Picture Book Biographies: Poets

April is National Poetry Month here in the United States. I've read poetry to my girls from the time they were babies, because I love it and want them to love it and to not be intimidated by the format. But I've found that sharing poetry with them is even more effective after they can first see the poet as a real person. Here, in no particular order, are some picture book biographies -some deal only with a certain portion of the poet's life- of poets that combine a well-told narrative with striking pictures to capture and keep children's attention. Each book is illustrated in a different style. (I'd recommend these books for ages 7 and up.)

William Carlos Williams

(Written by Jen Bryant; illustrated by Melissa Sweet)

Walt Whitman

(Written by Barbara Kerley; illustrated by Brian Selznick)

Emma Lazarus

(Written by Linda Glaser; illustrated by Claire A. Nivola)

Langston Hughes

(Written by Robert Burleigh; illustrated by Leonard Jenkins)

Emily Dickinson

(Written and illustrated by Jeanette Winter)

Pablo Neruda

(Written by Monica Brown; illustrated by Julie Paschkis)

Robert Burns

(Written by Joanne Findon; illustrated by Ted Nasmith)

Picture Book: Shibumi and the Kitemaker by Mercer Mayer

Shibumi and the Kitemaker

Written and illustrated by Mercer Mayer
Picture book
Ages 5 and up (Reading Aloud)
Published in 1999 by Marshall Cavendish

In this original fable by Mercer Mayer, Shibumi is a young princess of a "far-away kingdom" sheltered behind garden walls she isn't allowed past. She dreams of the wonders on the other side of the wall. When she overhears some children outside the wall making fun of the princess they've never seen, Shibumi climbs a tree to set them straight, but the squalor and deprivation she sees from that tree shatter all her illusions of a better world beyond the wall. Fearing that her father will punish her for climbing the tree, but driven to change what she sees, she conceives a daring plan (that only a child would think of) that will force her father, the emperor, to make the situation better. Her drastic action gets his attention, and through it, she finally tells him what she wishes to happen. As he starts to implement a plan to fulfill her greatest wish, his councilors, thinking he has lost his mind and not eager to have the status quo changed, engage in a treacherous plot that results in Shibumi fleeing into exile. Despite his broken heart, or maybe because of it, the emperor works for years to implement the needed changes to his land, but is now, many years after Shibumi's departure, besieged in outright war by angry nobles who want things to return to the way they were. A young samurai goes in search of Shibumi, knowing that her father needs her to help him continue what she started.

Mayer's love of Japanese art and culture is evident in every beautiful and meticulous illustration.

This is a book with some heavy themes for young children: inequality of classes, the "haves" vs. "have-nots," and the difference one person can make in a seemingly impossible situation. I appreciated how Mayer allowed Shibumi's "grass-is-greener" attitude to develop into a deep conviction that she needed to be -and believed she could be- an instrument of change. I also appreciated that he didn't show the process as being easy or quick. I expect it's a book my girls will think about for years to come.

My seven and eight year-old daughters loved this fable. My four-year-old at least stayed beside me while we read, sometimes tuning out, but then something would draw her back in.

Sadly, this book is out of print. Our copy was borrowed from the library.

Popular Books Everyone Else Has Read But Me (It Seems)

• The Hunger Games trilogy. I'll mention this first because of all the movie hype surrounding it right now. My mom and sister have both read it and recommend it, but it's not a series I've had a burning desire to read.
• The Harry Potter books. I should probably have my children's-lit-lover card pulled, but I couldn't get into this series. I've tried several times with the first book, and I've quit every time.
• The Chronicles of Narnia. I yawned my way through the first book when I was 11, and remember very little about it. I never had any desire to read the rest of the series. On the other hand, my sister read and re-read them.
• Charles Dickens books. I've tried at various times over the years, but I'm just not drawn to his writing style. I've never been able to finish one of his books.
• John Steinbeck books. I never had to read any of his works in my British international high school, or at university (amazingly) and I've still not gotten around to it as an adult.
• Stephen King books. I'm not into the horror genre, and until recently, I thought that was all he wrote, but I've since learned that's not so, however...so far I've not given any of his books a try. (I love the movies The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile, both film adaptations of his works.)

I'm sure there are more, but that's all I can think of at the moment.

