.  Bring in illustrations of the Milky Way galaxy and other pictures of other stars; bring in charts of our own solar system.  Discuss the distances involved in interplanetary travel as depicted in the novel.  Discuss how it is that Mrs. Whatsit is able to tesseract across galaxies, while Dr. Murry is barely able to tesseract between neighboring planets, and how vast the differences in travel distance there is between the two. Ask the audience to consider why it is that one is able to travel so much further.

Other reviews —

A legend in time. (2007). Scholastic scope, 56 (8), 5.

Never quit doing something you love. That's the lesson Madeleine L'Engle learned after 26 publishers rejected her novel, A Wrinkle in Time (1962)… When she finally found a publisher, A Wrinkle in Time became one of the most popular young adult novels ever! Today, critics still extol L'Engle for her lovable characters and cool blend of science fiction, fantasy, and adventure… "Why does anybody tell a story?" L'Engle once asked. Answering her own question, she replied, "It has to do with faith that our little human lives are not irrelevant, that what we choose or say or do matters, matters cosmically." For the millions of people who continue to fall in love with her stories, that couldn't be more true.

Livingston, N. (2003). A wrinkle in time. The reading teacher, 57 (1), 100.

This book was awarded the 1963 Newbery Medal for the most distinguished contribution to American literature for children, so it is ironic that the manuscript was rejected 26 times before it was published. The honor of the medal marked the first time in history that juvenile science fiction-in the story of three children transported from Earth to another planet-was accepted into mainstream children's literature. Written during the Cold War era of nuclear threat and the space race, A Wrinkle in Time delves into the world of space and time travel in the mid-20th century, taking the reader on a journey of the unexplored. L'Engle realistically portrays adolescent anxieties related to physical appearance, family relationships, and one's search for identity. There will always be a Meg, a Charles, or a Calvin inside every reader asking the same guestions: Do I matter? Does anyone care? In A Wrinkle in Time, they find out they are not alone in their pursuit of self-discovery.

Mattson, J. (2007) A wrinkle in time. The booklist, 103 (18), 58-59.

One need only look at lists of Newbery Medal winners in the decades prior to Madeleine L'Engle's A Wrinkle in Time to recognize the novelty of the 1963 committee's choice. Even today, the relative scarcity of youth science fiction is reflected in more recent crops of medalists; how much more surprising, then, that the historical and realistic stories dominating the pre-1963 Newbery Medalists came to be joined by a book involving tesseracts, theoretical physics, and, perhaps most startling of all, a heroine at a time when male characters like Tom Swift were most strongly associated with children's sf…

In hindsight, it's not so difficult to imagine why the time was ripe for A Wrinkle in Time; having been released the same year as the Cuban missile crisis, and in the thick of the race to land a man on the moon, a novel that projected youngsters into space to fight a looming "Dark Thing" must have plugged directly into children's most immediate interests and concerns…

But many novels that precisely fit their moment eventually age into quaint set pieces, while Wrinkle has endured through 69 hardcover printings (and numerous paperback, audio, and audiovisual formats) to enjoy its forty-fifth anniversary this year…

Indeed, in an era of No Child Left Behind controversy, L'Engle's comments in her Newbery acceptance speech have the same timeless resonance as her fiction: "There are forces working in the world as never before in the history of mankind for standardization, for the regimentation of us all, or what I like to call making muffins of us, muffins all like every other muffin in the muffin tin."

Its resistance to conclusions that pop fully formed from the muffin tin may be one of the secrets to A Wrinkle in Time's resilience-that, along with its perennially reassuring message about the ability of frail humans to avert doomsday. As Voiklis reflected, "Wrinkle doesn't offer answers, but I think it does offer people who are trying to understand their place in the universe a model for how to ask questions, and how to listen, and how to live joyfully in the midst of struggle."

Module 4 – Holes

image from www.amazon.com

Sachar, L.(1998) Holes. New York, NY: Frances Foster Books.

