We conclude this month’s exploration of picture books that put emotions front and center with The Rabbit Listened, a book that explores the many unique ways we each have for expressing our emotions and the healing power of a friend who can truly see and hear what we need.
Author: wowstudent
MTYT: Rabbit and the Motorbike
Dorea Kleker, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, and Patricia Castrodad, Caguas, Puerto Rico
In addition to the many ways we have all experienced the loss of loved ones, this year of turmoil has brought collective death front and center. From Black lives taken by police brutality to those lost in recent fires, hurricanes and other natural disasters to the approximately 1 million lost worldwide to Covid-19, death surrounds us. This week, we continue to look at books that put emotions at the heart of their stories. Rabbit and the Motorbike offers a gentle yet poignant look at what happens when we lose a loved one and the many feelings we face in moving forward.
MTYT: Small Things
Dorea Kleker, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, and Patricia Castrodad, Caguas, Puerto Rico
Last week we started our theme of Emotions by exploring a child’s question: Why Do We Cry?. This week, Small Things invites us to look more deeply at one of those reasons–anxiety–and the ways that the accompanying emotions play out in the day-to-day life of a child.
MTYT: Why Do We Cry?
Dorea Kleker, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, and Patricia Castrodad, Caguas, Puerto Rico
2020 has certainly brought with it many challenges–a global pandemic, many natural disasters, and the loss of more Black and Brown lives to police brutality just to name a few. We, (Patricia in Caguas, Puerto Rico, and Dorea in Tucson, Arizona struggled to come up with a theme that could even possibly begin to touch on all that we are currently experiencing. As we shared stories of what was happening in each of our home contexts, we recognized that while specific events are tied to 2020, the bigger context and varied emotions that accompany each of these are not unique to this year and have, in fact, been part of our worlds for a long time. This month, we turn our attention to four picture books, Why Do We Cry?, Small Things, Rabbit and the Motorbike and Rabbit Listened, that explore emotions not as simple categories such as “happy” and “sad” that can be easily remedied but rather, as complex and dynamic, with no single road map with which to experience them.
Creating Literature-Based Digital Classroom
By Junko Sakoi, Tucson Unified School District, Tucson, AZ and Yoo Kyung Sung, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM
In our school district (Tucson Unified School District (TUSD)), in this unusual time, “Bitmoji Classroom” is one of the hottest educational tools among teachers, especially Grades K-5, for distance learning. A bitmoji (personal avatar) classroom is an interactive virtual classroom that bridges virtual and hands-on learning to keep students engaged. It makes resources, such as a school calendar, books, and activities, easily accessible to students and provides them with a sense of virtual familiarity and stability. Continue reading
WOW Recommends: Butterfly Yellow
Thanhhà Lại gained many readers with her award-winning novel-in-verse, Inside Out and Back Again. Her newest novel, Butterfly Yellow, aims at an older audience of middle grade and teen readers, but, like her first novel, reaches inward to grab the reader’s heart. Continue reading
MTYT: A New Kind of Wild
By Seemi Aziz, The University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ and Janelle B. Mathis, University of North Texas, Denton, TX
As we conclude our week of introducing titles that for us speak to the many aspects of displacement, A New Kind of Wild shares a story that represents how local and applicable the notion of displacement can be for young readers. There are many ways that children are displaced in their daily life—required family moves to other communities or cities, family separations, feelings of not belonging, bullying, and other ways that emotional and physical displacement can occur. A New Kind of Wild is best described by the author’s dedication: “And to anyone who has had to leave a place they love for somewhere new, this is for you” (Hoang, 2020). Ren has always lived in the rainforest where, during the day, he imagines adventures with dragons, unicorns, fairies and kings while surrounded by nature. He must move to the city where he was lonely and finds nothing that stirs his imagination. Then he meets Ava who has always lived in the city and shares with Ren the imaginative wonders of her city life.
WOW Recommends: The Blackbird Girls
Pripyat, Ukraine, Soviet Union, 1986 may not mean anything to many readers but perhaps the word Chernobyl means something. If not, it will upon reading this deeply engaging book about Valentina Kaplan and Oksana Savchenko, two middle school girls who find themselves suddenly thrown into the most horrific circumstances when the nuclear power plant—Chernobyl—blows up in their city.
It was a Saturday, a half day at school, when Valentina finds her father not at the breakfast table, and the sky is red. Urged to go to school, Valentina notices the neighborhood is filled with police officers, and while she is curious, no one dares to ask the police any questions. At school, she is confronted by Oksana, an outspoken anti-Semite, who challenges Valentina to a race to show how Jews are the weaker race. Valentina does not comply with the rules that suggest she should just let Oksana win and by doing so, keep her place in the social hierarchy. She outruns Oksana, and it is from this starting point that readers are introduced to the two “blackbird girls,” who must navigate an evacuation from their city without their parents and learn to live together with Valentina’s grandmother in Leningrad, whom Valentina had never met. Valentina’s mother kept Valentina from her grandmother because of her dangerous actions, and while Oksana would never willing live with Jews, she has no choice as her mother is sent to Minsk because of radiation exposure. Valentina’s mother gives up her train ticket to Oksana, an action that again causes great dissonance in Oksana’s thinking about Jews.
This is a fascinating narrative that addresses not only the explosion of Chernobyl, but the political and social realities of Soviet rule in the 1980s. As Valentina and Oksana come to trust each other, and Valentina’s grandmother, readers develop compassion for both girls as Oksana, herself, has secrets that must be addressed. Ultimately, this is a story of hope, of friendship, and of loyalty that is truly inspiring. Based on real events and a real person who was a child in Pripyat at the time of the explosion, this book is a great read for any young reader of history and for those who love to see how overcoming dire circumstances is truly possible. -Recommended by Holly Johnson, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio Continue reading
MTYT: Sal and Gabi Break the Universe
Mary L. Fahrenbruck and Violet Henderson, New Mexico State University, NM
In their fifth and final MTYT installment for April 2020, Mary Fahrenbruck and Violet Henderson provide their take on Sal and Gabi Break the Universe written by Carlos Hernandez. The 400-page novel won the 2020 Pura Belpré Author Award.
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MTYT: The Undefeated
Mary L. Fahrenbruck and Violet Henderson, New Mexico State University, NM
In their fourth MTYT installment for April 2020, Mary Fahrenbruck and Violet Henderson provide their take on Kwame Alexander’s The Undefeated, illustrated by Kadir Nelson. The Undefeated was the winner of the 2020 Caldecott Medal, the winner of the 2020 Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award, and was a 2020 Newbery Honor Book.
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