Day-to-Day Homeschooling: What I Don't Do

Let me say this straight up so there can be no confusion: I am not a homeschooling expert or domestic goddess. I would probably be thrown out of blogdom's homeschooling club, or at least pointed to as an example of what NOT to do. I'm kidding. Those of us in the homeschooling trenches know that home education looks different for every family, as it should, since we're dealing with individuals, not paper dolls.

• I can't/won't label the method of our homeschooling. I have never found a good one-size-fits-all method to homeschooling my girls. Every year that we do this -and we're in our third- looks slightly different, based on their growing needs and knowledge, and the reality of my strengths and weaknesses. Heck, every day looks slightly different. I identify with lots of methods (unschooling, Charlotte Mason, Montessori, Classical, etc.) but I refuse to stick to just one, because I think that would be doing my girls an injustice and besides, it's too boring. We pluck the pieces of any method that fit our situation on a day-by-day, sometimes hour-by-hour, basis. Does that sound like it would get confusing? It doesn't. It's just a natural extension of parenting. For example, this year I had decided to use Calvert School* with them. I'm not sure why, now. But once we got going, we hated it so much (because it felt like school and I hate teaching from textbooks) that we scrapped most of it. (I love the read-alouds that came with it, and Olivia loves the history book Famous Americans, that came with her course. She reads it all the time.) I do better when I set the curriculum, which really just means that I buy some workbooks for the areas I feel we need them, and use real books and real life for the rest.
• We do not homeschool for religious reasons. God had nothing to do with my decision to pull my girls out of public school. We homeschool because it's the best fit and option for our family, and a natural extension of life. (I only say this because of an emailed comment/question I received after my last post, and I want to make sure our motivations for homeschooling are clear.)
• Routine? What routine? Okay, we have a vague one: get up, get breakfast, do math, free time for the rest of the day interspersed with reading aloud, chores here and there, and eating here and there. Maybe an outing to the zoo or what not. I don't make lesson plans. Tried it early on in our homeschool adventure, didn't like it. I don't roll like that, and to me life can't be scripted; and that's what we're engaged in here: life. The free time the girls have allows them to indulge in areas of their own interest. And believe me, they do.
• I don't have a dedicated schoolroom. There is just Todd's and my office which I facetiously call "Homeschool Central" because that's where I keep most of the schoolish stuff we use. The girls do their work wherever they please: if it's math, they stretch out on the office floor for quick access to me when they're having problems, or they'll sit at the kitchen table if I'm in there putting together our crockpot supper. We have lap desks that get used occasionally.
• I don't push academics before they're ready. I'm mostly talking pre-school years here. I cringe whenever I hear someone say they're homeschooling their three or four year old. I firmly believe that the business of young children is play. Some children are ready for academics at younger ages, some are not. My girls have always given cues as to their readiness for certain subjects. As long as I pay attention, things flow smoothly, and real learning happens. (For an excellent post about the business of pre-schoolers, read this wonderful response by Professor Tim of Fanny Harville's Unschool Academy.)
• I don't feel the need to enroll them in every activity/class under the sun, out of fear that they'll miss out on something or fear of the dreaded "S" word. (That's "Socialization" for you homeschooling newbies -something non-homeschoolers squawk about as being a BIG PROBLEM, but veteran homeschoolers laugh at.) I have noticed a tendency in homeschooling circles to use one's busy-ness as as a badge of...what, I don't know. For me, this is definitely an area where less is better, especially when children are young. This may be because I'm an older mom who's not a Type A personality; I just don't see the point in all the bustle of constant activity. I think we humans need plenty of quiet and space to process life experiences, plan and dream. (Also, our weekends are spent as a family. We see so little of Todd during the week due to his job, that weekends are all about low key time with Daddy.) I also don't feel the need to indulge every interest they express. Sometimes I have to tell them, "That's something we'll explore when you're older."
• I don't do arts and crafts. That is to say, I love the idea, but hate the execution. Beyond providing art supplies, I don't do art with them, except things like demonstrating a technique (maybe), teaching them the basics of crocheting, or refilling Susanna's water bowl when she's painting, etc. My kids, being kids, love art and have learned to carry on despite my relative non-involvement. Art station? Hah!! I can't even keep colored pencils or crayons in one container. My kids drag art supplies from one end of the house to the other (yelling because so-and-so took their glue stick) because heaven forbid they should do art in the same space as each other. They feel the need for their own creative space, which consists of their bed, the bedroom floor, the closets, etc. which also means there are art supplies and scraps of paper/cardboard/yarn EVERYWHERE! We dispose of a full 30 gallon trash bag of art trash every week, some of it finished products because they create something, drop it somewhere and forget all about it. I have no problem, not one twinge of guilt with the liberal use of the round file. (On a side note: I'll bet I get the meanest mom award for not even allowing markers or glue sticks in my house until I felt sure that all desire for writing on walls, furniture, etc. was firmly squashed, which means only in this last year have my children discovered the "joys" of markers and glue sticks. And I don't do glitter. Ever. Or sequins.)
• I don't "play" with my children, except playing games (board games, card games, etc.), and the occasional tag and hide-and-seek, and reading aloud. I feel that inserting myself into their imaginary play is intrusive, and doesn't teach them how to be comfortable doing their own thing.
• I don't allow them much computer time: a half hour twice a week at the most. I think too much computer time hinders their attention spans. I laugh when people insist that children need to familiarize themselves with computers early, like it's so hard to learn. Hello, those of us who were adults when the WWW came into being managed to learn pretty quickly. I'm not a Luddite, I like technology; I just feel that technology has its place and time.
• I can't think of anything else at the moment. If you have any questions, feel free to ask them.