Summary –

In this Newbery Award winning novel by Louis Sachar, we follow the adventures of Stanley Yelnats, an unlucky, overweight teen who has been found guilty of stealing a pair of sneakers. As punishment, he’s sent to Camp Green Lake, a camp for wayward boys. Under the control of the Warden and her counselors, the boys spend all day every day digging up holes in the dry Texas heat.  Digging starts at 5 a.m. so they can avoid the worst of the sun. Stanley, or Caveman as the other kids call him, makes friends with Zero, X-Ray, Armpit, Zigzag, Squid, and Magnet, the other boys in tent D. When Stanley discovers that Zero (Hector Zeroni) doesn’t know how to read, the two make an arrangement: Zero will help Stanley dig his holes, and Stanley will teach him his letters.   Once their arrangement is discovered by the counselor in charge of Tent D, Mom, Zero is embarrassed publicly by his pointed questions.  He smacks Mom with a shovel and runs away from the camp.  A few days later, Stanley decides to run away as well.  As fate would have it, he eventually finds Zero, and the two make their way across the desert toward God’s Thumb, an odd rock formation that turns out to be surrounded by wild onions, kept green by a welcome supply of water.  The two boys recuperate in the shade of the rock formation, surviving on water and onions, until they decide to sneak back to Camp Green. They plan to dig for treasure in the hole where Stanley had earlier found Kissing Kate Barlow’s lipstick container. They find a mysterious suitcase in the bottom of the hole, but are discovered by the Warden and Mom. Mrs. Mornego, the attorney that Stanley’s family had hired to help Stanley, accompanied by the Texas A.G., intercedes at the just the right moment and has the two boys released into her custody. The suitcase, belonging to Stanley’s great-great-grandfather, contained a treasure-trove of stock certificates.  The boys use part of the money to buy Stanley’s parents a house and to find an investigator to track down Hector’s missing mother.

Lucien’s thoughts –

This has been my favorite book we have had on our reading list thus far.  The writing is hilarious in its brilliant use of understatement, inference, and irony.  Even before we meet the characters, we are introduced to Camp Green Lake, a dry lakebed that once had a lake on it, but now is nothing but holes, rattlesnakes, scorpions, and yellow-spotted lizards. Sachar creates funny, rounded characters from the kids in the Tent D to the characters of the novel’s backstory: the original Stanley Yelnats, outlaw Kissing Kate Barlow, and Sam the onion man. It’s uplifting to see how much Stanley grows in character from the beginning of the novel to the end.  In addition, the novel cleverly intertwines the story of present-day Stanley with vignettes from the past; as the story of Stanley’s ancestors and the story of a teacher turned outlaw have profound consequences for the present day action. Sachar deftly interweaves the multiple narrative arcs into one cohesive story that was just nearly impossible to put down. I cannot recommend a book more strongly than I do this one.

Librarian’s use—

One of the topics that is central to the flashback story of Kate and Sam is the fact that he is an African-American and she is a white school-teacher.  In Texas, as in much of the South, it was illegal at that time for them to kiss.  Sam is chased and shot to death by a lynch mob, and the town Sheriff condones the mob’s actions.  The book provides a glimpse into a period in time when Jim Crow laws made it difficult for African-American in the South to lead their lives. This can be a window to a discussion of changes in the laws that allow people of different races to marry each other and how things have changed for the better. The librarian can tie this novel to other books about life in South under Jim Crow laws, selecting from appropriate biographies, non-fiction, and fiction books.

Other Reviews —

Wannamaker, A. (2006) Reading in the gaps and lacks: (De)Constructing Masculinity in Louis Sachar’s Holes. Children’s literature in education, 37 (1), 15-33.

Louis Sachar’s novel Holes (US, 1998; UK, 2000) has received much praise from both critics and child readers, who love the complex tall tale he has woven about two boys whose lives are connected by fate and an almost magical legacy of ancestral curses and obligations. Sachar creates characters and situations that seem realistic, but always teeter over to the side of the magical because they are wonderfully excessive and draw on common motifs from legends, folk tales, and popular culture... The novel does not easily fit into any one genre: while it is often classified as contemporary realism, it could also fit into the categories of fantasy or magical realism... This rich and complex novel – also on the border between children’s and young adult literature – has been awarded the Newbery Medal, the National Book Award, the ALA Best Book for Young Adults award, the School Library Journal Best Bookof the Year award, and several other major awards.

