Browne Education Campus

Little Golden Books are often the first books a child remembers hearing. My family called me the Poky Little Puppy sometimes because I was slow to get ready to go places. There are so many Little Golden Books that most children recognize them! 

The Monster at the End of this Book is often a familiar book for kids and adults. I showed the cover to my nephew for the first time on FaceTime recently, and my brother-in-law said it was one of his favorites as a kid! This is another simple, hilarious story. Grover from Sesame Street is the only character (other than us, the reader). Grover discovers that there is a monster at the end of the book, and he is truly terrified (but in a funny way). He begs us, the readers, not to turn the pages. He uses ropes, wood, and bricks to stop us from turning the page, but of course we continue to turn the pages. By the end of the book, Grover discovers that HE is the monster at the end of the book. He is relieved and embarrassed, but mostly happy that there isn't a "real" monster. This, like Leonardo the Terrible Monster, shows that monsters do not have to be scary!

This Second Person Point of View narration works really well in this book and the Pigeon books by Mo Willems. Second Person narration is very difficult to get right, and both books draw the readers in and really hit home with kids. I wouldn't be surprised if Mo Willems was inspired by this book and by his time on Sesame Street (he was an animator and writer on the show). The Pigeon books, like Grover, capture the reader's or listener's attention and use humor and heart to keep our attention throughout. I can't wait to share this with my nephew (when he is more awake next time I call). 

Mo Willems continues to bring me a lot of joy. One of his first books was Knuffle Bunny, a book about a little girl, her dad, and her special bunny, Knuffle Bunny. The magic of this book comes from its illustrations. Willems used black and white photos of his Brooklyn neighborhood and drew his characters over them. Thus, Brooklyn almost becomes a character in his story instead of just the setting. 

Trixie is a little girl. She can walk, but she can't yet talk with words. She can definitely communicate, though! Trixie goes with her dad to "help" at the laundromat, carrying her special Knuffle Bunny with her. As she "helps" put the clothes in the washer and put the money in the machine, she gets so excited that she forgets something. The middle of the book shows Trixie using her own language to try to communicate that something is wrong with her dad, which leads to an epic meltdown. She screams, goes boneless, and makes sure her dad knows how unhappy she is. It's hilarious. 

Of course, Trixie's mom sees that Knuffle Bunny is gone immediately and the entire family runs back to the laundromat to check the loads. Dad, of course, finds the Knuffle Bunny and Trixie says her first words: "Knuffle Bunny!!!"

As with many of Mo Willems' books, it's a simple story: lost and found. I don't say that to dismiss it, only to say that it is amazing how a simple story of a lost bunny comes alive due to the beautiful background photos of Brooklyn, the cartoon-ish characters drawn on top, and how Mo Willems is able to use illustrations to convey the emotions felt by the characters. 

What do you do when you have your first enemy, especially when this enemy laughs at you during baseball games and becomes friends with your best friend? Enemy Pie is a great book by Derek Munson and illustrated by Tara Callahan King. Our narrator (we never know his name) first makes an enemy list, listing only Jeremy as his enemy, and then asks his dad to help get rid of an enemy. His dad takes out an old, tattered recipe that says Enemy Pie at the top. Our narrator is excited at the possibility of this pie as a revenge: he brings worms, rocks, and other gross things for his dad to put in the pie, although is dad says they aren't needed. The boy plays while he smells a delicious pie being made and is still confused about how the enemy pie works.

After the pie is finished, his dad lets him in on the secret: he has to spend the whole day with Jeremy to make the enemy pie work and he has to be nice to Jeremy. Students tend to make two predictions at this point. Some predict that the revenge will continue, and that the narrator and his dad are setting Jeremy up. Others think they'll become friends. The next morning, our narrator and Jeremy start to spend the day together, and slowly our narrator has fun with Jeremy. He even lets Jeremy in his prized treehouse. 

When it's time for dinner, dad has made macaroni and cheese. Our narrator is now worried about the Enemy Pie and tries to tell dad not to serve it by telling his dad it's nice to have a new friend, but dad just smiles. In a panic, our narrator tells Jeremy not to eat the pie, but Jeremy, confused, asks why his dad is eating it if it's bad. Dad is chowing down on the cherry pie with ice cream, and the narrator accepts that the pie is good and realizes he lost his "best" enemy. 

This is a great book to read for friendship and for a community circle. While all students will not become good friends, the message that we can find common ground with people we don't get along with at first resonates with many students. The book also gives agency to the kids, rather than the parents. Dad may have gotten the ball rolling by making our narrator spend the day being nice to Jeremy, but the two kids found fun on their own. When I've read Enemy Pie to kids, they always enjoy the humor of the book and illustrations, and they always make genuine connections to their relationships with others. 

As I noted in my Leonardo the Terrible Monster post, Mo Willems is a favorite author of mine. Mo Willems worked on Sesame Street and created Sheep in the Big City, a cartoon that ran on Cartoon network for 2 years. His illustration style is definitely influenced by being a cartoonist. Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus is his first book.

