Unexpected Surprises in The Great Journey

I love books like The Great Journey by Agathe Demois and Vincent Godeau.

It's super fun with lots to look at as we follow a tiny bird on a long journey across various landscapes and see hidden, unexpected and surprising images along the way. I especially love the special effect of the green line drawings that are embedded in the bold red line drawings which the reader can only see when they use the magic view finder.  (The red lens of the view finder cancels out the red line drawings.) The hidden or embedded illustrations really make this book special.

Let me give you a couple of my favorite most playful examples.  As I've already mentioned, the little bird flies across various landscapes, countrysides, cities, factories, oceans, jungles etc.  When flying across the ocean scape it looks like there are several ice bergs. But look through the red lens and we discover that the ice bergs are actually the tops of ice cream cones. There is some kind of mining operation going on underwater with seals, penguins and polar bear bringing some kind of material to the surface. In another corner, we see a school of fish escaping a penguin through a twisty tunnel. One other segment of the same pages shows penguins bottling water.  It's a busy place!

Another fun illustration is a group of people walking about what looks like a city but the magic view finder shows us what's going on inside their bodies and brains mostly unexpected happenings. One fellow's leg is made up of a couple of hams, maybe or bird legs (unexpected). A young woman's insides are comprised of all sorts of gears (unexpected). A man in a puffy coat turns out to have a tattoo, pierced ears and wearing only briefs (typical). There's a woman carrying a guitar case filled with a very long, curvy snake (unexpected) but the animal carrier next to a different woman has a barking dog inside (expected). The one image I really like is of the two gentlemen in the foreground showing what's going on in their minds as they talk with each other. One man has two teeny-tiny men pulling a string straight from the mind of the other man's brain which shows a tangled mess of string.  Haven't we all had conversations like this?

The little bird does eventually reach his or her's destination which is in a jungle. Here a large tree that looks uninhabited is really filled with a mass of birds as revealed by the red lens viewer.

The viewer is attached to the book so it shouldn't get lost too quickly.

It's a fun, witty book which will  appeal to many ages but I would expect that kids in elementary and middle grades will be the main audience. 

If this sort of book appeals to you, I would also recommend Illuminature by Rachel Williams. It does a similar thing  uncovering various natural environments and associated plants, daytime or nighttime animals using a view finder with three coloured lens. Fascinating.

Both of these books would make great gifts.

Spinning, flipping and popping to learn

A couple of nonfiction books that recently caught my eye are from the publisher 360 degrees. What I liked their approach to lift-the-flap books for older kids. 

In Focus: Close-ups, Cutaways, Cross Sections, 10 Illustrators created by Libby Walden is a general information book that covers a range of topics from both the natural and human-made worlds in a unique way.  Each double spread focuses on a theme providing a random but interesting selection of facts about the creatures or things represented. These two pages then fold out to a four page spread to take the reader even deeper into the facts.

For example, the first spread is about the ocean. Featured are various sea creatures such as the blue whale, sea horse, puffer fish, swordfish, jellyfish and starfish, to name a few. We learn a pertinent fact or two about the animals from the front pages such as the blue whale is the largest animal to have ever lived on the planet and typically lives between 80 to 90 years.  Or that starfish are not fish and though commonly seen with 5 arms they can have as many as 40. Or that jellyfish have been around more than 650 million years!  Flipping open the top pages, we see cross sections of the animals exposing their skeletons and internal organs. From here, there is more detailed information. Did you know that the heart of the blue whale is the size of a small car weighing in at 770 kg or 1550 lbs? Amazing.

Topics covered are: the physical structure of homes found worldwide, space and space vehicles, international landmarks, various plants, animals and geological features, everyday objects, well-known buildings from around the world, fruits and vegetables, land animals and modes of transportation.  Wide ranging, indeed.

The second book is Wilderness: an Interactive Atlas of Animals by Hannah Pang. This one also uses flaps, pop ups and spinning wheels to engage readers about an array of animals from all continents both land and water.

The formats are the draw here and there are many of these kinds of trivia/random information books out there.  The illustrations are well done and support the informational tidbits.

I see these as interesting resources for classrooms but not necessarily crucial.  These books will appeal to some kids  and could be used in centres or for individual reading time. Elementary and middle grade students are the best audience for these books.

Fact or fiction?

