Hello, I'm Patrick Adams. And I'm Caroline Lejere.
And this is Librarians of Littles, a podcast
where we discuss books, give makerspace ideas,
and do tips and tricks for our youngest learners
in the library setting. This week, because by
the time this airs, it'll have been Father's
Day, we're going to pick two books to discuss
that focus on father figures and are just great
books to read. with children for Father's Day.
The first book that we're going to discuss is
Dandy. It is written by Amy Dyckman and illustrated
by Charles Santoso and it was published by Little
Brown and Company in 2019. This book was an award
winner. It was a children's favorite award selection
for 2020. And it's been on multiple state lists,
including the Sunshine State Young Reader Award
Junior 2020 -2021 Elementary School grades K
through two for Florida. It was on the Missouri
Building Block Picture Book Award list for 2020
for grades pre -K in Missouri. The Golden Sower
Award. 2021 -2022, Picture Books Grade K -3,
and the Red Bud Read Aloud for 2020 in Nebraska.
The Pennsylvania Young Readers Choice Award 2021
-2022, Grades K -3. And then it was also a Texas
two -by -two reading list for 2020 and a Texas
Mockingbird reading list for 2020 -2021. And
our author, Amy Dykman, as we were talking about
before we started recording this, she is a New
York Times best -selling award -winning internationally
translated children's author. And according to
her website, she would much rather be writing
children's books than updating her website. And
so that's kind of all the information she gives
us for a background. But she has also written
a total of 22 books. Amy Dyckman's other books
include Wolfie the Bunny, illustrated by Zachariah
O 'Hara, Misunderstood Shark, illustrated by
Scott McGoon. Misunderstood Shark, Friends Don't
Eat Friends, illustrated by Scott McGoon. Boy
Plus Five, illustrated by Dan Iaccarino. Horrible
Bear, illustrated by Zachariah O 'Hara. Vacation,
illustrated by Mark Teed. You Don't Want a Unicorn,
illustrated by Liz Clemo. Read the book Lemmings,
illustrated by Zachariah O 'Hara. And How Dinosaurs
Went Extinct, a Safety Guide, illustrated by
Jen Hart. And our illustrator is Charles Santoso.
He loves drawing little things in his little
journal and dreaming about funny and wondrous
stories. He gathers inspiration from his childhood
memories and curiosities he discovers in his
everyday travels. He worked at Animal Logic as
a concept artist and art director. and was involved
in various animated feature film and commercial
projects. And his work has been exhibited in
Sydney and also internationally in North America
and France. And some of his other books include
Otter by Catherine Applegate, A Boy Called Bat
Series by Elena K. Arnold, This Way Charlie by
Karen Levis, And so for our book today, Dandy,
it is the story of a dad who loves his lawn and
is distraught. when he finds a dandelion that
is marring that beautiful and pristine lawn.
More distressing is that his daughter, Sweetie,
becomes attached to the dandelion as it becomes
her new best friend, Charlotte. As the other
fathers in the neighborhood try to convince the
dad to take care of this weed, his efforts are
thwarted at every turn when his daughter pops
up next to that dandelion. In the end he realizes
that his child's happiness is more important,
his love for her is more important than that
perfect lawn. And this book is so amazing. I
love this book a lot. It's funny, it's silly,
and it's very relatable. The father that's the
typical wanting that perfect lawn kind of guy
is just something that is so relatable. All of
the throughout the story, the neighborhood dads
are all cheering him on as he's trying to get
rid of this weed. But it's like so relatable
in that as soon as he actually has the opportunity,
he finds that the flower has one of Sweetie's
pictures. that she painted. It's a picture of
her dad and the flower, the dandelion, and he
just kind of breaks down in tears realizing he
can't do anything about it. He has to leave the
flower alone and then accidentally drops the
snips, the clippers on the flower and has to
try and all the dads are around it trying to
help resuscitate the poor dying dandelion. It's
just a really cute story. The kids will love
it because of the dad's ridiculous attempts to
get rid of the dandelion. He ends up trying to,
like, be a ninja to take care of it, a mad scientist.
At one point he's dressed like a pirate, and
so it's, like, super goofy in that sense, which
will grab the kids' attention. And it's just,
like, that sweet, heartwarming kind of story.
In the end, Charlotte doesn't make it, but the
dad, you know... does what you do with the dandelion
and kind of blows all those seeds out into the
yard and at the end you can see that more dandelions
have popped up in the yard and the daughter is
just so happy and excited and the dad is just
resigned to the fact that he he will not have
that perfect lawn but it's it's worth it for
his child's happiness it's just such a sweet
and heartwarming story while also being goofy
and silly and and fun The pictures are amazing.