The premise is simple: the Bus Driver parks his bus, asks us, the readers, to watch the bus and makes sure to warn us not to let the Pigeon drive the bus. As soon as the Bus Driver is walking off of the page, the Pigeon is sticking its head onto the page, waiting for him to leave. What follows is the Pigeon begging, pleading, resorting to bribery, and throwing a tantrum to try to get us to let him drive the bus. The Pigeon sneaks off when the Bus Driver returns, only to come upon a semi-truck. The back inside cover page features the Pigeon and a thought bubble of the Pigeon driving the truck, matching the front inside cover page. The simplicity of the story and the illustrations masks that this is a story familiar to teachers. A child wants something, tries to get it by any means necessary, throws a tantrum, then finally realizes it is not going to happen and moves on, possibly repeating the cycle. 

The flip side to this story could play out in one of Willems' cartoons: the Pigeon sneaks onto the bus, gets it started, and goes on a joyride. The joyride could lead to a chase with other buses or to the Pigeon realizing it is in over it's head and drives back just in time. The Bus Driver would come out and not even know the bus was gone. I can close my eyes and imagine this 10 minute cartoon so easily. 

Although this is a simple story, it's the illustrations of the Pigeon and its emotions that are the core. The words and actions are serious to the Pigeon, but silly to the reader. The Pigeon's emotions are real, raw, and intense. It screams, "LET ME DRIVE THE BUS," and the way the words are illustrated shows as much as the Pigeon drawing shows. 

I was able to get this book signed when I met Mo Willems, but I had it dedicated to my husband. We joke and sometimes I call him the Pigeon when he is being silly. It has become a joke to us, but we both love the hilarity that happens in Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus, as well as Willems' other Pigeon books (I really like The Pigeon Finds a Hot Dog, Don't Let the Pigeon Stay up Late, and The Duckling Gets a Cookie?). Mo Willems is doing daily Lunch Doodles online during the Covid-19 crisis, so check those out every day! 

Teaching is often performing for students, especially during Read Alouds. I LOVE Read Alouds because they offer the opportunity to engage every student and (hopefully) create a desire to read more.

I don't know where or when I got my copy of Stephanie's Ponytail by Robert Munsch. I only know that I hit on some magic the first time I read it to students. Stephanie's Ponytail is a book about nonconformity and annoyance. Stephanie wears a ponytail to school one day and her classmates tell her it's ugly. She says, "It's MY ponytail and I like it." The next day, however, many of the girls come to school with ponytails. Stephanie continues to change her ponytail position each day, only to have it be copied the next by the boys, girls, teachers, and even the principal (who seems to be a few days behind). Finally, in a moment of frustration, she yells, "When I come to school tomorrow, I am going to have...SHAVED MY HEAD!" The next day, the teacher and all of the students come in with their heads shaved and Stephanie comes in with her original ponytail hanging from the back of her head. 

The first time I read the story to students, I did the different ponytails alongside Stephanie. The students laughed so hard as I placed ponytails on top of my head and in front of my face. This performance made Stephanie's Ponytail one of the most requested read alouds in my class. Although I could have made this into a longer lesson, Stephanie's Ponytail ​remained a classic book of enjoyment in my classes.

There are great books that take one moment in a person's or character's life and expands that moment into an entire story. Donald Crews, author ofShortcut is a master of this, as is Mem Fox, author of Hattie and the Fox. 

In Shortcut, Donald Crews is able to take an autobiographical moment, walking back to his grandmother's house (aka Big Mama) after dark with his siblings, and turn it into a suspenseful, interesting story that uses color and the Doppler Effect. The narrator and his siblings are walking home and decide to take a shortcut by walking along the train tracks. They know that no passenger trains are scheduled on the tracks, but the freight trains do not follow a schedule and could come at any time. They carefully listen and take their chances. The narrator describes the brambles that are possibly filled with snakes that are beside the train tracks. The illustrations get darker and darker as time passes. At first, the children and their brightly colored shirts are visible, but they become darker and shadow-ier. 

You can probably guess what happens: A train comes along the tracks before the kids get to the cutoff to Big Mama's house. They dive into the ditch and listen as the loud, long freight train goes by just feet away. The illustrations are magnificent: you cannot see the children at this point, just the loud train going by as the sky continues to darken. At the end of the story, it is so dark outside that you can barely see the siblings on the page. They learned their lesson about taking chances with the train. 

Shortcut finds its magic in those illustrations and in the one small decision that creates danger for the kids. I loaned my copy of the book to a teacher at some point and did not get it back, but check it out somewhere. It is also inspirational for students when writing. This book takes place over about 10-20 minutes from the time they decide to take the shortcut to the time they get to Big Mama's House.  It's a great mentor text for personal narratives. 