Furthermore, at a time when educators, parents, and U.S. policy makers are becoming increasingly concerned about reports of boys’ declining levels of literacy, Holes could be seen as a useful book that can interest boys in reading: it is easy to read, the plot moves quickly, it is adventurous, and it features likeable boy protagonists.

Mollegaard, K. H (2010) Haunting and history in Louis Sachar’s Holes. Western American literature, 45 (2), 139-161.

Many landscapes of the US West, fictional as well as real, are haunted by specters of the past. Jacques Derrida noted in Specters of Marx (1994) that linear history cannot explain how the past saturates the present, nor can it explain how time seems to be out of joint when events from the past reemerge and provoke events in the present... Specters of the past are always part of the present, not merely as revivals of the past, but as crucial cultural and political factors that set in motion events in the present... Since Holes is one of the few books evoking Wild West mythology and frontier history recommended on current junior high/high school reading lists, anyone interested in the literature of the US West should consider how this novel simultaneously deconstructs and infuses the notoriously "empty" landscapes of the West with specters of racial violence, rebellious women, and Wild West legends.

Module 3 – Tuesday

image from www.amazon.com

Wiesner, D. (1991). Tuesday. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Company.

Summary –

In this nearly wordless Caldecott award-winning book, frogs take flight one Tuesday evening, floating over the swamp and into town.  Their flight startles the fish and turtles in their swamp, and the birds and dogs in town.  While the inhabitants of the town sleep, the flogs fly into houses to watch late-night TV and soar through the hanging sheets on the clotheslines.  As dawn approaches, the frogs return home, leaving the town police a weird set of clues to try to understand.  The following Tuesday, it’s the pigs’ turn to fly!

Lucien’s thoughts –

This is definitely a weird and wonderful little book. The powerful illustrations drive the whimsical story.  Without a single explanation as to why the frogs are flying, the book captures the excitement as the frogs take flight and explore the nocturnal environs of a small sub-urban town.  The story is humorous and the watercolors are drawn in a near-realistic style, which is a fun disjuncture from the fantastical story being told.  The images clearly capture all the small details: turtles on logs, the back of a television, the police and ambulance vehicles on the scene the following morning.  This books just invites rereading to view all the little details in the backgrounds of the images.

Librarian’s use –

This book’s lack of words invites the reader to fill in with their imagination.  A book like this can be great for pre-readers, since it doesn’t have words to trip them up.  Young audience members can be asked to try to provide a narration of the images in their own words. One activity that is perfect for wordless books like this one is to make photocopies of the pictures into a book that has space at the bottom. Readers can then be invited to write down their narrative to go along with the pictures.  Each audience maker thus becomes co-author of his or her own version of Tuesday.  Different co-authored books can then be compared one to another to see what details the “author” focused on and what details are different.

Other reviews –

Cassady, J. (1998). Wordless books: No-risk tools for inclusive middle-grade classrooms. Journal of adolescent and adult literacy, 41 (6), 428-432.

Wiesner commented in an interview (Caroff & Mole, 1992) that he has received numerous letters from students in drama classes, English as a Second Language classes, and creative writing classes who have used his wordless picture book, Tuesday. Wiesner identifies one of the most valuable characteristics of wordless books-the endless possibilities for creative interpretations… The use of wordless books can encourage reluctant and struggling readers in middle school and junior high to read, develop vocabulary, and make the connection between written and spoken language. Older readers seem to respond to wordless books because they are so visually appealing and because they often involve cleverly developed plots.

Silvey, A. (2002). David Wiesner. The horn book magazine, 78 (4), 401-405.

In an age obsessed with marketing, David allows his books to do the talking. Although he proves a charming guest at a conference, library, or bookstore, he travels infrequently to make public appearances. Because his energy, time, and talent go into creating books, each book becomes stronger, and readers react to its inherent qualities rather than the publicity about it. Although this course of action generally produces fewer initial sales, in the long run only the book and the way children respond to the book matter. David never forgets what truly matters.