I just love the story overall. It's just a well
-rounded book. It's not super long. It's got
a good pacing to it. And so I would definitely
give this a five out of five bookmarks. I think
it's a great story, a lot of fun, and I think
students have a really great time enjoying it
and listening to this book. I agree. I was so
glad to see that you picked this book in particular.
This is one of my favorite books to read in the
school year. I usually read this one in the spring
or half the last several years anyway. And this
is a book that both the students listening to
it love and the paraprofessionals that attend
our story time with our pre -k classes, they
love listening to it too. There's, I almost always
get somebody like one of the teachers like stops
me afterward and they're like, that was brilliant.
Good, I'd love that. It's both. It's very clever.
It's very entertaining It's really funny, but
it's also heartwarming it kind of has all the
components of just a really excellent story some
count told all within like you know five minutes
like it's kind of amazing how you can hit all
those emotions and Really it checks all the boxes
very very quickly. It's It's a near perfect book.
Maybe it is a perfect book. I don't know. If
there is one, this might be it as far as, you
know, pre -K story time goes. So I love this
one. It's really good. Yeah, I agree. Like I
said, my students have really enjoyed it. They
love to see the dad's crazy attempts at getting
rid of the dandelion and the way the daughter
keeps popping up right next to the dandelion
to to stop the father from doing anything it
like it really grabs their attention it's silly
and fun and they just really love it so yeah
i think this is one of those books that is even
though this one is from a little bit a couple
years ago so 2020 you know it's a little older
book but it still still works and the kids really
enjoy it so definitely worth reading definitely
worth being part of your collection of books.
So for makerspace activity, I have two possibilities
depending on what supplies and what things that
you might have available in your library. The
lower maintenance and probably more accessible
activity would be using Legos to have your students
build and design a garden. So you can give the
students some parameters, give them a set amount
of space that they can use to build a garden.
They can build some raised beds and things like
that and put in some flowers into their Lego
garden. So that's one option. The other option
that could be available but would be a little
bit more time consuming and a little bit more
work is if your campus has a garden area or I
know Caroline, at least one of your campuses
had some raised beds. that were put in um so
having the students actually get their hands
dirty and to plant some flowers to to to have
for the campus so putting them out giving them
some either I generally for this I don't think
I'd start with seeds I'd start with some like
young plants and have them help have them help
dig a hole and place the plant in and cover it
kind of back up with a little bit of dirt and
add the water and help the plants grow that way.
But having them actually be able to get into
the dirt and dig the hole and put the plants
in and get their hands a little bit dirty, I
think that would be a fun activity that maybe
some of the kids haven't ever done before. And
so giving them that opportunity to actually like
plant a plant. And then that would be something
that you could also follow up with throughout
the time that you have them on campus by like
having them come out and help you water them
or having the class kind of set a time with the
teacher if they're available to set a time to
like every couple days go out and water the plants
and keep an eye on them and pull weeds and that
kind of thing. That would be a fun little activity
that you could do to help them kind of start
fostering that love of plants and letting them
see all the things necessary to keep those plants
going and alive and that kind of thing. I love
that idea. I love that it's very hands -on for
the kids and gives them that really good experience
of getting down and dirty in there with the garden.
That's a lot of fun. It's an experience that
a lot of our kids may not necessarily get and
it's kind of an important one. It's kind of a
good life skill as well. These are some great
suggestions and both of my campuses did have
some raised beds so yeah that would be a really
good one for everybody could read this book and
then get to have some hands -on experience in
the garden as well so yeah excellent suggestions.
I really like that idea because I know so often
a lot of our kids when they're at home they're
in front of a screen either the tv or an ipad
or something not a lot of kids go out and get
their hands dirty anymore. and so giving them
the chances to do that is really important to
let them just get dirty and play and you know
it's important agreed a lot of our kids are just
like living in a very sterile environment just
stuck on screens all the time when they're not
at school so yeah now more than ever you're right
it's important to get out there and like have
life experiences yeah yeah all right So this
week for our Library of Littles management tip,
I thought that we would discuss a little bit
about being a book ally, like helping kids find
the right kinds of books. Even in our pre -k
setting, our kids have certain preferences and
tastes of the kinds of books that they enjoy.
