Rob Reid is a senior lecturer
in the Department of Education Studies,
where he primarily teaches children's literature
as well as Literature for Adolescences.
He is the author of two picture books for children,
and 16 resource books for children's literature
for teachers, librarians, and parents.
He has also written over 100 articles in national magazines
and has his own column in Book Links magazine,
titled, "Reid-Aloud Alert",
as in Reid, R-E-I-D.
Among his awards, he was chosen as
the Wisconsin Librarian of the Year
by the Wisconsin library association.
Next year will be his 20th year at UW-Eau Claire,
coinciding with the university's centennial.
Rob says he's going to pretend
that all the celebration for that event
will really be to celebrate his 20 years.
Please help me welcome Rob Reid.
(audience applauding)
- Thank you.
Thank you Rose, and thank you Wisconsin Public Television
and everybody for showing up today.
Well, as author Jim Trelease says about his book,
"The Read-Aloud Handbook,"
"It's not about teaching a child how to read;
"it's about teaching a child to want to read."
Today's topic will focus on ways to get kids excited
about the notion of reading,
to make literature come alive for them
through read-aloud tactics
with a bit of music and a bit of storytelling.
The Read-Aloud Handbook is a treasury that should be in every
household, school, and public library.
Author Trelease lists research
on the impact of reading aloud to young people.
One study shows a factor in producing
higher achievement in education
is related to the frequency of teachers
reading aloud to them.
Another study shows the same effect
from being read at home.
The Read-Aloud Handbook has several chapters
listing studies that support the importance
of reading aloud to young people.
Now, I'm not gonna duplicate his work here for you,
but I want to let you know where to find that
should you need it.
I saw Jim Trelease give a presentation on the topic
very early in my career,
and it validated my career choice,
and also enhanced my role as "Dad"
to my four now grown children,
and "Grandpa" to my four grandkids,
and as a children's librarian
to hundreds of other folks' kids over the decades,
and now here at UW-Eau Claire,
working with future teachers and librarians.
As you heard, I have written four books on "Read-Alouds",
all published by the American Library Association.
For each of the two "Reid's Read-Aloud"s there
and "Biographies to Read Aloud With Kids",
I profile 200 great read-alouds.
And with "Silly Books to Read Aloud",
there are even more.
As Rose said, I have a column in Book Links magazine
where I share more read-aloud recommendations.
For the magazine article
and the two "Reid's Read-Alouds" books,
I also feature something that I call
"The 10-Minute Selection."
This is something I honed while a children's librarian.
I gave many tours to school classes
and showing them the different
sections of the library, of course,
telling them how to get a library card,
telling stories, and then always reading a passage to them.
Now, of course I didn't have time to read
a whole chapter book,
but I wanted to showcase those chapter books.
Giving a book talk,
a mini-commercial about different books
is one strategy that librarians use.
So I kind of took some elements of that
and came up with short, stand-alone passages
to read to them.
I read lots of children's novels and look for a passage,
or cobble together a couple of scenes together
to make one cohesive passage
to point kids in the direction of that particular book.
Sometimes the kids are intrigued
and they ask to read the whole book.
They want to check it out. Sometimes they don't.
They wanna do something else. That's okay.
We just spent some quality literature time together.
We planted the seed that reading is fun,
as well as libraries are fun, too.
Now, "The 10-Minute Selection"
can really be anywhere between five and 15 minutes long.
Each passage needs no or little introduction.
The kids will catch on what's going on
from the context of the passage.
I'm gonna start off with a selection
from one of our Wisconsin authors, Julie Bowe,
and she has a best-selling series out,
this is the first book in the series,
called "My Last Best Friend".
So, imagine yourselves as a group of kids,
and I don't have time to read the whole book.
[From "My Last Best Friend"]: I scoop up some turkey tetrazzini on my fork
and think about last summer
when Elizabeth and I swapped flip-flops.
We never got around to swapping them back
before she moved away.
I'm right in the middle of remembering
how much fun we had gluing pom-poms
and plastic lobsters onto those flipflops
when I notice Jenna is glaring at me again.
"What? I say through my turkey tetrazzini.
"You know what's in that turkey, don't you?
Jenna says back.
"No," I say, swallowing.
"I didn't realize there would be a quiz."
Jenna just shakes her head.
"Horbones," She announces to the other girls.
"Lots and lots of horbones!"
"What's that?" Stacey asked,
poking suspiciously at her food on her tray.
"That's the stuff that makes turkeys so fat"
Jenna says, giving me a glance.
Then she starts to explain how my turkey
spent his whole life inside a crowded pen
eating horbones day and night
with all the other unfortunate birds.
Three minutes into Jenna's lecture
I'm wishing I had warned Stacey not to show any interest
in anything Jenna has to say, but then I'm trying not to say
much of anything at all to Stacey Merriweather.
I tune out Jenna's yakking
and nibble on my rock-hard biscuit
and get a better look at Stacey.
She has pretty eyes and pretty evenly-spaced teeth
and pierced ears.
Her hair smells the same way
my mom's hair does after she gets a perm.
I can't imagine having any friends
if I smelled that way,
not that smelling the way that I do
has gotten me lots of friends.
It hasn't.
Oh sure, I have the regular kind of friends,
the kind you wander around the playground with,
making up excuses together
for why you don't wanna join the dodgeball game,
when really you just don't wanna look stupid
when the red rubber ball smacks you in the face.
But that was before I met Elizabeth.
She was the kind of friend
who made it worth getting up and going to school every day
just so I could sit by her on the bus
and play with her at recess.
The kind who told me secrets she never told anyone else.
The kind of friend I never thought about
having to say goodbye to until she all of a sudden
decided to move away.
As I sit and watch Stacey listen to Jenna's description
of her family's summer camping trip--
"We had to brush our teeth with baking soda "and pee in a hole.
"It was great!"
I think about Elizabeth and wonder if she's eating lunch
at that exact same time, too.
I wonder if she's as happy in her new school
as Stacey Merriweather seems to be in hers.
I want to say, "Excuse me, Stacey Merriweather,
"but don't you miss your old best friend at all?"