Pinkney, J. (2012). My favorite Caldecott. The horn book magazine, 88 (4), 18.

David Weisner’s command of watercolor in Tuesday (1992) is masterful and his visual storytelling is flawless.

Dooley, P. (1991) Tuesday (Book). School library journal, 35 (5), 86.

Dominated by rich blues and greens, and fully exploiting its varied perspectives, this book treats its readers to the pleasures of airborne adventure. It may not be immortal, but kids will love its lighthearted, meticulously imagined, fun-without-amoral fantasy. Tuesday is bound to take off.

Module 3 – Grandfather’s Journey

image from www.amazon.com

Say, A. (1993). Grandfather’s journey. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Company.

Summary –

The author recounts the story of his grandfather’s travels as a young man, when he left Japan in a steamship to visit North America.  His grandfather traveled all across America in a variety of transportation modes: train, boat, and by foot.  He loved seeing new places and longed to travel even more; he met people of all different backgrounds.  He finally returned to Japan to marry a wife, and the two of them moved to San Francisco, where they raised a daughter (the author’s mother). Once she was nearly grown, they returned to Japan, where she married and had a little boy (the author as a child). The author remembers his grandfather fondly recounting the beauty of California, land that he loved. Although his grandfather planned to cross the Pacific once more, war came, and scattered their lives like leaves in the wind.  Grandfather’s house in the city was destroyed, and he returned to the village where he grew up.  Although the grandfather never got a chance to return to his beloved California, the author honored his grandfather’s memory and visited California once he was a young man.  He stayed there and raised a daughter of his own, occasionally returning to the rivers and mountains of his youth.  He explains how he now understands his grandfather’s longings, always glad to be in one country but homesick for the other country.This is a lovely story about the feelings of an immigrant, in love with both countries he  calls home.

Lucien’s thoughts – 

This was my favorite book from this week’s readings.  I thought the language of the story was very simple and easy to enjoy, and it left plenty of room for the illustrations to show the beauty of the lands where the grandfather traveled.  The economy of words is well balance by the gorgeous paintings.  The beautiful landscapes and realistic portraits add so much richness to the little story of loving more than one country; I often felt as if the pages came out of his grandfather’s photo albums of the people and places he encountered.  The story is also very tender in the way the author remembers little details in his grandfather’s life. For example, he remembers that his grandfather surrounded himself with songbirds, but after the war, he no longer did.  The story is very delicate in how it touches on a grandfather’s love for his grandson, and how much the author misses his grandfather, now that he is gone. In general, I found it to be a touching story, without being overtly sugary. It felt simple and real.

Librarian’s use – 

One of the themes that is so strong is this book is the bonds of family.  The librarian can illustrate a family tree using his or her family, and include photographs, names and birthplaces of their family, then invite the audience to make their own family trees.  Children can share where their parents and grandparents were born, or places they have lived in.  The book can easily be a springboard into the topic of genealogy. 

Another possible avenue of exploration is to ask for volunteers in the community who are of Japanese decent to come and give a brief talk about their culture. Invite the audience to view kimonos, tea kettles, and other artifacts of traditional Japanese life. Invite the children to talk about how their grandparents may have had a different culture growing up than the one they are in (this could include the difference between countries, or perhaps the difference between small town life and city life, among others). 

Other reviews – 

Buchoff, R. (1995). Family stories. The reading teacher, 49 (3), 230.

In Grandfather's Journey (Say, 1993), a grandson reminisces about his grandfather's love for two different countries. These beautifully illustrated books help children discover that the memory of a deceased family member can often be kept alive through the creation of a story.

Leonard Lamme, L., Fu, D., McKoy Lowery, R. (2004). Immigrants as portrayed in children’s picture books: a journal for readers, students, and teachers of history. The social studies, 95 (3), 123-129.
 
Feeling lost and homesick is a common experience for many immigrants, whether old or young. Usually it is much harder for school-age children to leave what is familiar or to understand why they have to give up so much and start a new life in a new country. They may wonder, Why did we have to leave our home? ... In the Caldecott-winning book Grandfather's Journey, Allan Say (1993) chronicles the movement of three generations of his family to and from America and Japan. He writes, "The funny thing is, the moment I am in one country, I am homesick for the other" (31).
 