Now this is a book that teachers, librarians and those of us who teach research skills will approve –

Two Truths and a Lie: it’s alive! by Ammi-Joan Paquette & Laurie Ann Thompson is a pretty fun book that teaches us about the natural world (plants, animals and us, humans, too) but promotes critical thinking and digging for the truth, along the way.

The book is divided into three parts each focused on either plants, animals or humans. Each part has three chapters and within each chapter there are three stories written loosely connected about a particular topic. 

Now, the three stories within a chapter has two stories based on facts and one that is fabricated.  All the stories capture the mystical nature and sometimes strange wonder of the natural world making it tricky to figure out which one might be the ‘lie’. The fake story often does contain bits of information that is true but the overarching information is false.

Along the way, there are pull-out boxes that give us additional information, quick lists of true or false statements to research, define words, provide maps and photos, and suggest activities and tips on research.  The answers are provided at the back of the book as well as a bibliography of the sources the writers consulted.

The introduction sets up the book, what to expect and how to read through it.

A section at the back of the book provides the reader with suggestions on how they might tackle figuring out which stories are true and which are not. It promotes using the internet and how to best work through the information found there. They caution the reader to be extra careful as there are people out there who intentionally want to fool us into believing false information. Selecting reliable sources, checking these sources, verifying information from more than one source, visiting libraries and thinking critically about what you’re reading are outlined in the book and promoted as crucial for good research.

This will appeal to a certain kind of reader who will likely be keen to work through it on their own but I think this book will have a bigger appeal for classroom work teaching research and critical thinking skills. The stories have a ‘wow’ factor that holds the reader’s attention and then there’s the gaming element that presents a challenge of figuring out fact from fiction.

I can see introducing this book to student-teachers when I next hold a workshop about information literacy or dealing with ‘fake news’.

I highly recommend this book for grades 4 to 8 but could see it being used at higher levels, as well.

Trio of fun

I've three recommendations that are interactive and fun, fun, fun.

First, is a book from Tara Books.  This is an Indian publisher known for its handmade books that are often illustrated by ethnic peoples from various parts of India in traditional styles.  Visit the Bhil Carnival by Subhash Amaliyar and Gita Wolf is one such book.

This fold-out, pop-up picture book features two children who wander through a maze-like carnival, enjoying balloons, Ferris wheel, ice cream, Indian sweets like coconut burfi, music, dancing, and visiting friends. Opening the book we see Neela and Peela starting off to the fair. Turn the page and two flaps that run along the top and bottom of both pages reveal a peak-a-boo opening that tells us to “Come In”.   Pulling the flaps open reveals the entire fairground in an explosion of colour and dots.

The illustrator is from the Bhil tribe from Madhya Pradesh in central India.  His folk style uses the colour and dots to convey the constant movement and excitement to be found in this type of celebration.  The fold-out page includes a small story-book tucked and affixed into the corner that tells us what Neela and Peela are up to and a pop-up Ferris wheel too. Try this one with grades 2 and up as it ties into the social studies curriculum about community, quality of life, and India very easily.

Walter was Worried by Laura Vaccaro Seeger is a terrific combination of visual and word play.  If Walter is worried, we see a boy’s worried face but the details are comprised of the letters that spells the word ‘worried’. If Shirley is shocked, we see a girl’s face with ‘s’ and ‘k’ as eyebrows, ‘c’ and ‘d’ for eyes, ‘h’ and ‘e’ are the pupils and ‘o’ for an open, shocked mouth.  It’s good fun and kids may be inspired to come up with their own depictions of spelled-out, facial emotions.  It’s a pretty sophisticated concept book that will work well with upper elementary.

And, my last bit of fun to offer you is Book-o-Beards: a wearable book by Lenke & Lentz. This oversized board book displays the bottom half of several hairy, male faces.  Holding the book up to your face with your nose tucked over the spine, you can try ‘wearing’ a new, bearded look before actually committing the time and effort in real life. If beards are back in, then anyone can be a part of this trend.  If you want to be a lumberjack, then you may want to try out a full, curly, orange beard.  Not into cutting down trees, then maybe take to the high seas as a black-bearded pirated complete with braids, bows and beads.  The knife held between yellowed-teeth is included for authenticity.  Also included are a cowboy, a sailor, Santa Claus, and a police officer. This will appeal to anyone with a sense of humour.

Thanks, Cowboy Barb, for showing us your beautiful beard.