But before I have a chance to say anything, I see it.
A spitball,
right in the middle of my turkey tetrazzini.
I look up and see another one fly.
This time, it lands in Stacey's curly hair.
I look around the lunchroom.
Two tables away, Rusty Smith
and two other fourth grade boys,
both named Dylan, are cracking up.
A shredded napkin lies in front of Rusty.
A straw is in his hands. I look at Stacey again.
She's still eating and listening to Jenna talk,
but I could tell by the way her eyes stopped sparkling
that she knows she's being used for target practice.
Then I see Rusty take aim again, and again.
After six direct hits, Stacey sets down her fork
and quietly says, "Excuse me, ladies."
She walks over to Rusty.
He's so busy laughing with the Dylans
that he doesn't notice Stacey
putting her hand on his bony shoulder.
But he starts paying attention when she smiles at him
and says in a sticky-sweet voice,
"You like me, don't you?"
Everyone within earshot turns and looks.
Rusty looks too. "Huh?"
"You do!" Stacey squeals. "You like me!"
Then she puts her arm around him
And practically sits on his lap.
Now everyone in the whole lunchroom
is turning and looking.
Rusty peels Stacey's arm off his shoulder
like it's a poisonous snake.
Stacey puts it back.
Everyone laughs, then the Dylans start singing
"Rusty likes Stacey! Rusty likes Stacey!"
Stacey smiles and scoots even closer to him.
By the third round of the song,
the lunchroom sounds like a choir,
and Rusty's ears look as red as his hair.
He wiggles out from under Stacey
and bolts out the door.
I sit there, staring at Stacey Merriweather
and wondering how a person
with six spitballs stuck in her hair
can do something like that.
Then Stacey gets up and walks back to our table.
She sits down, picks up her fork,
and finishes every last bite of her lunch.
Well, as you can imagine,
kids will be excited to hear that passage
and want to know what happens with those characters.
I'd like to point out that the author of the book
is sitting in our audience today.
Julie Bowe, right over here.
Thank you very much for permission
for reading that long passage there.
Well, even though I have
hundreds and hundreds of recommendations,
there are certain books I keep going back to,
my fallback list, including "My Last Best Friend".
And here are a few of them.
Very quickly, I'll just kind of go through.
"All About Sam" by Lois Lowry.
A lot of us know that Lois Lowry
is a two-time Newberry Award winner
for "The Giver" and "Number the Stars".
Very heavy topics, but she's also
one of our funniest authors, too.
She's got a "Gooney Bird" series out,
she's got the Anastasia Krupnik,
who's up there in the picture with her brother, Sam,
and Sam has his own books also.
And there's a passage in here I like to read to kids.
I'll just tell you very quickly,
Sam is a preschooler.
He wants to make a big impression at Show-And-Tell.
He wants something special.
So he brings something special from home,
and when the teacher says, "Sam, it's your turn."
he pulls out his father's pipe and his father's lighter.
And he's about to demonstrate
how he and his father sit around smoking,
he's making that part up, when the teacher says, "Hold it right there.
"Sam Krupnik, what are you doing?"
And he's kind of caught
with borrowing when he shouldn't have.
A lot of you know the "Junie B. Jones" books.
Barbara Park, one of our funniest authors out there, too.
You can read almost any section
of any "Junie B. Jones" book
and get kids hooked on the series there.
I paticularly like
"Junie B. Jones Has A Monster Under Her Bed",
the opening chapter where she frets
about getting her classroom picture taken
while she is making a funny face.
"The Pepins and Their Problems" by Polly Horvath
is about a numskull type of family
who don't always think very clearly,
and kids like to be superior to people like that.
You can see that they're up on a roof.
Don't ask me how they get up there,
it's too long to tell you how that happened.
And the ladder fell down.
And so, they're wondering how they're going to get down.
And the neighbors come over and they say, "Whatcha doin' up there?"
And they said, "We got stuck, the ladder fell down."
And the neighbors look at the ladder and go,
"Oh, well what are you gonna do about it?"
And they come up with these elaborate practices to get down,
and one of them involves getting equipment
from the neighbor's garages.
And so the neighbors go get these things.
They set the ladder up, go hand the stuff to the people,
then go back down and set the ladder down
and wait for them to get off the roof.
Andrew Clements, who wrote "Frindle"
and a lot of other school setting books
has a few books with Jake Drake.
"Class Clown", in this particular book
Jake is upset that the new student teacher
is too strict about the Spelling Bee rules.
She says,
"Say the word, then spell it, then say it again."
And kids keep getting those directions messed up,
and the teacher says,
"Well then you're out."
So when it's Jake's turn, he goes--
He wants to spell the word. The word is "mouse".
And he goes,
"Mouse: M-I-C-K-E-Y M-O-U-S-E."
And the teacher goes, "That's not funny."
And then he goes, "Well, I guess I'm out!"
You can see where kids would be excited about that.
"Time Warp Trio" by Jon Scieszka
is a series that are humor stories
of time travel through magic.
The boys go back and forth in time and the future.
In "Knights of the Kitchen Table"
I like to read Chapter 3 to the kids
where the boys, through magic,
are transported to the days of King Arthur
and the Knights of the Round Table,
and they are faced by the charging black knight.
"The SOS File" by Betsy Byars and a couple other authors.
Betsy Byars is the primary author on this one.
Each chapter is a good read-aloud on its own.
They're a a series of reports from school
where a teacher says, "Write about a time you needed help."
And some of them are very heartwarming,
and some of them are laugh-out funny.
And then the last one, "Toys Go Out."
A lot of you in the audience here are familiar,
like to read this one all the time.
This is anthropomorphic toys,
kind of written in the style of AA Milne's
"Winnie-The-Pooh" series,
and I like to read the chapter here
where the stuffed buffalo
meets the washing machine in the basement.
And one great experience I had
was that when I was at a school in Minnesota.
I was doing a storytelling presentation
for an audience of 200 kids in an auditorium,
and I thought to myself,
"I've read to classroom size and smaller,
"and my own kids on my lap,
"but I've never read to 200 kids before.
