Eyes on This Book: “Grandfather’s Journey” is an incredible children’s picture book written and illustrated by Allen Say and published in 1993 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. This book , with its powerful illustrations and captivating story line, won the Caldecott Medal in 1994.

Book Type: biography, memoir

Overview of the Author & Illustrator: Allen Say was born in 1937 in Yokohama, Japan. The product of divorced parents, Say sought refuge in art and became a cartoonist’s apprentice in his younger days in Japan. Say eventually became a commercial photographer, writing and illustrating in his spare time. His first book, Dr. Smith’s Safari, was published in 1972. Say would go on to quit his job as a photographer to become a writer and illustrator full time, publishing several books, including: The Boy of the Three Year Nap, Grandfather’s Journey, Tree of Cranes, Allison, Tea with Milk, The sign Painter, and Home of the Brave.

Summary: Grandfather’s Journey is the story of a Japanese immigrant’s journey to America as told through the memories of his grandson, Allen Say. The story of Say’s grandfather is beautifully told, depicting a love for both America and Japan. The story end with Say, himself, travelling to California to follow in his grandfather’s footsteps.

Elements of Writing: Immediately upon picking up a copy of Grandfather’s Journey, the reader is met with a watercolor painting of a man, on a ship, dressed in old-timey clothes. The back cover depicts an origami boat that seems older and weathered, as well. These two believable, yet nontraditional illustrations draw the reader in, peaking one’s interest as to what the pages might entail.

Similarly, throughout the entire book, each page is beautifully decorated with a carefully- crafted water color illustration which takes up most of each page, save for one or two sentences at the bottom. Each image supports the writing on each page, as well as the overall setting, in an interesting way, yielding “a more powerful experience than either alone” (Tunnell, Jacobs, Young, & Bryan, 2016). The watercolor format of the illustrations also embody the feeling of a memory, intact in one’s mind, but slightly blurred around the edges.

Say’s incorporation of precise vocabulary, accompanied by meticulous illustration, allows the reader to be transported back in time. For example, he uses words like “the New World” to describe America and references “trains, riverboats, and walking” as modes of transportation. He also describes meeting new people, calling them “black, white, red, and yellow” men.

Figurative language is utilized by Say to convey feelings to the reader; in other words, “showing” the reader instead of “telling” him or her. Strong and meaningful verbs are used to describe grandfather’s experiences; words like “marveled,” “astonished,” “journeyed,” “explored,” “amazed,” “reminded,” “bewildered.” The use of imagery and description gives power and insight (Tunnell, Jacobs, Young, & Bryan, 2016) to grandfather as an adventurer, with a wanderer’s heart, as seen on pg. 13, “never thought of returning home.”

The very end of the book brings both understatement and unexpected insights to the reader’s experience. Page 29 reads, “The last time I saw him, my grandfather said that he longed to see California one more time. He never did.” This incredibly moving couple of sentences understates the notion that grandfather had passed away before following up on his desires; a turn of events inferred by the reader without explicitly being said. In this way, the reader can become a participant in this moment, without being directly guided (Tunnell, Jacobs, Young & Bryan, 2016). Unexpected insights follow this with the final page reading, “I think I know my grandfather now.” This final sentiment connects the reader to the human experience of learning about one’s ancestors and struggling with the death of a family member, while also ultimately providing credibility to the author.

Active Learning & Construction of Knowledge: Grandfather’s Journey quite literally represents the construction of knowledge that each one of us experiences in some way. In other words, we all have a heritage and ancestors that have influenced our existence and made it possible to live the lives we do today. Our ancestors made decisions that continue to influence us, and we are the sum of those decisions.

This text provides the opportunity for students to question, discuss/theorize, practice inquiry, experience a contextualized/authentic/real-world text, and actively construct the story in their minds, especially when confronted with unexpected insights at the closing of the book. All of these tenants are markers of constructivism in the classroom.

Through this picture book, Say prompts the reader to reflect on his or her own experience with issues concerning relatives, war, immigration, death of a family member, moving to a new place, etc. , while also forcing the reader to consider different perspectives on the same memories and confront one’s schema/pre-conceived notions in the process.

References:

• About Allen Say. (2019). Retrieved June 15, 2019, from http://www.houghtonmifflinbooks.com/authors/allensay/author.shtml
• Say, A. (1993). Grandfather’s journey. New York, NY: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
• Tunnell, M. O., Jacobs, J. S., Young, T. A., & Bryan, G. (2016). Children’s literature, briefly (6th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson.

Eyes on This Book: “Seven Blind Mice” is a children’s picture book written and illustrated by Ed Young. This book was first published in 1992 by Philomel Books. This wonderful text is most noticeably recognized for its outstanding awards: Caldecott Honor, Boston Globe Horn Book Award, California Children’s Media Award.

Book Type: fiction, fable

Overview of the Author & Illustrator: Ed Young, an accomplished author, has written seventeen books and illustrated over eighty. Young was born and raised in China, and claims inspiration for his books from Chinese art. He was trained as a commercial artist in advertising but later switched to writing of children’s literature. Most famous for writing Lon Po Po, The Emperor and the Kite, and Seven Blind Mice, it must also be noted that Young has been a highly sought after college instructor, as well. You can find Young residing in New York along with his daughters and cats (Young, 2006)!

Summary: In this simple yet intricately designed picture book, the reader encounters a succession of six different blind mice as each attempts to describe a strange object found near their pond. The last mouse, the seventh mouse, uses suggestions from the six to look at the whole picture and determine the true identity of the object- an elephant. As the moral states, “Knowing in part may make a fine tale, but wisdom comes from seeing the whole” (Young, 1992).

