Balloons over Broadway

Growing up my family attended the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade in NYC almost every year.  I was always amazed by the sight of the balloons and we always took pleasure in the ones that didn't make it or that we're barely hanging on by the time they reached us.  WW also marveled at how many people it took to steer them, hold them down and navigate the balloons through the NYC streets.  That is why once I saw this book, I knew it would be one I could connect with immediately.

I enjoyed reading it not just because of my own personal connection but because of the great adaptability of the puppeteer of the balloons, Tony Sarg.  He was in fact a puppeteer first and then the balloon inventor.  I had no idea the connection with Ohio or Goodyear and those connections for me made this all the more worthwhile.  As a picture book, there are so many more stories in the pictures and the layouts then just in the text.

Helen's Big Words

the beautiful, simplistic cover drew me into this book but what kept me fascinated as a teacher was how seamlessly this book lent itself to teaching first and third person writing.  The author carefully wove in quotes from Helen's autobiography to capture the whole story of Helen's life.  I have read Helen's autobiography as a kid and I was amazed at how much more I learned from this picture book.  I knew that Helen's teacher Annie was credited for so much of her success but I didn't remember how devoted to Helen Annie was all throughout her life.  I also never realized how outspoken Helen was on such politic issues and that people listened to her opinions of issues.

Uncle Andy's

The great part about this book is that it is told in such a way and illustrated in such a way that you are certain that it must be a fiction book,  it is great to read along side a biographical article about Andy Warhol to realize that this is a biography of his.  This is great for teaching author's point of view, author's purpose and characteristics of a biography. Great combination of illustrations in a very fun yet informative way!

Further Tales of Uncle Remus - Author Study

Lester, J. (1990). Further Tales of Uncle Remus. Dial Books: New York.

Although four Uncle Remus Books were published, they were later republished as a complete collection so this third book was the last one that I could personally get a copy of.  This book continues to have encounters between Brer Rabbit and Mr. Man but also other animals mishaps with Mr. Man as well.  This collections introduces new characters such as Brer Buzzard and Brer Polecat.  What is important to note in these books that I hadn't noted before was that when Lester originally read Joel Chandler Harris's versions of these stories they were in "black slave language" and thus they were hard for those that speak common English today to understand.  Lester kept some of that slang or dialect as we refer to it, like Ain't and gon' but made it so the entire story isn't filled with that language.

The reason I point out language is because it is important to teach students about the use of dialect and slang in writing and when it is appropriate and when it is not.  The lesson is great to discuss author's purpose and language choice.  This collection is a good example of that.  The introductions written by Lester helped to give students the background knowledge to better synthesize the stories and make inferences from them.

More Tales of Uncle Remus - Author Study

Lester, Julius (1988). More Tales of Uncle Remus. Dial Books: New York.

When Julius Lester wrote his first Uncle Remus book he was rewriting a collection from Joel Chandler Harris.  This collection had 263 tales and 113 with Brer Rabbit.  Thus, it was not surprising that after receiving the Coretta Scott King Award for his first Uncle Remus book, he wrote another.  IN the introduction, by Julius Lester, he explains that Brer Rabbit is not a personified slave or even a black man but a personification of all people - black or white.  These are considered by Lester as "Trickster tales" and thus this collection and are not to be interpreted as moral lessons.   Lester does say though that Brer Rabbit was created by slaves and thus the importance in Afro-American history.  This collection has Brer Rabbit teaming up with Brer Fox, falling in love, and the introduction to Mr. Man.

This is a great continuation of the Uncle Remus stories as presented yesterday and could be taught in a similar way, but using different characters or talking about how those characters interact and what impact they have on Brer Rabbit's life.

The Tales of Uncle Remus - Author Study

Lester, J. (1987) The Tales of Uncle Remus. Dial Books: New York.

This book is a collection of stories told by Uncle Remus.  The forward of the book explains that when the stories were first published by Joel Chandler Harris in the late 1800s.  In those books Uncle Remus was an obedient slave who told these stories as a form of entertainment to the white slave owner's child.  The cultural thought those is that Brer Rabbit was in fact a personification of a slave and Brer Fox whom he often tricks is a slave owner.  In this collection, Lester write Uncle Remus, the storyteller, to be neither a slave nor a black person but a voice who is retelling the stories.  It is felt that they are an important part of black culture and history.

This book would work well when chosen stories are pre-selected for either reading groups or independent reading that would lend themselves well to reading responses.  Because many of the stories have a central character but do not need to be read in order students can teach each other about the story that they read and then they can come up with a character profile of Brer Rabbit from the retold stories. 

Day of Tears - Author Study

Lester, J. (2005) Day of Tears. Hyperion Books: New York.

This is the story of a slave named Emma who has helped to raise her master's daughters since their mother left.  Her master is a very wealthy landowner with many slaves but he gets himself into a lot of problems due to a gambling debt.  This story is about the two days that he needed to auction off his slaves in order to pay off his $300,00 gambling debt.  This was an actual event and is called the day of tears because it rained hard throughout the entire auction and stopped almost immediately as soon as the auction was complete.  

If you've read enough of this blog, you know that I always look for books that are written from a unique point of view.  This book is true to that choice and passion.  It is written as a novel in dialogue.  I cannot think of any other novel that is written in this way.  I've read novels in poetry but never in dialogue.  This book would be great for students to practice their fluency and to read in a reading group because students can take roles and see the author's true intent and reasons for writing in dialogue.