Desai, C. (2004) Weaving words and pictures: Allen Say and the art of illustration. The lion and the unicorn, 28 (3), 408-428.

Alien Say was raised in Japan and immigrated to the US as a young man-thus retracing his grandfather's steps, as he describes in his Caldecott Award winning picture book, Grandfather's Journey (1993). As he encounters the wonder and discovery of the immigrant experience, the story's narrator appreciates his grandfather's complicated cultural identity and his sense of displacement in both worlds… His works show mastery of the cartoonist's command of line, action, and comedy; the Japanese artistic sense of harmony, simplicity, and suggestion; and the Western artist's sense of expansiveness, realism, and color. Say uses these talents to create moods and extend the meaning of the texts in ways appropriate to each work.

Module 2 – Madeline

image from www.amazon.com

Bemelmans, L. (1939). Madeline. New York, NY: Puffin Books.

Summary –

“In an old house in Paris that was covered in vines
lived twelve little girls in two straight lines.”

Miss Clavel is the nun in a habit who lives in the old house in Paris. She’s in charge of twelve little girls, the smallest and bravest of which is young Madeline. She’s not afraid of mice in the kitchen or tigers in the zoo.  She loves to skate and frighten  Miss Clavel with acts of daring. One night, Madeline comes down with a horrible pain, and Miss Clavel phones the doctor. It’s Madeline’s appendix, and it must come out.  She spends the next ten days recovering at the hospital, where the other girls come to visit her, bringing flowers. Once she shows the girls her new scar, all eleven want to have their appendixes out, too.

Lucien’s thoughts –

This beautiful story told in rhyme is a treasure.  The couplets are great for reading out loud to pre-readers, who can enjoy the sing-song lilt of this delightful tale.  The language is lively, yet simple, and it tells the story of how the littlest girl can have the biggest heart, by not being afraid of the things that might frighten other girls.  I love the fact that Madeline is shown as having courage and spunk, and I can see why she’s part of a long literary tradition of brave girl heroines.

Bemelmans deftly illustrates his own book with landmarks from Paris, including the Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame, and the Opera House, using a loose and impressionistic drawing style.  The twelve little girls are drawn in bright yellow uniforms with broad-brimmed yellow hats.  The color pallet of the illustrations is spare, often times monochromatic with accents in yellows, reminiscent of children’s own art work. Nevertheless, Bemelmans artwork captures the architecture of Paris in with his fun sketches.

Librarian’s use –

I think one of the new concepts that librarians can explore with young readers is the need for unplanned visits to the doctor.  Starting with appendectomies and moving on to tonsillectomies and other childhood ailments, the librarian can ask the audience to contribute stories from their lives about visits to the doctor, both planned and unplanned.  Reader can discuss times when they were brave in the face of scary medical adventures (such as needles and vaccine shots or visits to the ER).  The librarian can then ask the audience to draw pictures of their medical adventure story.

Other Reviews –

Eastman, J. (1991) Aesthetic distancing in Ludwig Bemelmans’ Madeline. Children’s Literature, 19, 75-89.

For a young reader, one of the most satisfying of these delights is a pervasive sense of controlled danger—a tantalizing tension between the anarchical naughtiness of a supremely vulnerable heroine on the one hand, and, on the other hand, the order and sense of aesthetic distance implicit in such elements as rhymed couplets and the recurring image of "twelve little girls in two straight lines." Madeline's central crisis is as compelling as that of many fairy tales; the climactic rush to the hospital for an emergency appendectomy embodies two of childhood's most painful and frightening possibilities—separation from loved ones and a brush with death… This opposition between symmetry and asymmetry, between order and anarchy, civilization and nature energizes all of Madeline, at the same time that the dominance of the forces of order affords us a sense of security. The mightily glowing sun—a powerful locus of yellow which our black-and-white reproduction cannot adequately depict—suggests the unharnessed force of nature. On the other hand, the massive buildings, the perfect double-line formation of children, and the placement of trees symmetrically suggest the restraints of civilization.