Now, What Kind of Picture Book is This Exactly? As far as picture books go, there are many varieties and formats available for one’s reference. In fact, Tunnell, Jacobs, Young, and Bryan (2016) explain that the children’s picture book has transformed into its own form of art. From counting books to ABC books, concept books to board books, and everything in between, the options are limitless for adults and children alike. Seven Blind Mice, however, might be considered by some to be both a “better” counting book as well as a concept book. I’d like to make the argument, though, that it is more of a concept book than a text focused on numerals.

In a more literal and elementary sense, this book might also be utilized to teach young children about color words, ordinal number words, sequencing, adjectives/describing words, and fables/morals.

Constructivist Learning: Through the use of mice, Ed Young perfectly captures the notion of constructivist learning, a theory which assumes that each person has his or her own interpretation of new information based on past experiences. In the case of Seven Blind Mice, each mouse encounters a piece of a larger object, mistaking it for the entire object, and making a guess accordingly. The final mouse is able to consider all the pieces and combine them into the whole, an elephant! This entire book, in fact, is a metaphor for constructivist learning in the classroom. Students construct new knowledge based on their own personal factors, just as the mice did in the story. We, as teachers, should support our students in integrating old and new learning, while also fostering collaboration and discussion through active discovery.

References:

• Tunnell, M. O., Jacobs, J. S., Young, T. A., & Bryan, G. (2016). Children’s literature, briefly (6th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson.
• Young, E. (1992). Seven blind mice. New York, NY: Philomel Books.
• Young, E. (2006). Retrieved June 14, 2019, from https://edyoungart.com/about.html

Eyes on This Book: “The Farmer and the Clown,” written and illustrated by Marla Frazee, was first published in 2014 by Beach Lane Books. This book is the recipient of various Best Children’s Book Awards, ribbons, and excellent reviews, most notably the 2015 Boston Globe/Horn Book Picture Book Award. Checkout other accolades here: http://marlafrazee.com/farmer-and-clown

Book Type: fiction

Marla Frazee’s passion and talent for children’s literature are perfectly captured by her quote: “Children’s books are an emotional medium. They need to make us feel something” (Frazee, n.d.).

Summary: “The Farmer and the Clown” is a wordless picture book that uses stunning, yet muted images to tell the story of a lonely farmer who receives a surprise in the form of a little clown friend. The clown accidentally falls off of a passing circus train and is taken in by the farmer, during which time the two become fast friends through eating, playing, and working together. This lovely book ends with the clown returning to his clown family after an emotional goodbye with him and his new buddy, the farmer.

Right off the bat, one’s eye is drawn toward Frazee’s use of Prismacolor pencil, gouache, and subdued coloring to not only establish a somber mood, but to also represent the lonely and irritable farmer in his field. Brighter colors come along with the appearance of the circus train and the clown himself. The arrival of color provides a stark contrast between the farmer’s black and white dress and the clown’s yellow and red suit. Similarly, the use of simple and muted lines are reader-friendly, allowing for one’s eye to be drawn to each character’s simple, yet detailed, clothing and facial expressions. Line is also elegantly employed to depict movement and action as the story progresses.

This book expertly utilizes composition and perspective to create visual patterns using spacing and shadows to demonstrate the vastness that is the farmer’s loneliness in the beginning, especially. The farmer is shown to be in the bottom corner of most pages, depicting a wide open and bleak landscape. As the clown arrives in his life, and the farmer’s mood improves, the characters become more centered and focused on the pages.

Lastly, this books iconic use of imagery provides subtle depth of detail that might easily go unnoticed, yet are startling when recognized. For example, when the farmer and the clown walk hand-in-hand inside to get to know one another, the farmer strips his black and white clothing to reveal red underclothes. This subtle detail represents the simultaneous shedding of the farmer’s tough exterior now that he has a friend. Additionally, when the clown washes off his painted red smiley face, we see a somber expression underneath, a juxtaposition against the perma-frown being turned into a more pleasant expression.

Active Learning & the Construction of Knowledge: “The Farmer and the Clown” supports active learning and construction of knowledge (or social constructivism) in that the text/illustrations allow for the reader to consider what is being viewed and construct meaning based on his or her own beliefs, background knowledge, personal experiences, culture, etc. There are no words to plainly tell the reader what to think; the reader must be actively engaged to assimilate what they are “reading” into their schemas. This very book could be read in my second grade classroom, eliciting limitless understandings, hypothesis, emotions from my students, depending upon what each student already knows and interprets from the text. From the feelings depicted on both the farmer and the clown’s face, to the interactions between the two, to the clown returning to his family, each student could and should have their own assessment of the text and its intended meaning.

References:

• Frazee, M. (2014). The farmer and the clown. New York: Beach Lane Books.
• Frazee, M. (2015-2019). Marla Frazee. Retrieved June 14, 2019, from http://marlafrazee.com/about
• Tunnell, M. O., Jacobs, J. S., Young, T. A., & Bryan, G. (2016). Children’s literature, briefly (6th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson.

Hello, Colleagues! Welcome to the Book Worm.

My name is Katie Bolger and I am a second grade teacher at Stargate School, a charter school for gifted students in Thornton, CO. I have been teaching gifted first and second graders for 9 years, seven of them at Stargate.

I LOVE sharing new, fun, and interesting books with my students, and I can’t wait to explore many more during the course of this class. Happy reading to all!