Presto Change-o!

What a great title!  Presto Change-o: a book of animal magic by Edouard Manceau is a fun, interactive book for the primary grades.

This is an oversized board book that presents an initial image that can be manipulated with a few turns of various flaps to become an animal.  For example, a black pot (think caldron) over a fire bubbles as it cooks a stew. By swinging the flap over, the pot becomes the top part of the head of a raccoon with a bandit face peering out at us.  Two pieces of wood (part of the fire) turn up and the raccoon has arms and paws.  The accompanying text on the preceding page states’ POT’ with several rhyming lines  that almost sound like a spell, playing into the idea of a magical transformation that ends with our RACCOON friend appearing. (See the cover above.)

The text itself may be a little challenging for the youngest children but the rotating flaps will keep them engaged.  The bright colours and fairly simple, stylized illustrations have an unassuming charm that is appealing.  The first and last words are bold and easily read by earlier readers with the other text read by an older reader.  Great for playing a game of prediction, “Presto change-o! What will this become?”

This may be a book to get kids to model their own art work, coming up with two different things and figuring out how to get one object to transform into the other with just a few flaps.

The Art of Clean Up: life made neat and tidy by Ursus Wehrli is a very funny and very clever book.

I can’t say that I think the idea of tidiness or cleaning for a children’s book would be all that relevant or of interest.    But after going through this very quirky book, I’m willing to change my mind.  I think it will hold and engage almost anyone.

Ursus Wehrli , besides being uber-organized, is a typographer, a comedian, live performer and freelance artist.  His humour and penchant for ‘tidying’ things is played out with flare in this book.

Let me give you some examples.   On each set of facing pages we are given a photo of a fairly commonplace scene from everyday life.  Clothes hanging out to dry, a child playing in a sand box, an aerial view of a car park or a school ground with playing children, a bouquet of flowers, a decorated Christmas tree or a pile of pretzels to give you a range of the mundane and ordinary that we surround ourselves with.

But if you were to take the ‘chaos’ away from each of these and prettied them up, life would be less jumbled, way more orderly and colour coded to boot.

Clothes on a clothesline would be grouped according to colour and displayed rainbow-like.   The child playing in the sandbox with various plastic toys, would now be sitting (and no doubt marveling) at very neatly arranged rows of pails, rakes and shovels, sieves, watering cans, sand molds and dump trucks displayed on freshly raked sand.   The messy mound of bent pretzels is now shown as two rows of straightened, salted snack food.  Who knew that a Christmas tree ‘broken down’ into its component parts would equal a pile of needles, a bundle of kindling, one stand, a coil of tinsel, one pointy tree topper and several rows of red and silver round ornaments, hooks and lights?  Kind of takes the romance away, but that’s what makes it funny.  It plays with our expectations.  Now if only I could get my decorations to look even half as neat.

It becomes somewhat of a game trying to see all the components between the before and after pictures.  Take a look at the book cover above. What are those white dots lined up with all the various pieces of fruit found in a bowl of fruit salad?  Why it’s the polka dots that were on the bowl, of course.

Besides the visual humour factor, I do think there could be some classroom application when it comes to pattern making and observation skills.  This isn’t the book you’d use to introduce young children to the concept of patterns in the earliest primary grades. But older children will be able to work things out.  Might be a book that you can model your own attempts to tidy up and get organized once and for all.  Not a crucial resource but one that is lots of fun.

Choose-your-own-adventure technology

Tammy’s discussion of “Choose your own adventures” books  led us to an interesting conversation on the appeal of these books to non-readers and then further, to if these  type of books might appeal to on-line game players and X-Box players (do they call them X-Boxers?).  Our sense of this was no – but were there on-line versions that might incorporate some of the decision making and thought processes?

Some Googling and trials of different search terms (choose your own adventure, interactive character stories) brought me to  Choice of Games, a company devoted to “producing high-quality, text-based, multiple choice games”. Their belief is that text-based games are an underutilized format in computer games, and that the use of text interacts with the imagination in different ways than a graphics-based game. (Hmmmm – interesting premise. I like it.)