Munson-Benson, C. (2006) 15 picture-book classics for preschoolers. Book Links, 15 (6), 66-68.

This Caldecott Honor Book can barely contain the exuberance of the spunky main character, Madeline, whose exploits in Paris—where she resides with 11 other girls and their headmistress, Miss Clavel—fascinate preschoolers, who delight in the lilting rhyme and her derring-do in this first book…

Breen, K., Fader, E., Odean, K. & Sutherland, Z. (2000) One hundred books that shaped the century. School Library Journal 46 (1), 50.

This all-time favorite introduces one of the best-loved, best-known, and most enduring characters in children's books. Fearless and intrepid, Madeline will live on forever.

Module 2 - Mr. Popper’s Penguins

image from www.amazon.com

Atwater, R. & Atwater, F. (1938) Mr. Popper’s penguins.  (R. Lawson, Illustrator). Boston, MA: Little, Brown and Co.

Summary –

Mr. Popper is a house painter who loves reading about foreign places. Although he has never left his hometown of Stillwater, he’s fascinated with tales of expeditions to the earth’s poles.  One day, his life is turned upside down by a strange package from the South Pole, which he receives from Admiral Drake. Inside, he finds a penguin who he names Captain Cook. The book follows the adventures of the Popper family as they adopt Captain Cook and later a female penguin named Greta. The two penguins eventually turn to twelve, as the couple’s eggs hatch new chicks.  Mr. and Mrs. Popper and their two children, Janie and Bill, all have an exciting winter as the family adapts to a life of daily adventures with the penguins. However, the Poppers discover caring for a flock of Antarctic fowl can be very expensive.  They decide to train the birds to perform and soon find themselves touring North America to pay the bills. As the cooler months end, Mr. Popper faces the realization that his flock of Mr. Popper’s Performing Penguins will not easily weather the summer. He decides to help Admiral Drake and his North Pole expedition, hoping to bring the Antarctic birds to an Arctic environment.

Lucien’s thoughts –

The writing in this book uses clear and simple sentences to tell its imaginative story of a man whose daydreaming leads to a real-life adventure.  It introduces a large number of new vocabulary terms that younger children may not yet know.  It’s a chapter book and would lend itself very well to being read aloud a chapter at a time to children that can’t yet master reading it by themselves; each chapter has enough exciting adventures to fill a story-telling, yet they often end in enough of a cliff-hanger that readers will want to continue on to the next chapter.  The premise of the book is just silly enough that it will make children laugh, yet grounded enough in reality that children will learn about the habits of penguins and real life explorers.  For an example of a silly thought taken to absurd conclusions, the Poppers start out by giving over their refrigerator to Captain Cook and end up converting their whole basement into a frozen habitat for the growing family of penguins.  When the Poppers decide to train the penguins for a show, Mrs. Popper plays tunes on the piano, but is forced to learn to play with gloves on, since it’s so cold.  The book is full of silly little touches like that, which are sure to make younger children giggle.  I really enjoyed reading this book, often laughing at the vivid descriptions of the odd scenes that take place when penguins intrude in places where no penguin has gone before (e.g. Stillwater’s Main Street, the barbershop, fine hotels).

As far the illustrations go, the black and white pictures are done in a realistic style, which I honestly found to be a little uninspired.  There are several full page illustrations, as well as illustrations that take up only half a page or less.  The pictures depict the story, with very little extra detail, so while they reinforce the story, they don’t actually add much to the book. I will concede, the illustrations do a good job of showing Mr. Popper’s transformation from untidy house painter to well-dressed stage performer, by showing how his clothing and general neatness improve.  The illustrations also provide reasonably realistic images of the penguins, rather than stylized or cartoony depictions of the animals. In general, the images are serviceable, but not too much more than that.

Librarian’s use –

I think one of the ways to bring this book to life in a library is to use globes and maps to explore some of the places mentioned in the story.  Mr. Popper is fascinated with explorations of places he has never been to, like the North and South Pole.  Later, he tours various cities in North America. He even names the penguins after famous explorers, so it might be useful to discuss with a map places that were discovered by Horatio Nelson, Christopher Columbus, Robert Scott, and Ferdinand Magellan.  The children can then be asked to find on a map different places that they and their families have visited, pointing out that they, too, can explore new places.