*Calvert uses a boxed, fully set, secular curriculum. They are the original makers of a complete boxed curriculum. Originally created for State Department kids overseas, they expanded into the U.S. homeschooling market, too.

Our Homeschooling Goals

Our family became homeschoolers in fits and starts. After a traumatic and disastrous time spent in public school, we knew we had to bring our girls home for good. But I knew I had to deal with the reality of homeschooling. Despite my teacher training in college, the reality of being my children's primary academic educator was a wee bit daunting, no matter how natural the idea felt. What should it look like, really?

Todd and I both felt strongly that we didn't want it to look like the public school system we had pulled them out of. I read everything I could get my hands on regarding alternative educational philosophies, e.g. John Holt, Charlotte Mason, Maria Montessori, Waldorf, etc. I read books of real parents in the homeschooling trenches.

I shared my findings with Todd and we had many long discussions, trying to wrap our minds around a completely different, but more natural, idea of what being educated means. More importantly, what should it look like for us?

We realized we needed to begin with the end in mind: in imagining our children grown, what was it we TRULY wanted them to be able to do, that we could give them REALISTICALLY? Thus our homeschooling "mission statement" was born.

• We wanted them to be comfortable with math and math concepts.
• We wanted them to be able to read and to (hopefully) enjoy reading. (If they learn to read, then the world of knowledge opens up for them.)
• We wanted them to have the skills necessary to find things out for themselves.
• We wanted them to have the life skills (balance a check book, read a map, follow a recipe, clean a toilet, etc.) that they’d need to negotiate life.

Then I gave myself permission to let the rest go. Their life is not going to be ruined if we cannot/will not provide them with every possible learning experience. My job is to teach them how to learn; they have the rest of their life to experience many, many things, (including arts and crafts and science projects.) The whole of life is a learning journey.

So right now we focus on real books (as opposed to textbooks,) life skills, and math, and plenty of time for them to pursue their own interests.

Books Read in January

Linked to my reviews.

Books with asterisks (*) are re-reads.

