by Ann Parker, Pima Community College, Tucson, AZ
Last week, we heard from Jason Low from Lee and Low Books, a company that focuses on writers and illustrators of color. This week, we present an interview with Dana Goldberg, Executive Editor of Children’s Book Press.
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by Ann Parker, Pima Community College, Tucson, AZ
Last week, I shared an interview with Heather Lennon from North/South Books, a company that finds outstanding books from around the world and translates them into English for children in the United States. This week, we hear from Jason Low, Publisher at Lee and Low Books.
by Ann Parker, Pima Community College, Tucson, AZ
For the month of January I will be exploring several independent book publishing companies that publish multicultural and even bilingual children’s books in the U.S. and that have received national attention for the quality of their books. These companies have not only avoided being bought out by a large conglomerate, they have even been able to successfully compete with some of these larger publishing companies in publishing quality children’s books that sell well. As I discussed in an earlier blog, it is often easier for these independent companies to publish books for “niche” markets such as books from within specific cultural viewpoints, mainly African-American, Asian-American, Native American, and Hispanic. The four companies featured this month are NorthSouth Books, Children’s Book Press, Lee and Low Books, and Just Us Books.
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Yoo Kyung Sung, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque NM
This winter, while visiting Seoul, I felt like I a special reporter assigned to a foreign country. While I am there, Seoul amazes me with its advanced technology and great public services that I wish were available to me in the U.S. Korea is busy, young, and somewhat more modern than I remember from my last visit. I go to places where crowds of foreign tourists enthusiastically hang out. People, old and new, meet at Starbucks and other European coffee franchises. They are beloved here. All of it makes me feel like I am in a real city. Watching sophisticated Korean people subtly reminds me that my new home is Albuquerque. I grew up in Korea and married a Korean man from Seoul. Visiting Korea every other year allows me to comprehend the many rapid changes in Seoul. It is my native culture, yet it is no longer home.
Bookstores are also places that I feel and notice changes. Selections in the children’s area as well as the young adult section are growing more rich and creative. Floods of new genres and themes in children’s literature thrill me. I just want to sit down and read them all!
As I reflect on my experiences living in the U.S. I often focus on how Korea is perceived by the many Americans I meet. When I moved to the U.S. about 10 years ago, people often tried to engage me in a conversation based on their knowledge of Korea. All too often Korea is still remembered within the context of the Korean War, fought some sixty years ago. Sometimes, younger adults ask me whether I am from South Korea or North Korea. It is obvious that they don’t recognize the difference. Before my departure on this current trip, I was frustrated with most American’s limited knowledge about Korea and the Korean War. The question, “Which Korea are you from?” seems innocent enough, yet it reveals an ignorance of the politics on the Korean peninsula.
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by Yoo Kyung Sung, University of New Mexico Albuquerque NM
Why, in the classroom, is immigration often presented only as a parochial issue? Seldom do U. S. students read and discuss migration as a worldwide political and economic concern. Far too often their understandings of other countries are formed from easily generalizable geographical and cultural information. This denigrates the complexity of socio-political realities and the historical experiences of other countries. For example, they often reference Africa as one large nation instead of as a continent of many countries and diverse cultures. They are primarily aware of dominant groups within countries who, for their part, are frequently dismissive of others (i.e. Koreans in Korea dismissing non-Koreans). Sophisticated inquiry required for deeper understandings of global issues is too often neglected. I want to, then, introduce two books that may challenge such superficial assumptions about other nations.
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by Yoo Kyung Sung, The University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM
“I didn’t know what was happening in Asia during WW II. I had no idea Korea was under Japanese occupation!” Every semester I repeatedly hear this message from my preservice teachers after reading books like When My Name Was Keoko, by Linda Sue Park. I wonder, “How did they miss this in their American history courses?”
These comments, and the picturebook The Grandmother Who Loves Flowers by Yoonduck Kwon, were catalysts that led me to reflect on the childhood texts I read, as a young Korean schoolgirl, about the WWII Japanese occupation of Korea. Seeking the truth about our history was important to me, but it was also equally uncomfortable. The Grandmother Who Loved Flowers is based on the story of Dahl Yun Sim, a thirteen-year-old Korean girl, kidnapped by Japanese soldiers during WW II as she and her sister were out picking wild greens.
by Yoo Kyung Sung, The University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM
This December I want to, literally, take you to a different world of words — more specifically, a world of words in South Korea. Lately, Korean picture books have gotten worldwide attention due to their noticeable growth and uniqueness in styles. (From now on ‘Korea’ refers to South Korea in this post). Publishers, like Kane and Miller, have translated and published large numbers of picture books from Korea. The global attention and recent popularity of Korean picture books has triggered domestic scrambles among publishers in Korea to produce high quality picture books. In the last five years, a number of new book awards have been created. This new movement focuses on encouraging the development of new writers and illustrators by recognizing, through awards, young potential authors and illustrators.
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by Janine Schall, University of Texas-Pan American, Edinburg, TX
I hope that through reading the previous four blog posts you became more aware of available technological resources for literacy classrooms. In this last blog post for November, I will briefly discuss some challenges facing teachers who want to use 21st century technological tools in their classrooms. I end with some online and print resources for those who want to explore these issues further.
by Janine Schall, University of Texas-Pan American, Edinburg, TX
What happens after the book is read and the discussion is over? How do students share their current understandings of the literature? Presentations and reports have also moved into the 21st century with a number of technological tools available.
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by Janine Schall, University of Texas-Pan American, Edinburg, TX
We know that collaboration can help students create more sophisticated responses to literature. As students think together through oral or written dialogue they hear multiple perspectives, challenge others’ thinking, and revise initial responses. While children have always talked with friends about the books they read, today reading is increasingly social in new ways. Informal talk on the playground is being supplemented with a variety of online resources. For example, a very quick Google search brought up multiple online sites for fans of the Harry Potter series, including a message board, wiki, and fanfiction site.
These sites are sometimes run by a publisher or author, but they are often started by children and adolescents who want to share a reading experience with others. These children are building, maintaining, and moderating the sites. In addition, they are contributing a tremendous amount of content through writing, artwork, and video.
It is clear that children love to talk about books with other children in these informal, out-of-school contexts. How can teachers harness some of that impulse towards social interaction to support thinking about literature in school as well? In this post I will briefly discuss three online possibilities that can help with this: social networking, wikis, and voicethread.
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