"How's that gonna work?"
And I decided to do it with that scene with the washing machine
in "Toys Go Out."
And it was perfect.
The kids were all just leaning forward and listening,
and the librarian came up afterward, says
"We're gonna order that book!"
And I thought,
"Well, I should get some of that royalty, "don't you think?"
So anyways, these are some of my favorites,
and most of these are books that I use in my profession
when I go out and talk to kids.
I do have lot of memories from being a father,
great memories of sharing certain books with kids.
I'll share two of those with you.
Yeah, "Where the Red Fern Grows".
Yeah, you know that one, right?
It's a dog story. It breaks your heart.
When I saw Jim Trelease speak,
he talked about reading this book to his teenage son,
and then he gets to that certain scene,
you guys know which scene that is, right,
Where he just breaks down and cries.
And I go, "Oh wow.
"What a great memory Jim Trelease that you have."
And so, I was reading it to my kids,
and I get to that scene, and all of a sudden
I can't proceed.
I'm choking up, and I go,
"Sorry, kids, dad needs a moment."
And they're like,
"It's okay, dad. It's okay."
And I'll never forget that. I'll never forget that.
I read the first four "Harry Potter" books
to my youngest child, Sam,
and then when we read the fourth one,
this is like the 730-page one, and I would come home from work
and we would read a couple chapters before bed.
And then, this was in the summer
so we didn't have to worry about school the next day.
But we got to like, page 500,
and it's the fourth Harry Potter book.
You know that one.
And it was like 9:30 at night,
and we're on page 500, and we look at each other and go,
"We can't stop now!"
So we just kind of were sitting on the couch
and we had just, "Let's go for it! Okay!"
Alright, and I'm reading, and I'm reading,
and I'm reading, and I'm reading,
and I'm losing my voice,
and somehow in the next three hours,
it was around midnight when we finished,
we went from the couch to the floor,
and our heads were against the wall with the book,
and we just got to the end and we went,
"Wow!"
And I have that memory.
Even though we had to wait a year
for the next volume at that time.
So, and those are great memories, too.
Now, if anybody would like the age index
and subject index of my two "Read-Aloud" books,
send me an email.
And I'm not talking to group in the lecture room here.
I'm talking about people out there
on the internet and television there.
You guys, too. That's alright.
You can just go up to my office and do it.
I am more than happy to share those.
Otherwise you can get my "Read-Aloud" books
from the library, through inter-library loan.
My subject indexes include reccomendations
for animal stories, family stories, school stories,
historical fiction, fantasy, science fiction,
horror, humor mystery, outdoor survival,
stories set in other countries,
people with disabilities, other aspects of diversity,
folklore, biographies,
short story collections and more.
I continue to update my lists,
particularly because of my deadlines
with my "Book Links" article.
I just finished this book up on the screen last week,
and I thought, "Ooh, just in time for this lecture."
And it's "The League of Beastley Dreadfuls" by Holly Grant.
And the way I'm already describing this book,
because I'm telling everybody I can see about this book,
is that she writes like a combination
of Lemony Snicket and Roald Dahl
and Kate DiCamillo, and Charles Dickens
all rolled up into one.
So, I have a couple short, short passages from this one.
Just enough introduction
to let you know that Anastasia is told
that her parents had met their demise
in a freak vacuum cleaner accident,
and that two aunts that she never knew about
scoop her up and take her to her home,
which is a former insane asylum.
[From "The League of Beastley Dreadfuls"]:
Reader, there are no greeting cards
for many occasions.
There are cards for holidays.
There are Hanukkah and Christmas cards,
and soppy pink Valentines, trimmed in lace,
and "Get-Well-Soon" cards.
There are even "Thank-You-For-Pet-Sitting" cards.
However, as of the printing of this book,
no card manufacturer has ever marketed a
"Congratulations On Your
"Very First Premonition of Doom card."
Nor can you easily find a
"Sorry You're Frightened Out Of Your Gourd
"Because You're Locked In A Former "Lunatic Asylum
"In The Middle Of Nowhere On The Day Your Parents Were Mangled
"In A Freak Vacuuming Accident" card.
It's a shame, because a card like one of those
would have been perfect for Anastasia
at this dreary point in our story.
Isn't that fun just to read aloud?
Here's another part where she's looking around this asylum,
and she questions, she's kind of trapped,
she questions:
Was the asylum on fire?
Anastasia rammed the door with her shoulder,
panic swelling in her tonsils.
The wood moaned but refused to budge.
"Crumbs!" Twisting herself like a Bavarian pretzel,
she placed the souls of her galoshes
against the door and kicked with all her might.
The door burst open, and out tumbled Anastasia,
hurdy-gurdy, head-over-heels,
nose-over-toes, bum-over-tea-kettle,
right into another one of asylum's mysterious armpits.
So, what makes a good "Read-Aloud"
besides having the words just tumble off
like that last one there?
Well, first of all, the book should
hold the reader's attention, the adult
as well as he young audience's attention.
C.S. Lewis says,
"A children's story is the best art form
"for something to say.
"A children's story which is enjoyed only by children
"is a bad children's story."
Now, I try to do my best to imagine
many scenarios of young listening audiences
so I don't limit my choice to "Adult Male Interests",
and working with kids and having kids of my own
has helped me develop empathy toward their tastes.
And young people going into the education and library field,
you are developing those skills as well.
At least, you should be.
Two, the writing must flow
and be a delight to read out loud,
like that passage I just read.
"Fun on the tongue" is how I put it.
Physically pleasing to say out loud.
Three, if reading several books,
look for a balance of protagonist of both genders,
particularly if you're working with a classroom-size.
I should also add variety of genres here.
I know a lot of people read one fantasy after another,
and then they might miss out on
the pleasure of a historical fiction book
or contemporary realism.
This helps develop that "windows" metaphore,
looking at new experiences or characters unlike yourself
by looking through a window at them
while listening to a story.
Four, don't always pick the award winners.
Just because it won an award
doesn't mean that it is the best one to read aloud.