Picture Books

• The Sorely Trying Day (Russell and Lillian Hoban) -  A chain of events leads members of a family to behave badly, causing a ripple effect of bad behavior down the line. Funny and still apropos, despite the somewhat archaic language form used at times. My girls laughed ruefully as they recognized their own behavior.
• Fannie in the Kitchen (Deborah Hopkinson; illus. by Nancy Carpenter) - Takes place in the late 1880's in Boston, Mass. Marcia's mother appreciates Marcia's "helpfulness" but hires Fannie Farmer as a mother's helper, mostly for her cooking. Marcia's ire soon turns to intrigue as Fannie teaches her how to cook. Marcia in turn inspires Fannie to set down her recipes on paper. The pictures are an intriguing combination of images and styles: Victorian lithograph-type for the background, parents and baby; warmer, rounder drawings, in color, of Fannie and Marcia. The idea, obviously, is draw the eye to these two central characters. The hilarious little details in the period-inspired drawings keeps them from pretension; one page shows Marcia's mother licking her plate. The chapter divisions are in keeping with the theme. Each one is a meal "Course," with a little Fannie Farmer hint box on most full page spreads.
• Apple Tree Christmas (Trinka Hakes Noble) - A terrible blizzard near Christmas ruins a girl's favorite apple tree. Will her personal sorrow ruin Christmas? A very good family Christmas story, non-religious, without Santa Claus.
• Birdie's Lighthouse (Deborah Hopkinson; illus. by Kimberly Bulcken Root)  - Birdie's journaling of how her family becomes the lighthouse keepers on a small, bare, rocky and lonely island. Then when her father gets sick, she has to take over as lightkeeper. Although fictitious, Birdie is based on real women who were lightkeepers. There is a wonderful "Afterward" by the author that gives the history of real women/girl lightkeepers.
• When Jessie Came Across the Sea (Amy Hest; illus. by P.J. Lynch) - A young Eastern European Jewish girl receives a boat ticket to America from her Rabbi. Leaving her beloved grandmother behind, she uses her sewing skills -taught to her by her grandmother- to earn money in America, saving it in order to bring her grandmother across the sea as well. A lovely story, beautifully told and illustrated, of devotion and love.
• Uncle Vova's Tree (Patricia Polacco) - A story about a family's Epiphany traditions and the continuation of them even after their beloved uncle, who was the "keeper" of the traditions, dies. I liked it up until the mystical end, which made it lose its power as a family story, to me.
• The Orange Shoes (Trinka Hakes Noble; illus. by Doris Ettlinger) My girls loved this story of a poor country girl who uses her art skills to turn an ugly incident into a work of art, and the family who loves and supports her through it all. Olivia was the one who found this book and read it first, and then came to me and said, "Mom, you have to read this! It's so good!"
• *Tikki Tikki Tembo (Arlene Mosel; illus. by Blair Lent) - This classic brings a giggle every time we read it.
• Grandmother Winter (Phyllis Root; illus. by Beth Krommes) - My girls were confused by this story until I explained the concept of Grandmother Winter. Then we read it again and they could enjoy it. Gorgeous illustrations. 
• Blue Willow (Pam Conrad; illus. by S. Seilig Gallagher) - The "fable" of how the design on Blue Willow china came to be. Well written but sad story. 
• Morris the Artist (Lore Segal; illus. by Boris Kulikov) Morris, who loves to paint, buys a birthday gift for another child that he wants, and when he gets to the party, won't hand over.
• Uncle Blubbafink's Seriously Ridiculous Stories (Keith Graves) -  "Seriously ridiculous", yes. I think it takes a different kind of personality than mine to appreciate this book. Didn't appeal to me at all. I couldn't bring myself to read it aloud to my kids.
• *The Complete Adventures of Peter Rabbit (Beatrix Potter) - I read this periodically to my children, but they never get excited about them. 
• *Frog and Toad All Year (Arnold Lobel) - My girls are huge fans of Frog and Toad.
• *Days With Frog and Toad (Arnold Lobel) Reading about Frog and Toad never gets old, although some volumes (like this one) are better than others.
• *My First Counting Book (Lilian Moore; illus. Garth Williams) - Linked to my review. 
• Al Pha's Bet (Amy Krouse Rosenthal; illus. by Delphine Durand) 
• This Plus That (Amy Krouse Rosenthal; illus. by Jen Corace) 
• Little Pea (Amy Krouse Rosenthal; illus. by Jen Corace) 
• Little Oink (Amy Krouse Rosenthal; illus. by Jen Corace) 
• Little Hoot (Amy Krouse Rosenthal; illus. by Jen Corace) 
• Spoon (Amy Krouse Rosenthal; illus. by Scott Magoon)
• *Blackout (John Rocco) - A young child wants to play a board game with someone, but all the family members are "MUCH TOO BUSY."  When the lights suddenly go out, there is nothing but time for family togetherness. My girls love this book and keep picking it up to read or look at the pictures. The pictures do most of the storytelling; the text is pretty spare. (As an aside, I love that the family is multi-racial, that the youngest family member could be a boy or a girl, and the dad is cooking.)
• *Grandpa Green (Lane Smith) A little boy tells the life history of his great-grandfather, who is forgetting things. But the topiaries he creates do the remembering for him. A beautiful book, full of clever topiaries to help tell the tale. I appreciated it more than my girls did.
• *Are You My Mother (P.D. Eastman) Always a favorite with my littles.
• *A Bargain For Frances (Russell and Lillian Hoban) - Frances gets tricked by her friend into buying her friend's tea set. When Frances finds out about her friend's trickery, she figures turn-about is fair play. I was never that smart as a child.
• *Bread and Jam For Frances (Russell and Lillian Hoban) - My personal favorite of the Frances books. Deals with the meal battles that parents face with picky eaters. If only they were resolved as easily (and amusingly) as they are in this book.
• *Owl Babies (Martin Waddell; illus. by Patrick Benson) - Linked to my review.
• *Chrysanthemum (Kevin Henkes) - A little mouse girl is made fun of because of her name, until a wise music teacher intervenes. My girls love this book.