They have many, many games that they have produced – the one that Tammy and I played is called “Dragon”. It starts off with a knight who attacks a dragon (the character that the player assumes). The choices that are made determine the arc of the story.  Whoever wrote this one clearly has a sense of humour and a willingness to push the boundaries of stereotypes. Here is an example:

“As you think about it, the knight’s attack was probably inevitable. After all, you did just kidnap the princess from right out of her tower. Although…Isn’t it a little sexist to always kidnap princesses?

o   Maybe, but tradition demands that dragons kidnap princesses, even if that is sexist.

o   You dare question my actions?

o   You know, I never thought about that before. In fact, I think I kidnapped a prince, just to avoid being sexist.

o   I’ll have you know that I make a careful point of alternating between princes and princesses, but it happened to be time for a princess.

Good humour displayed here and at a level that kids would get, I think. As you move through the game, the choices that you make determine things about your character (or you) – in this case, whether you, the dragon lose or gain brutality, cunning, disdain and infamy, what your wealth is and if you have wounds. 

The adventure continues – unlike physical books however, if you don’t like the way it is going, you have to go back and start again, which can certainly change the entire focus.

But what Tammy and I thought had huge potential was that Choice of Games offers the opportunity for you to write your own multiple choice games. They offer a basic guide to their programming language that enables someone to post their adventure online. Of course, you cannot just randomly start writing the program. And this is where an opportunity to capture the attention of reluctant writers and addicted gamers comes in. The story line will have to be plotted out, include what happens at each choice point – students would need to know about plot development, think through the impact at each choice point and perhaps even read a few books/short stories to get some ideas for story ideas and what might appeal to a particular age group.

This would not be a quick project – but the inspiration of being able to see a game that you have written on line might just appeal to those who are reluctant writers and readers.  It certainly would have more appeal than a book report – at least from my perspective.  And certainly, in Alberta, at any rate, a project of this nature would go a long way toward achieving not only the vision set out in  Alberta Learning’s Learning and Technology Framework, but the ability to foster cross-curricular learning is invaluable.

Choice of Games can be played both online and as downloads through iTunes and Android. In addition, authored games can be placed on iTunes and Choice of Games will split proceeds with the author. Kind of a win-win for everyone!!
                                                                                                                                                       --Janet

How does your city grow?

When was the last time you drove down a road or through a part of town that you hadn't visited for awhile?  All of a sudden you notice something new.  “When did that pop up?” you wonder.  Cities like Calgary are like that.  Things, buildings, stores, houses are forever popping up, seemingly overnight.

Popville by Anouck Boisrobert and Louis Rigaud (307.76 BoP 2010 PIC BK), is a 3- dimensional exploration of how a landscape grows from a single building down a single road in the countryside.  Then come two roads and a few more buildings and a few less trees.  Each flip of the page shows increasing growth, more roads and buildings, growing outward into a rural area.  The last page is a fully developed urban landscape showing a network of roads and railroad tracks for cars and trains, various buildings (skyscrapers, industrial, residential, and a church), green spaces, and even a series of telephone poles with string ‘wires’.  The implication, of course, is that there are more people as well.

The really delightful part is the pop up aspect of the book.  The original building is in the centre of the book on the spine crease. The clever die cast design allows for everything else to grow up around it, ‘popping’ up through cut squares beside it, also along the spine of the book.  Mostly, we look down on to this changing landscape giving us a different, aerial perspective.  When we look closely, at eyelevel we see the fronts of the buildings but these are without much detail. The illustrations are fairly stylized with primary colours.

At the back of the book are questions that asks the reader to consider what is involved when a city grows, such as more people requiring more services and infrastructure.

An interesting book that will work well with elementary grades and up into the middle grades.

Today is Nonfiction Monday and hosted at Books Together.  Lots of great children's literature to discover today.

How you look at it

Palazzo Inverso by D.B. Johnson (823 J6311P PIC BK)  is, without a doubt, a fun book. 

Based on Escher-like illustrations, a young apprentice to a master builder is accused of tinkering with the building plans of a grand palazzo.  The building is topsy-turvy causing all sorts of chaos for the carpenters, bricklayers, and painters, not to mention the mistress of the house.  Staircases run in opposing directions and ceiling and floors are mixed-up.  Are things upside down or downside up?

The text runs along the borders of each two-page spread.  Once you’ve reached the end of the book the text runs up the side border, directing you to turn the book over and continue the story, reading towards the front of the book.  It’s a continuous loop. Occasionally, the narrative feels a little contrived to work with the illustrations.