Now, a lot of award-winners are excellent to read aloud,
but there's also a lot of
other great "Read-Alouds" out there
that don't win awards and are still worthy of sharing.
And then five,
be careful about picking books with a more sensitive nature.
There's a lot of books out there
that are better for the reader to read on their own
and not to share with somebody else.
So, you think of books like Judy Bloom's books.
You know, somebody going through puberty,
or other sensitive topics.
Or books that have a strong language.
Now, I find that if there's a book I like
that has strong language,
and everybody has different measurements
on what strong language is,
feel free to skip some of those words
if they make you uncomfortable.
Or you might swap out some words.
I might say "butt" instead of "ass"
or "bleep" instead of, you know.
I prefer to sell those books
to individuals kind of more
through a book talk approach instead of Read-Aloud.
So, those are just some simple candidates for that.
And then for tips themselves,
I think the biggest one is know your audience.
You know, if it's one or two kids you know them very well.
If it's a classroom size group
or an auditorium full of listeners, too.
You kind of know, you can kind of gauge what they can handle.
There are some kids that would love
"Coraline" by Niel Gaiman, a really creepy, scary book,
and there's other kids that couldn't handle it.
So you have to kind of be able to know that.
Some can relate to a story,
like "Joey Pigza Swallowed The Key"
where Joey, a boy with attention deficit disorder.
Other kids might be immature enough,
they might make fun of someone who is like Joey.
They might point to someone who is like Joey in their group,
but hopefully they'd be mature enough to handle that.
Remember that listening age ranges
are broader than reading age levels.
Now, most kindergarteners cannot read
"Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane" by Kate DiCamillo.
But, they can certainly enjoy listening to it.
In fact, a local school a few years back
had all of the teachers, all of the classrooms,
K through 5 read the same book
to all of the kids with great success.
Number three, book talk topics are broader
when reading to a captive audience.
I have "Princess Academy" up there, by Shannon Hale.
I argue that this is a good book to share with boys.
It's got adventure, kidnapping,
a smart protagonist.
Now, boys won't pick it up
because of the title and the cover,
but if they are listening,
they are a captive audience, they will enjoy it.
I like to think the same is true of "My Last Best Friend".
You get a lot of boys reading their book too.
Spitballs in a girls hair?
Hey guys, listen to this!
I mean that's you're selling point, right?
Four, choose books you've read.
You won't believe the number of adults,
mostly teachers, who come to me and say,
"I was reading this book to a group of kids,
"then this embarrassing scene happened.
"It just showed up."
And I don't feel sorry for that teacher.
Read it ahead of time,
so that you can practice reading it,
and then you could be prepared
for those potential embarrassing scenes.
Choose books you enjoy.
Goes without saying.
Practicing names, foreign phrases
and vocabulary ahead of time,
and number seven:
Be an entertainer with your voice and expressions.
And the key to that is being enthusiastic.
The rest comes easy.
Don't overdo it, don't worry about
being an actor, a ham.
Don't worry about keeping track of
several different character voices.
Follow the author's lead.
A lot of authors read their work aloud
as they write, and they know how it should sound.
And then if you do that, if you follow the author's lead,
you'll know when to add tension, when to add lighthearted humor,
and everything in between.
Here's a passage from a recent Newberry Award winner.
Yes, it was an award winner.
This one deserved it and it's a good "Read-Aloud" too.
By Kate DiCamillo, one of our Minesotta writers,
from "Flora & Ulysses",
I've cobbled a couple of paragraphs together
from the beginning of the story here.
Listen to this one from "Flora & Ulysses":
She was interrupted a few minutes later
by a very loud noise.
It sounded as if a jet plane had landed
in the Tickums' back yard.
"What the heck?" Said Flora.
She got up from her desk and looked out the window
and saw Mrs. Tickum running around the backyard
with a shiny, over-sized vacuum cleaner.
It looked like she was vacuuming her yard!
"That can't be," thought Flora,
"who vacuums their yard?"
Actually it didn't look like Mrs. Tickum
knew what she as doing.
It was more like the vacuum cleaner was in charge,
and the vacuum cleaner seemed to be out of its mind,
or it's engine, or something.
"A few bolts shy of a load."
"Flora said out loud.
And then she saw that Mrs. Tickum
and the vacuum cleaner were headed
directly for a squirrel.
"Hey now!" said Flora. She banged out the window.
"Watch out!" she shouted,
"You're going to vacuum up that squirrel!"
She said the words,
and then she had a strange moment of seeing them,
hanging there over her head.
"You're going to vacuum up the squirrel."
There's just no predicting
what kind of sentences you might say, thought Flora.
For instance, who would ever think you would shout,
"You're going to vacuum up that squirrel?"
Didn't make any difference, though, what word she said.
Flora was too far away,
the vacuum cleaner was too loud,
and clearly it was bent on destruction.
"This malfeasance must be stopped!"
said Flora in a deep and super-heroic voice.
She stood at the window and watched
as the squirrel was vacuumed up.
Poof. Fwump. "Holy Bagumba!" said Flora.
Almost like poetry coming off it, you know?
You know, it's just fun.
Like I said, physically pleasing.
And speaking of poetry,
there's a lot of wonderful poetry collections out there.
We shouldn't forget them.
There's a lot of novels and verse,
This is kind of a popular format of late
where the narrative is told through a series of poems.
Some of my favorites here include
Karen Hesse's "Out of the Dust",
a series of poems that talk about
one family's ordeal during the Great Depression,
the Dust Bowl era.
She did such a good job.
I felt like I had to brush my teeth
and take a shower afterwards.
"Love That Dog", which a lot of you know,
is also a favorite one where a boy,
he expresses a dislike for poetry,
at the end discovers that he likes poetry
and it also helps him with a healing process.
"May B" is a novel that I would recommend
for fans of "The Little House" books,
and it's about a young woman who is hired
to go work for a couple living out in the prairie,
and then they leave her alone
and she's stranded in the middle of a storm.
"Inside Out and Back Again", which is a novel in verse
about a Vietnamese immigration experience,
and then two biographies in verse,
"The Poet Slave of Cuba", which was an actual poet
who was enslaved.