Hattie and the Fox is a similar story in that it takes one small moment and stretches it into an interesting story. Mem Fox, the author, has her main character, Hattie the hen, narrating something she sees in the bushes. First, Hattie sees a nose, then she sees a nose and two eyes. As Hattie relays this information to the rest of the animals, the Goose, the Pig, the Horse, the Cow, and the Sheep, they all ignore her. This leads Hattie to get more and more agitated with her body as this Fox gets closer and closer. Julie Vivas, the illustrator, clearly shows Hattie's fear as the fox gets closer and closer, then on the next page she shows the other animals relaxed and having fun, not worried at all about Hattie and her information. When she finally yells, "It's a fox! It's a fox!" the other animals FINALLY get it and most are frightened. Hattie, for her part, flies into a tree that might give her protection, but the other animals freak out. Only the cow keeps his wits about him and is able to scare the fox away. 

Both stories end with the characters rendered speechless. In Shortcut, it says, "We walked home without a word. We didn't tell Big Mama. We didn't tell Mama. We didn't tell anyone." In Hattie and the Fox, it says, "And they were all so surprised that none of them said anything for a very long time." That quality of fear replaced by a combination of feelings is interesting. Humans and fictional animals are generally social, but the relief plus the processing of what might have been often renders us quiet or speechless. It's interesting to try to talk to kids about why this might happen to these characters. 

I vividly remember the day I found my co-favorite book to read to kids,Leonardo the Terrible Monster by Mo Willems. It was the Spring of 2006 and I was at the book fair for my school. As my students browsed, a busy book cover caught my eye. The title and the picture of half of a creature's face took up the entire cover, and instead of "written by," it said, "Your Pal Mo Willems Presents." I leafed through the book and was immediately taken by this amusing story. Leonardo is a "terrible" monster because he can't scare anyone like the other monsters. He decides to aim low: to make himself feel good, he'll scare an easily scared child, Sam. The book plays out exactly as you assume it will, other than an extremely hilarious tirade by Sam. 

The first time I read this book, I made sure to read it in a way that captured the spirit of the characters. When I got to Sam's tirade, I channeled my "little sister" (I am the little sister in my family) and thought about how I reacted when my big sis tormented me as a kid. The students were shocked to hear me read like an eight-year-old having a major tantrum. They LOVED it and BEGGED ME to read that page again, which I did (this happens almost every time I read the book, even now). The students roared with laughter and we all took a minute to crack up. 

Picking up Leonardo the Terrible Monster at that book fair probably changed my life as a literacy teacher. Suddenly, I had a new favorite author who already had great books for me to find, and who continued to publish wonderful books. I actually read Knuffle Bunny Too before the original because it came out in 2007, and love the entire Knuffle Bunny trilogy. I joke that my husband acts like the Pigeon in the Pigeon series, I absolutely love the strangeness of Edwina the Dinosaur who Didn't Know She was Extinct and Naked Mole Rat Gets Dressed. It's exhilarating to see 1st graders fall in love with Elephant and Piggie because the books look like read-alouds but are also easy readers (level G/H). They truly get to read like a "teacher" when they read those books. 

I really think the magic of Mo Willems books is in the way he captures kids' feelings. The feelings aren't complicated. Leonardo feels inadequate, Sam feels overlooked (and scared, of course). The pigeon wants what he wants when he wants it and can't handle not getting his way. Trixie (the protagonist of the Knuffle Bunny books) has that special thing that she needs to feel safe, special, and secure and freaks out when she doesn't have it or when she realizes it's not unique. Students relate so well to Willems' books. I've never had a student who did not enjoy it when I read one of his books. 

I got to meet Mo Willems in the fall of 2010. I was in grad school at Vanderbilt in Nashville, TN.  and my Children's Literature professor was moderating a panel about a children's literature documentary. Mo Willems and Jon Scieszka (author of The True Story of the Three Little Pigs and many other great books) were on the panel with the documentary's director. The panel turned into the Mo and Jon show. They are longtime friends who know how to amuse an audience (and I found out later that one of them did not like the documentary much and didn't want to spend an hour talking about it). Afterward, I attended a Mo Willems book reading and then got in line with my copy of Leonardo the Terrible Monster and a copy of Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus for my boyfriend (now husband). I was handed two post-its to write the name of the person for whom Mo would dedicate the book. When I finally got to him, he seemed cranky but also seemed to be trying his best to hide it. "Never meet your heroes," I initially thought. Later, I saw that he was at the end of a book tour for his Cat the Cat books that were first published earlier that year and he'd been away from his home and family for about a month. That would make me crabby, too. 

Anyway, to complete this long, rambling post, I still have my signed copy of Leonardo the Terrible Monster. I don't let students handle it much anymore after some mishaps and because it's getting old! I still own a lot of Mo Willems books. The sequel to Leonardo, Sam the Most Scaredy-Cat Kid in the World was released a few years ago. I picked it up and loved it, but I haven't bought it yet. This weekend I put it in my Amazon cart to remind myself to buy it when the bookstores reopen in DC. If you've never read a Mo Willems book, pick one up.