Children's Non-Fiction

• Swirl By Swirl (Joyce Sidman; illus. by Beth Krommes) - A lovely, lyrical book about spirals and the many places/ways they occur in nature. Gorgeous illustrations.
• A Fraction's Goal - Parts of a Whole (Brian P. Cleary; illus. by Brian Gable) - Excellent for gaining an overall understanding of fractions. My only reservation was with the pages showing the baking measurements, as the drawings made it unclear to my daughters what the "whole" was. But I can understand how that would be hard to capture in a drawing. We followed up with some hands-on kitchen fractions.
• So You Want to Be An Inventor? (Judith St. George; illus. by David Small) A big hit with my girls, this fun book that talks about the qualities necessary to be an inventor and highlights actual inventors throughout history and the inventions they created as a result of those personality qualities. Superb illustrations.
• Just a Second (Steve Jenkins) A fun trivia book of happenings in the natural world based on time as the unit of measurement, i.e. things that happen in a second, a minute, an hour, etc. Fascinating stuff. Amazing collaged pictures.
• What To Do About Alice? (Barbara Kerley; illus. by Edwin Fotheringham) - An amusing picturebook biography about Alice Roosevelt (daughter of U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt) who wanted to "eat up the world." The illustrations are great.

Middle-Grades Fiction

• The Little Bookroom (Eleanor Farjeon) - A compilation of fantastical little stories; some better than others.
• The Middle Moffat (Eleanor Estes) - I read this aloud to Olivia and Karina. Linked to my review.
• The Children of Green Knowe (L.M. Boston) - Linked to my review. 
• Ballet Shoes (Noel Streatfeild) - Linked to my review. 
• Rufus M. (Eleanor Estes) - I read this aloud to Olivia and Karina. They liked this one better than The Middle Moffat. The episodes are more amusing.
• Breaking Stalin's Nose (Eugene Yelchin) - Linked to my review. 
• Anna's Blizzard (Alison Hart)

Young Adult Fiction

• The Girl of Fire and Thorns (Rae Carson) - I liked it.
• Divergent (Veronica Roth) - I read this for book club. Meh.
• The Wild Orchid: A Retelling of "The Ballad of Mulan" (Cameron Dokey)  Well written, likable characters, great storyline, but for the length of story it was (not long), there was too much build-up. When it came to the actual getting to the battle and what made her a hero, it felt rushed and hurried. This is my complaint of all Cameron Dokey's novels in this series: too much build-up, rushed climax and ending.
• *Wildwood Dancing (Juliet Marillier) - This intriguing story is a wonderful blend of several fairy tales (12 Dancing Princesses, The Frog Prince, etc.) and Eastern European legends.

Adult Fiction

• Gap Creek (Robert Morgan) - Just didn't do it for me.
• The Hum and the Shiver (Alex Bledsoe) - Interesting modern Appalachian spin on Celtic legends. Just not sure how I feel about it.
• The Informationist (Taylor Stevens) - Linked to my review.
• *Sacred Hearts (Sarah Dunant) - Linked to my review.