Other reviews—

Jones, M. (October 9, 2004). Review a day – Mr. Popper’s Penguins by Richard Atwater review by Powells.com. Retrieved from http://www.powells.com/review/2004_10_09.html

It's time for comfort reading. Something light. Something frivolous. Something completely irrelevant to Iraq, the economy, health care, the environment, or anyone or anything from Texas or Massachusetts. For some, that might mean a moody spy thriller, or a trashy celebrity bio, or a stirring historical romance. Others will find solace in astronomy or bugs or food (though Martha Stewart fans may be at a disadvantage this year). For me, it's penguins.

Even as a little boy, I loved penguins. Who doesn't? They waddle. They toboggan. They squawk. And those little black suits! Come on America, we love black and white. What's not to love?

That's why this month I'm recommending one of my favorite childhood books, Mr. Popper's Penguins. I hadn't read Mr. Popper's in about three decades, but recently stumbled across a copy and enjoyed it like I was eight-years-old all over again. And let me tell you. It's a lot more fun than the Hitler biography I've been working my way through for the past two months. The story is simple. Mr. Popper is a common house painter who secretly longs to travel to Antarctica with Admiral Drake (and what bored house painter doesn't?). So he sends his hero a long adoring letter. The Admiral is so impressed, he not only responds, he sends Mr. Popper a gift: one adult penguin (named Captain Cook). Soon, Mr. Popper receives a second gift, a mate for the Captain, and, by the end of the chapter, baby makes twelve. The Poppers turn their gaggle of penguins into a traveling stage act and become rich and famous. The story has charming illustrations by Robert Lawson and is told with a subtle wit reminiscent of E. B. White.

Still, this title is not right for every reader. Originally published in 1938, Mr. Popper's Penguins is somewhat outdated. For starters, in the final chapters, Admiral Drake returns to the US and asks Mr. Popper to join him on a trip to the North Pole. The North Pole doesn't have penguins, and he wants Mr. Popper to bring his troupe along and introduce them as a seed population. An obvious environmental faux pas. You can bet Tipper Gore wasn't reading this title to her youngsters. Far more disturbing, though, is the scene toward the end of the story where Mr. Popper is approached by a big Hollywood producer. By this time Mr. Popper's Penguins have become quite famous, so the producer, hoping to make a buck, offers the Poppers a lucrative film contract. After careful deliberation, Mr. Popper decides that the well-being of his Penguins is more important than money -- or Hollywood! -- and turns him down. Naturally, some parents may find this a disturbing message for impressionable young readers and might prefer a more commerce-friendly title. But quibbles aside, Mr. Popper's Penguins is an established classic that will delight readers of all stripes -- especially those looking to avoid any mention of red and blue.

Gelman, P. Mr. Popper’s Penguins – Book review. Retrieved from http://www.commonsensemedia.org/book-reviews/mr-poppers-penguins

Mr. Popper’s Penguins is one of those classic childhood books that kids always remember. The chapter book's witty dialogue (albeit with dated language), clever characters, and an ethical predicament make this book as enjoyable today as in the 1930s. Many teachers today use it as part of their language arts curriculum. Mr. Poppers Penguins is a good fit for most first- and second-grade readers, and can be read aloud to kindergartners. Though the book was written in 1938, Mr. Popper was ahead of his time for progressive parenting, letting his kids leave school to help him take the penguin act on the road. He also treats his wife with respect, giving her voice equal status in the household. Kids will see through this funny, quirky man that learning never stops, and sometimes, by asking questions, great things happen. Mirroring the partnership of Mr. and Mrs. Popper, Richard Atwater got sick and was unable to finish the book, so his wife, Florence, picked up where he left off.

Module 1 - Miss Smith’s Incredible Storybook

image from www.amazon.com

Garland, M. (2003). Miss Smith’s incredible storybook. New York, NY: Puffin Books.