He was bought by a woman who considered him her son,
but mistreated him severely,
and then "Carver: A Life in Poems" by Marilyn Nelson,
which is a biography of George Washington Carver,
but done all in poems, and I'd like to read
two little selections from that book here.
This first one is called "Green Thumb Boy"
and it's given from the perspective of a professor,
Dr. L.H. Pummel, and he is talking about
how impressed he is with Carver.
[From "Green Thumb Boy"]:
We had doubts about giving him a class to teach,
but he's done a bang-up job with the greenhouse.
His students see the light of genius
through the dusky window of his skin.
just yesterday, that new boy, what's-his-name, from Arkansas,
tried to raise a ruckus when Carver
put his dinner tray down.
He cleared his throat, stared,
rattled his own tray, scraped his chair legs
in a rush to move away.
Carver ate on in silence.
Then the boys at the table
the new boy had moved to cleared their throats,
rattled their trays, and scraped their chairs
as they got up and moved to Carver's table.
Something about the man does that,
raises the best in you.
I've never asked what.
I guess I'll put his name next to mine
on that article I'm sending out.
And then another one called "Chemistry 101"
in which Carver is actually teaching the Chemistry class.
A canvas apron over his street clothes,
Carver leads his Chemistry class into the college dump.
The students follow,
a claque of ducklings hatched by hens.
Where he sees a retort, a Bunsen burner,
a mortar, zinc sulfate,
they see a broken bowl, a broken lantern,
a rusty old flat iron, a fruit jar top.
Their tangle of twine, his lace.
He turns, a six-inch length of copper tubing in one hand.
"Now, what can we do with this?"
Two by two, little lights go on.
One by hesitant one, dark hands are raised.
The waters of imagining, their element.
Just love to read poetry aloud,
and it's a good way to share it with kids, too.
Now, you've probably noticed
I've spent most of this lecture so far
focusing on chapter books.
I could spend an entire lecture
on informational books, biographies,
as well as an hour on picture books.
Now, picture books are always fun to share,
and here is a brand new one
by author/illustrator Mike Wohnoutka of Minnesota.
Many picture storybooks
have the illustrations tell the story
where the words leave off.
So pace yourself, so that you make sure
that your young audience can see the images
and process what the images are saying.
So, let's take a look at this one here.
"This is Oliver, and this is Oliver's dad"
And if you've ever seen Mike,
he must have done the illustrations
while looking at a mirror.
All summer they played together,
laughed together, sang together,
and read together.
On the first day of school,
Oliver's dad didn't feel good.
"My tummy hurts."
"It's okay, dad."
"You're just a little nervous. Come on, let's go!
"We don't wanna be late for the first day of school!"
But Oliver's dad had a few things he needed to do
before they left.
Just love this picture.
"Daddy! What are you doing?
"We need to go now!"
So, Oliver's dad hid behind the couch.
Oliver found him.
He hid inside the closet.
Oliver found him. He hid outside.
"Daddy!"
Oliver found him and dragged him to the car.
Oliver's dad drove very slowly.
"You're probably going to really miss me
"when you're at school, Oliver."
"Sure, daddy."
When they got to school, Oliver ran to his classroom
and met his teacher.
"So nice to meet you, Oliver."
"My tummy really hurts."
Then it was time to say goodbye.
"Bye, daddy.
"Daddy.
"Daddy?" "Daddy!"
The teacher walked Oliver's dad outside.
(audience laughing)
My favorite picture in the book.
"Bye, daddy!" Oliver's dad drove home.
He couldn't stop thinking about Oliver.
He worried about Oliver, he missed Oliver,
and his tummy really, really hurt.
Then he realized,
"I'm not ready for school!"
Oliver's dad drove back to the school,
he ran to the classroom,
and just before he opened the door, he stopped.
He couldn't believe what he saw!
Oliver was playing.
He was laughing, then he was singing and reading.
Oliver's dad smiled.
Oliver and his dad were ready for school.
And after the first day of school,
they celebrated until their tummies hurt.
"Good job, daddy."
Yeah, isn't that cool?
Thank you to Mike for letting me,
gave permission to show all those images up here, too.
I ran into Mike one time, too.
Also, he's the guy who did the illustrations
for "Moo!" written by David LaRochelle,
and oh, look, it's autographed.
- [Audience] Ooh!
- Yeah, they're well trained, okay good.
And so it's the word "moo"
over and over and over,
and I ran into Mike one time at a book festival
and I said, "How do you read this moo?
And he said, "However you want to."
And I think that's just kind of an overriding message here.
However you want to read it.
Now, when you're reading, consider singing.
And there's a lot of picture books out there
that are actually song lyrics.
* Catalina Magdalina Hoopensteiner Wallendiner
* Hogan Logan Bogan was her name. *
An old camp song.
And you might have learned a different version,
because in the back, Ted Arnold has a list
of all the different fun names you can have.
* Do your ears hang low Do they wobble to and fro *
And this one particularly by Caroline Jane Church
opens up and a big fold-out of the dog's ears come out.
* Little bunny Foo-Foo
- [audience] * Hopping through the forest
* Scooping up the field mice and bopping them on the head *
- Now, wouldn't it be fun to just hold a picture book with the kid
while you're singing that with them, too?
* How much is that doggy in the window *
* He's got the whole world in his hands *
So, we're gonna get to the music portion
of tonight's lecture.
Now, there's a lot, a lot of versions
of "Old McDonald had a farm," out there,
and of course a lot of different illustrators and authors wanna
come up with their own version.
Judy Sierra wrote "EIEIO: How Old McDonald Got His Farm."
He used to live in a house, he had a lawn...
"With a mow, mow here, "and a mow, mow there."
Old McDonald had a wood shop
where the lamb MacDonald, sheep MacDonald.
"With a shh, shh here, and a shh, shh there.
And a bang, bang here" and a bang, bang there."
Ms. MacDonald had a class where the kids do
"Snip, snip here" with the scissors, "paint, paint here".