Adult Non-Fiction

• Reading For the Love of It: Best Books for Young Readers (Michele Landsberg) - I love her insightful look at so many aspects and issues within children's literature, and I agree with her on so much. So worth the read despite it's age (published in 1986.)
• The World of Downton Abbey (Jessica Fellowes) - I loved this behind-the-scenes look at the world of BBC's Downton Abbey. A fun peek at history, too. Gorgeous photos and back story, in-depth look at the filming of the show. I'm so enjoying watching it right now.
• HTML Manual of Style (Larry Aronson) - Marginally helpful. It would have been more helpful if I understood it better; I think I need a "dummy's" version.
• The God Delusion (Richard Dawkins) - So interesting. He has many valid points, and makes his points very logically and sensibly, but I can see how religious people would be offended by some of what he says. But it's also true that religious people tend to see atheists as amoral at best and immoral at worst, which is just a completely false picture.
• Things I Learned About My Dad (In Therapy) (essays compiled by Heather Armstrong) - Some interesting essays on fathers; some not so interesting.

2012 Newbery Honor Winner: Breaking Stalin's Nose by Eugene Yelchin

This book flew invisibly past my radar. I hadn't heard of it or even seen it until I read that it won the Newbery Honor. Obviously, I had to rectify that, so when my latest batch of books came from the library yesterday, full of this year's award winners, I wanted to read this one first.

Synopsis: Ten-year-old Sasha is a fervently loyal Stalinist, who is excited to become a part of the Young Pioneers (Stalin's youth organization) and extremely proud of his father, who works for the State Security (secret police). They live with 46 other people in a communal flat/apartment, happy -from Sasha's perspective- that they are the living epitome of Stalin's ideals. Then, in the middle of the night, the secret police come and roughly haul away his father. What follows is a quick succession of events that has Sasha questioning his loyalty and the validity of the system.

The action of this fairly quick and completely gripping story takes place over the course of only one evening and the following day. It's a book that contains important issues such as freedom (or the lack of it), paranoia, propaganda, idealism vs. reality, standing for right (or not).


Here are some thoughts I had as I read:

• I think Yelchin does a very admirable job of tackling his subject from a naive ten-year-old's perspective. It's a genius approach, reminiscent of Boyne's The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, where the limits of the young protagonist's understanding and maturity throws a spotlight on the horrors going on around them. What Yelchin seems to steer away from are Sasha's emotions. Deliberate devise or not, I think it's genius to downplay them, because again, it throws the spotlight onto the world in which he lives. The buildup of paranoia and hysteria that exists in the book -created by living in such a system- engulfs the reader in their own emotions. I think it would be completely overwhelming if we had to deal with both sets of emotions at once, especially for the targeted reading age group.
• In the beginning, Sasha is the perfect little Communist, just as he's been trained from baby-hood. Even as people are betraying his family, he doesn't feel a sense of betrayal, rather he admires their patriotism. There are also a few instances where Sasha has to choose to take a stand for right, and you can't help having empathy for his choices. (You will have to read the book to understand this in context.) I think it's a credit to Yelchin's writing ability that he can make us empathize with a boy with whom we have ostensibly very little in common.
• It's interesting to me how the author subtly shows the disconnect between child and adult. Here is Sasha's father, who has trained him to be a good little Communist from birth, and yet somehow expects him to know where the inconsistencies lie between the dogma and reality. It's a mistake we parents frequently make: assuming that our young children can see and understand those subtleties and inconsistencies.
• Yelchin, through young Sasha, gets to the heart of why this period of Russian history is known as The Great Terror: what happens to society as a whole and the individuals within it when every infraction is treated like it's the very worst possible crime? What happens when people are kept in such a state of terror and propaganda that they don't even realize they are the victims?
• The illustrations are dark, and have an exaggerated quality that perfectly accompanies the exaggerated paranoia. (There's an ironic one on pages 106-107 depicting the principal as Hitler.) The illustrations are reminiscent of Communist propaganda posters from the era. The other interesting thing to note is that we only see Sasha from the back or side -always turned away from the viewer- throughout the book, until we finally see his face for the first time on p. 137, just before the end.
• This book would make an excellent accompaniment to history lessons about that era for children age 10 and up. I'd have high schoolers read it as part of a Russian history unit. I think it would also make excellent book club reading.