The optical illusions make this is a terrific book for looking at the concept of perspective.  When turned over the, pictures show a different point-of-view of the same scene.  It’s cleverly done and draws the reader’s attention in different directions all at once.

Pair this book with A Imagine a place  by Rob Gonsalves (823 G588I3 PIC BK) or one of his other books in this series, or Reflections by Ann Jonas (823 J692R3 PIC BK) for further play with perception and visual trickery.

I would recommend Palazzo Inverso for grades 2-6.

If you’re looking for more images created by Escher, look for M.C. Escher published by Taschen (769.924 EsM 2006).  Included are works for different periods of Escher’s life.

Help for getting over yourself

Beautiful oops! by Barney Saltzberg (823 Sa39B PIC BK) is a great little book celebrating the opportunities that arise when we make mistakes.

This small, interactive board book is not only for small children (recommended for ages 3 and up) but for everyone, because who hasn’t made a mistake?

The focus here is on art - and what to do when you drip paint, tear a page, leave a coffee stain, or make a hole in whatever project you happen to be working on.  The torn paper becomes the mouth of a crocodile.  Drips of paint become cartoon pigs driving away in a car. A coffee stain, depending on the shape, may become a hungry frog.  And the hole becomes an accordion-folded viewing ‘scope’ that pops up.  See what’s on the bottom layer.

The message, however, can certainly extend beyond the obvious.  We can all look for opportunities to make our mistakes into something else, into a beautiful something else.

The book is creative, fun and a reminder that everything in life doesn’t have to be absolutely perfect.  So, for all the perfectionists out there, this book is for you.  Relax.  Have fun with your (inevitable) mistakes.

Earth=Home

A wonderful picture book has come the way of the Doucette Library, thanks to  Tulika Publishers.  Home by Nina Sabnani takes a unique approach to storytelling as she looks at the concept of what is, or makes, a home.

I said this was a picture book but it's not your typical 32-page picture book that opens one page at a time, front to back.  This book is a compilation of images and words on four boards that fold out, accordion style from a central panel that represents a window. The book works best upright (it will stand up on its own) rather than lying down. This format comes from traditional storytelling from Rajasthan, India.  The back cover describes this as,

The Kaavad is a portable wooden shrine used by traditional storytellers…Its many-hinged panels display vibrantly painted scenes from local myths and folktales.  The Kaavadiya Bhat narrates the stories, opening up each painted panel as he goes along, pointing at each figure with a peacock feather.  Through the stories he reinforces inter-connections within his community and establishes his own space in it.

So, pull out the two front boards, the ‘cover’, to open the book and look at where birds, animals, insects and humans live.  The reader will learn that some live in groups whereas others live alone.  The central panel, with a die-cut window, tells us that we all live in the same world and looks ‘out’ onto images from the folded panels at the back of the book.  Turn the book 90 degrees either way and there are additional images on each of the folded boards that depict different types of families (large, small, one with two dads, single mom), different types of homes (apartments, tents, huts, even street people living in a tunnel) and showing that every family and home has its share of stories.

 The illustrations are rendered fairly simplistically, similar to drawings done by children or in a 'folk art' style.

Check out the YouTube video where the author provides background information about the Kaavad and how it works.  She also explains how she sees her book as a way to push the imagination of a child reader, as it enables them to make up their own narratives for each image.

This book could tie into the Alberta Education social studies curriculum for grades 1 to 3, related to identity, family, community (specifically India, in grade 3).  Otherwise, the book could be used for prompting storytelling at the primary grades. Students who are struggling with learning English as a second language may find this book useful, as well.

Desperately seeking…

I’m often asked for recommendations for math resources and especially for picture books to add interest to the lesson.  But a common problem is that there’s always a run on the same resources at the same time.  And then what?

Which takes me to the problem with the books about patterns.  They’re all out!

As it turns out, I just finished previewing a couple of new picture books that would fall more into the category of ‘game books’.  Within pages of brightly coloured patterns and/or animals we must find hidden creatures or discern similarities and differences between creatures.  Lots of fun.  But, they could be used with children who are working on visual patterns, as well.

So, check out these two books, if you’re desperate like I am, when all the other pattern books are out:

Same & different by Manjula Padmanabhan (793.73 PaS 2010 PIC BK)

Spot it!: find the hidden creatures by Delphine Chedru (793.73 ChS 2009 PIC BK)