And so, I've come up with a different Old MacDonald version.
I find that if you share a song,
whether it's in a picture book format
or just sing it to them without the book,
they love knowing the basic song.
And then if there's new versions, they like those too.
And so, I always come up with new words.
And so, one time I was doing kind of
a lesson plan dealing with the letter O,
and I picked Old MacDonald
because Old MacDonald starts with the letter O, right?
But then I thought, wouldn't it be fun
to have everything on Old MacDonald's farm
begin with the letter O?
Now, there's not a lot of farm animals
That begin with the letter O, so we kind of broadened our thinking.
And so, I thought of an owl.
Alright, so if we do an owl
with the format of Old MacDonald,
we have to come up with a gesture.
So, how about an owl wing?
So, here we go.
* Old MacDonald had a farm * E-I-E-I-O
* And on his farm * He had an owl
* E-I-E-I-O
* With a... - [Audience] * Hoo, hoo
- * Here, and a... - [Audience] * Hoo, hoo. * - Everybody now!
* Here a... - [Audience] * Hoo
- * There a... - [Audience] * Hoo
- * Everywhere a... - [Audience] * Hoo hoo
- It took some of you, your wings a little longer to get going there.
So, while I was working on this, I was hired to do some stories
up on Madeline Island at the La Point Public Library.
And it was the summer and we were
all out in the yard there.
It was a beautiful summer night.
And I told the crowd I was working on this,
and right away a little girl goes, "Ogre!"
And I go, "How are we gonna do Ogre?"
And she did this:
"* And on his farm he had an ogre
"* E-I-E-I-O
"* With a [growls] here And a [growls] there
"* Here a [growls], There a [growls], Everywhere a [growls] *"
It was funny because she was about this big when she did that.
And then a boy shouted out "Octopus!"
And I go, "Octopuses don't make any noises.
"How are we gonna do that?"
And he came up with: " * A hug, hug, here,
" * And a hug, hug, there
" * Here a hug There a hug
"* Everywhere a hug, hug "
And then one of the moms in the back said, "Onion!"
So guess what we did with onion?
* And on his farm he had an onion
* E-I-E-I-O
* With a boo-hoo here
* And a boo-hoo there
* Here a boo There a boo
* Everywhere a boo-hoo
I took those verses
and I put them in one of my music books,
and I wrote that book too soon,
because then I'd go out to different libraries
and I do it, and you get more suggestions.
And my all-time favorite suggestion
was when somebody said,
"Old MacDonald had an opera.
" * With a... * (audience vocalizing)
" * Here, and a... * (audience vocalizing)
* There... * Here a... (audience vocalizing)
* There a... * (audience vocalizing)
* Everywhere a... * (audience vocalizing)
* Old MacDonald had a farm
* E-I-E-I
(audience vocalizing)
Okay, that was passable. That was passable.
"Wheels on the Bus."
You all know "Wheels on the Bus"?
* The wheels on the bus go round and round
* And the people on the bus go up and down
* And the wipers on the bus go swish, swish, swish
* And the baby on the bus goes wah, wah, wah
* And the parents on the bus go shh, shh, shh *
Well, here's a few other versions.
Here's a "Wheels on the School Bus"
where it's full of teachers.
They're going on a field trip.
So, the librarian says "read, read, read"
and the other teachers do their things.
This is one book I thought,
"Oh, I wish I thought of this one!"
"The Seals on the Bus." Full of animals.
The seals on the bus go [imitates seal]
Those snakes on the bus go... [imitates hissing]
or, I'm sorry it's the vipers.
The vipers on the bus go [imitates snakes]
You know wipers, vipers? Okay, now you get it, okay.
And the skunk on the bus goes... [imitates spraying].
That's near the end, and the last one is
The people on the bus go "Help, help, help"
So, I came up with my own.
I need you guys to kind of help out with this one.
We're gonna get off the bus now,
and we're gonna get into a nice, red, shiny sports car.
Yeah, thank you.
* The wheels of the car go * Round and round and round
* Round and round and round
* The wheels of the car go * Round and round and round
* All around the town * The horn on the car goes
* (imitating car horn)
* The horn on the car goes (audience imitating car)
* All around the town You're gonna like this one.
The motor on the car goes (imitating speeding car)
(audience laughing) Okay, so basically
you spit quite, spit loud, spit quiet, okay?
The motor on the car goes
(audience imitating speeding car)
Let's try it one more time.
The motor on the car goes
(audience imitating speeding car) * All around the town
Alright, let's get out of this car,
because I'm teaching you bad driving habits.
It's unsafe, and besides
front row's getting a little wet here.
So, let's get into a rocket ship.
* The boosters on the rocket go
*(imitates rocket)
* The boosters on the rockets go
* (imitates rocket)
* Up above in space
The people in the rocket go...
Okay sorry, * the radio on the rocket goes
* "Houston, I'm getting (mumbling)"
The radio on the rocket goes,
"I can't understand a word you're saying."
* Up above in space
The people in the rocket go,
"Hey, I'm floating."
"Hey, I'm floating. "Hey, I'm floating.
The people on the rocket go... - [Audience] "Hey, I'm floating.
- * Up above in space.
Okay, let's land this rocket now.
We're gonna get into the most exciting
mode of transport I can think of.
Are you ready? Here it goes.
It's a donkey cart! (audience laughing)
* The wheels of the cart go * (imitating wheels)
* All around the town
* The driver in the cart goes, * "Giddy-up! (spits)
* "Giddy-up! (spits)"
* The driver on the cart goes * - [Audience] "Giddy-up! (spits)" *
- * All around the town
The donkey on the cart goes [imitating donkey]
- [Audience] (imitating donkey)
- The donkey on the cart goes - [Audience] (imitating donkey)
- * All around the town
The kids on the cart sing,
* That's all, that's all, that's all" *
The kids on the cart sing, - [Audience] * That's all
- * All around the town
That's all for music we'll do right now.
Thank you, give yourselves a round of applause.
(audience applauding)
Give yourself a triangle of applause.
Give yourself a rectangle of applause.
Give yourselves a rhomboid trapezoid of applause.