Summary –

Zach’s first grade teacher, Miss Smith is something different from what he’s come to expect in a teacher.  In her hands, story-telling time comes to life, with the characters leaping off the page and into the classroom.  Zach and his fellow students find themselves in the middle of the action. However, things go awry on the day Miss Smith is late for class. The principal, Mr. Rittenrotten, begins to read from Miss Smith’s magical storybook and is spooked when the characters from the story invade the classroom.  He leaves the classroom in a panic, looking for help.  Student after student all take turns reading snippets from different stories, and the characters from various stories all vie for attention and soon overrun the hallways of the school.  When Miss Smith finally arrives, she’s able to restore order to the mess, reading each story from beginning to end and returning each cast of characters back into the book.

Lucien’s thoughts –

I think the book uses very exciting language to show how a story can come to life in the hands of an able storyteller.  Zach can “feel the breeze in his hair and hear the waves pounding on the side of the ship.”  It uses vibrant language that engages the senses to show how a story can transport the readers into a world of imagination.  It also reinforces good reading skills in that the chaos created when everyone reads little bits of various stories is reversed when the teacher reads each story from beginning to end.

The illustrations are brightly colored and rich in detail.  For example, as the children are listening to a story about pirates, the classroom changes into a pirates ship, its deck full of student desks and its borders filled with peg-leg pirates, pirates with eye-patches, and a chest full of gold. Later, as the children cause confusion reading from different stories, the pages are filled with character from various well-know children’s tales: Little Red Riding Hood, Robin Hood, Dorothy, Tom Sawyer, Humpty Dumpty and others. Miss Smith is distinctive in her bright red glasses, wild red hair, and punk-rock leather jacket.

Librarian’s use –

One of the ways to discuss the book with young readers is to invite the audience in helping you identify some of the characters found in the stories illustrated in the various pages of Miss Smith’s Incredible Storybook and see if the audience can tell you what story they come from.  This exercise connects this book about reading with other books that the children might want to explore.  It would be handy for the librarian to have picked out copies some of stories in question: the story of Little Red Riding Hood, the story of Goldilocks and the three bears, the story Robin Hood, the Wizard of Oz, the story of the three little pigs, Alice in Wonderland, etc.  You can then ask the audience to think about what would happen if the characters swapped places with characters from other books; would the story still be the same?  what would be different?  You can also invite the readers to think about their favorite book, and ask them to draw a picture of their favorite book character.

Other reviews—

Threadgill, C., Jones, T. E., Toth, L., Charnizon, M., Grabarek, D., & Larkins, J. (2003). Miss Smith's incredible storybook (Book). School Library Journal, 49(10), 125.

Zack's exciting new teacher has a magic storybook. When she opens it up and reads aloud, the characters pop out and bring the tales to life right before the students' eyes. But Miss Smith's book isn't for everybody, and when stuffy Principal Rittenrotten has to fill in for her one morning, the dragon, princess, and knight that materialize from the pages send him from the room in a panic. The only way to make them disappear is to finish their respective stories, but Zack's classmates keep beginning new ones instead, until the school is overrun with Goldilocks, the Mad Hatter, and other such characters, seen vividly cavorting across the full-page spreads. Fortunately, Miss Smith shows up just in time and returns them to the safety of the book's pages, leaving the principal confused and her students forever in her debt. The lively, bright illustrations have a glossy, computer-generated quality that young readers will appreciate. Miss Smith wears a black leather jacket and a lapel button advertising "The Clash," and has a punk-rock hairdo. A satisfactory addition to most collections.

Miss Smith’s incredible storybook. (Book). (2003). Kirkus Reviews, 71(11), 803.

Zack's new second-grade teacher confounds his expectations, not so much with her black leather jacket and flaming red brush-cut, as with the big, ornately tooled book she carries--which, when opened, disgorges real pirates, pigs, knights, dragons, and the like as she reads. When Miss Smith is late one day, the Principal, and then the children, get hold of her book, and because they can't manage to finish the stories they start, utter chaos ensues until she sweeps in to restore order. Using saturated hues and crisply drawn figures, Garland crowds the classroom with lively characters, many of them recognizable from classic stories and folktales. A brief but animated invitation to the pleasures of reading, as well as a tribute to unconventional teachers everywhere.