Yeah, I had a math teacher come up and say,
"There's no such thing."
Okay, and then the last thing we're gonna talk about,
very shortly, I could go on and on and on about this one,
that is storytelling.
Storytelling is a wonderful companion
to reading aloud.
You have the extra bonus
of having that direct link between
the storyteller and the listener.
"The Exploding Frog" is a story I've told
hundreds of times over the years.
It's basically called "The Ox and the Frog."
It's an Aesop's Fable.
This book now is long out of print.
"The Exploding Frog and Other Fables from Aesop"
retold by John McFarland, illustrated by James Marshall.
And the basic premise of this story is that
a frog hears about an ox.
He says, "I can get as big as that ox"
and then he explodes.
And the last page of this, and the book is out of print,
I can't find a copy of it anywhere,
it has green bits of frog going in all directions.
And I thought to myself,
"That looks like a balloon when it pops."
So, I go around, and I tell this story with a balloon now.
And once upon a time, there were these two little frogs,
Playing leapfrog and "Guess how high I can jump".
And they were down by a creek.
Down there also was a great big grand-daddy bullfrog.
I got him right here.
There, you see him? Proves it's a true story, right?
He was taking a nap.
While he was sleeping, the little frogs were playing,
a great big ox came down to get a drink.
And the little frogs, that's all they could talk about
was how big he was, even after the ox left.
Well, they talked and talked so much,
that they finally woke up
the great big grand-daddy bullfrog.
He listened for a few minutes, and he said,
"You know what you're describing is just an ordinary ox.
"They're not so big.
"Why, if I tried hard enough,
"I could get as big as that ox."
The little tiny frogs said, "Oh, no you couldn't!"
And he said, "Oh yeah, well stand back and watch this!"
So he stretched his skin this way,
he stretched his skin that way,
he got bigger and bigger, bit by bit,
just like this.
"There." he said,
"Was that ox as big as this?"
The little tiny frogs shook their heads and said,
"No, no, he was bigger!
"He was bigger!"
"Bigger, huh?
"Okay, I can get a little bit bigger."
So he stretched a little more.
"There." he said. "Was that ox as big as this?"
The little tiny frogs shook their heads and said,
"No, no, he was bigger. He was..."
- [Audience] Bigger. - You guys want bigger?
- [Audience] Bigger!
- "Bigger, okay I can get a little bit bigger," he said.
So he stretched a little more.
"Was that ox as big as this?"
The little tiny frogs shook their heads and said,
"No, he was..." - [Audience] Bigger!
- Bigger. You want bigger.
"Okay, I can get a little bit bigger."
So he stretched a little more... What's the matter with you guys?
(audience laughing)
He stretched a little more.
"Was he as big as this?"
The little tiny frogs shook their heads and said, "No, he was..."
"Bigger, okay I can get a little bit bigger."
So, he stretched a little more.
(audience gasping)
The little tiny frogs picked up what was left
of that great big granddaddy bullfrog
and they said, "He was almost as big as that ox,
"but not quite big enough."
And that's the story of Aesop's exploding frog.
Alright, I wasn't going to
blow it up here at the last minute,
because I was worried about the microphone and everything.
I even told the crew, "I'll just let it go."
Because if you let it go, it goes (imitates balloon)
and it gets just as big a laugh from kids
as the blowing up part.
I do tell older kids if they want to use the balloon,
make sure that they blow it up beforehand
so the know how big it gets,
because when it's nice and tight,
if you pinch it, it explodes.
If you don't have a lot of air in it, you wind up wrestling with it,
but you also don't want it to blow up too soon.
And there's been a few times where
I've been blowing it, and it blew up in my face.
And it can cut your lip pretty bad.
And when you're in front of a bunch of preschoolers,
"Okay, ignore the bleeding storyteller"
It doesn't work very well.
So, my favorite story about this story is
One time I was asked to do some story program
down by Lake Geneva in Darien, Wisconsin.
And back in the 1980's,
the librarian's name in Darien was Marian.
Marian the librarian in Darien.
True story, I'm not making this up.
And I went in and I said, "I'm your storyteller"
She said, "Upstairs."
And at that time, the Darien Public Library
was a modified one and a half story house.
So I went up there to the children's room, which was the attic,
and the roof was this far from my head.
And I noticed on their poster they had a juggler in the following week.
I wondered, how is that gonna work?
And so, I had an audience of
a nine-year-old boy, two little preschool girls
and three young women who came with the girls.
I thought, and this was a great thought back then, right?
I thought, "I'll start off with the exploding frog"
So, I blow up the balloon, pinch it, bang!
Next sound I heard was (imitates crying).
The two women picked up the three girls and they left,
and it was me and the nine-year-old boy.
And I had 45 minutes to kill.
And I said after the second story,
because he started doing this thing.
"You have enough?" And he goes, "Yeah" and he left.
So that was my storytelling experience there.
So, shoot ahead about 11 years or so,
12 years, 13 years.
I had just written my book,
"Something Funny Happened at the Library"
and I was asked to do a workshop
in the neighboring town of Burlington
for librarians, for teaching librarians
how to be funny.
And I said, "It's nice to be here,
"not too far from Darien.
"I have a funny story about it."
And I told the story I just told you there.
And one of the librarians in the back goes,
"That was my son."
I go, "You're kidding, how old is he now?"
"21. He never went back to the library after that day."
So, yeah, Rob Reid.
He doesn't make literature come alive for kids
he scares kids from the library.
Alright, we're gonna close today's program
with a retelling of "The Enormous Turnip"
Now, there's a lot of picture books
that share this tale from Europe.
Basically, a farmer plants a turnip seed.
It grows to such a gigantic size he can't pull it out.
His wife comes, the two of them can't pull it out.
Their kids come one by one, they can't pull it out.
The animals come, they can't pull it out.
Until a little mouse joins in the line
and when the mouse tugs with them, they pull it out.
When I was a librarian, every September
we had big requests for books about apples,
mostly daycare providers,
and they would come in and wipe us out.
We would spend a lot of money on apple books and they would wipe us out.
And then the person who just got a job would come in and say,
"Hey, I need a picture book about apples tomorrow."
And we'd go, "No, they're long gone."
And I felt bad for him, so I came up with a version,
an apple version of "The Enormous Turnip" for them
that they could tell to their kids
after hearing it one time.
And I like to share this story
with kids come up from the audience.
So, I need some actors here.
I need an apple tree. We're gonna have my apple tree.
Thank you very much for volunteering.
I was thinking of different animals
that live in Wisconsin that eat apples.
And I need a pig.
So I need someone who's gonna be a pig.
Thank you very much sir. Okay I need my pig.
I need a goat. I need a goat, great.
I need a llama, because we have a lot of llama farms around.
So, I need a llama. Stand right over here.
Okay, I need a horse.
I need a horse, very quickly.
Okay, you guys over here. You're my tree.
You guys over there. That's far enough.
My tree right here. My tree's gonna be right here.
Okay, and the hero of our story, the worm.
Thank you for volunteering to be the worm.
Thank you very much.
That's what you get for your son marrying my daughter.
Okay, there. Okay, put this down here.
Alright, now the rest of you I know you said,
"Oh darn, he didn't pick me. But there's a part for you too."
Okay, all right, so now you put your branches up.
Okay, the biggest juiciest tree
in the whole orchard started as as a small blossom.
Do you see it? Right there.
It grew until it was the size of a tennis ball.
It grew until it was the size of a bowling ball.
It grew until it was the size of a watermelon.
The apple grew and grew and grew
until it was as big as the tree.
Pig was the first one into the orchard.
Ah, very good. Pig saw the apple.
Why don't you stand up, pig, so the camera can see you.
Pig saw the apple. His eyes grew wide.
His jaw dropped.
He said, "That must be the biggest, juiciest apple
"in the whole orchard. I want it."
So he grabbed onto that apple, and he pulled.
And audience, this is where you can help.
He pulled, and he pulled
and he pulled.
The tree bent way over.
Yeah I'm glad you went that way
because I've had college students go this direction.
They have to drop my class and take Physics 101.
Okay, but the apple stuck tight to the branch.
Take two steps back. Alright good, alright.
Next into the orchard was the goat.
Come on in, goat.
Goat saw the apple, her eyes grew wide her jaw dropped.
She said, "That must be the biggest,
"juiciest apple in the whole orchard; I want it."
Pig grunted at her. - (grunts)
- Yeah, he said "I saw it first,
"but I guess there's enough for both of us."
So they switched places. Goat pulled pig.
Pig, don't pull the tree. Pull the apple. There we go.
Pig pulled the apple and they pulled, and they...
- [Audience] Pulled. - And they... - [Audience] Pulled.
You guys gotta use your body English.
The apple stuck tight on the brance.
You guys take two steps back here.
Llama strolled in from a nearby llama farm.
Llama saw the apple. Her eyes grew wide. Her jaw dropped.
She said, "That must be the biggest, "juiciest apple in the whole orchard.
"I want it."
The other two animals grunted at her. - (grunting)
- They said, "We saw it first."
But we guess there's enough for all of us.
So, llama got to the end of the line.
Come a little closer here.
Llama pulled goat, goat pulled pig,
pig pulled the apple, and they... - [Audience] Pulled.
- And they... - [Audience] Pulled.
- Tree bent way, way way over. Feel the burn, tree.
But the apple stuck tight to the branch.
Okay you can stand up now.
Alright, take two steps over, there you go.
Horse galloped into the orchard
Horse saw the apple.
Her eyes grew wide, her jaw dropped,
She said, "That must be the biggest juiciest apple in the whole orchard.
"I want it." The other animals grunted at her.
- (grunting) - (growling)
- They said, "We saw it first.
"But we guess there's enough for all of us."
So, horse went to the end of the line.
Horse pulled llama, llama pulled goat,
goat pulled pig, pig pulled the apple, and they...
- [Audience] Pulled. - And they... - [Audience] Pulled.
- But the apple stuck tight to the branch.
Worm cam into the orchard.
Come right over here, worm.
Worm saw the apple.
His eyes grew wide, his jaw dropped.
He said, "That must be the biggest, juiciest apple
"in the whole orchard; I want it."
The other animals said, "You're too puny to help.
"Why don't you just scram?" Say scram.
- Scram.
- He said, "I'm not too puny. I can help."
So he went to the end of the line.
Worm pulled horse.
I'm not sure how, but worm pulled horse,
horse pulled llama, llama pulled goat,
goat pulled pig, pig pulled the apple, and they...
- [Audience] Pulled. - And they...
- [Audience] Pulled.
- Freeze!
And while the four animals in front were still pulling,
they said one more time to worm, "Scram, worm!"
- "Scram, worm!" - So worm simply let go.
The tree snapped in the other direction,
sending the four animals in front tumbling through the air
where they disappeared out of sight.
There we go. There we go.
Then the tree snapped in the other direction,
sending the apple high into the air
where it did an apple turnover.
Thought of that one myself. Headed straight for worm.
His eyes grew wide, his jaw dropped,
moments before the apple landed
he dug a hole in the ground and disappeared
and the apple landed with a plop.
Give me a big plop noise. (audience banging tables)
Come back worm, you're running out of camera here.
Alright, worm was trapped.
Did he worry? - [Audience member] No.
- No? Did he fret?
No, he's a worm, it's an apple.
He simply smiled the biggest smile a worm could smile.
(audience laughing)
And he began to chew his way through that apple.
He chewed and chewed and chewed and spent a very long time
in the middle of the biggest, juiciest apple
in the whole orchard.
Tree, you can drop your arms. Worm, join the tree.
Four animals, tumble back into sight,
and get right up in here in the front row here,
and everybody take a bow to thunderous applause.
(audience applauding)
Thank you, thank you all, thank you.
Alright, good job.
Alright, well that's just a little snippet
of things we could do
to make literature come alive for kids.
I want all of you to go out there,
read to kids, sing to kids, and tell stories to kids.
Thank you.
(audience applauding)