And so building those relationships, getting
to know the students so that you can help them
find those really fitting and good books that
they'll enjoy. can be challenging especially
when like if you only see them once a week or
for like like personally this year I got to see
each of my pre -k classes once a week for about
25 minutes and when you're doing a lesson that
during that time sometimes it could be challenging
to build those relationships and get to know
the kids on an individual level to help them
find the books that they're looking for so there's
a couple things that you can do to build those
relationships and really get to know the kids
a little bit better and help them so that they
can find the books that they're looking for.
One of the things that I really enjoy doing is
near the beginning of the school year I will
make an anchor chart using some giant paper and
I'll put a bunch of the most popular kinds of
books like in to like a grid format on this anchor
chart and so I'll have a box with like the princess
books and I'll have a box with the dinosaur books
and I'll have a box with like pirate books and
things like that, sports and superheroes and
different things like that. And then I leave
one box labeled others. And when I make these
labels, I generally use a picture and a word
to match. So like I'll use, I have on, well,
At my last campus, I had visual signs that had
picture representations of the section and it
had the words to match. So like princesses had
a picture of like a crown and it said princesses.
So I have those already made. I would use those
to label the boxes. And then what I do is I give
every kid just a circle sticker, like one of
those cheap circle stickers you can buy from
like Staples that you can kind of put anywhere.
And so what I do is I give each kid one of those
and I tell them I want them to put their sticker
on their favorite kind of book. And so they've
got probably eight different choices on the anchor
chart and they can go through and they put their
sticker on their favorite kind of book. My only...
caveat is that if they put their sticker in the
box that says other, they have to be able to
tell me the kind of book that they want, that
they like, that isn't listed. So they can't just
say other and just walk away. They have to tell
me what other thing that I didn't list that's
not on the chart they like. And so what I'll
do is I'll do that for all of the pre -K classes
as separate classes. But what it does is it allows
me to see where the kids put their stickers so
that I can get a better idea of what kind of
books the kid is interested in. It also helps
me as a class see what kind of books each class
is most into and so that helps me to make choices
when I'm picking books for my lessons to kind
of work towards hitting the most popular kinds
of books because I find that helps also with
their attention span. If I'm hitting books that
and using books in their lessons that are popular,
that helps too. But it gives me an idea of what
the kids are interested in, and I can kind of
make mental notes about certain kids and the
kinds of books that they're looking for. Every
year there's always at least one kid that puts
an other, and most of the time they're pretty
interesting. I've had, one year I had a kid that
wanted a book about carrots, and so I'm sure
that we read the creepy carrots. during the school
year and I showed him where that was so he could
find it and check that book out you know like
some of the book choices are surprising there's
a lot of kids like there's some that aren't surprising
there's a lot of girls that like unicorn books
and princess books there's a lot of boys that
like superhero books and monster books there's
a lot of girls that like the monster books too
like it's not necessarily gender specific but
there's always some of those kids that are like
oh I like books about the solar system or, oh,
I like books about, you know, about food or farms
and that kind of thing. And so it's nice to be
able to see the kinds of books that each kid
has and then be able to work with them to find
those kinds of books throughout the library.
And if you, I'm in the process of genrefying
my picture book section. And so once that's done,
it'll be even easier for those students to be
able to find those kinds of books. But just being
able to work with them and see that chart and
see where they're putting their books definitely
gives me a better idea of where I can help the
kids find certain things. And it's a nice way
to get to know the class as a whole. And then
throughout the year, when it's time to do book
checkout, I try to kind of bounce between the
students and give them as much assistance as
I can and have those little conversations of
like, oh, have you read this one? Oh, you really
liked it? Okay, let's look for another one that's
similar to it, that kind of thing. And it's just
a nice way to start building that relationship,
letting them know that you're there to help them
find what they want, not what you want, right?
A lot of kids are like, well, can I get that?
Yes. Any book that's in the library, that's in
the sections that we kind of give you, yes, it's
free reign. You get to make the choice. It's
not me making the choice for you. And so just
building those relationships so that they feel
comfortable to come to you and ask you where
to find certain books. That's the big thing.
And it takes a lot of work, but in the end, it's
really, really worth it to do that. You get to
know the kids so much better. especially on my
campus over the last two years what I found is
nice because I work with them in pre -k and then
the next year I have them again in kindergarten.
I have new kindergartners coming in also but
at least I know where these kids kind of fall
as far as what kind of books that they'd like
and I can help them and I can get them take a
second and learn the new kindergarten kids and
then so this coming year the first year I was
on this campus, those pre -K kids are gonna be
first graders. And so they've already, we've
already kind of built a solid relationships that
I can continue to build and work on with them
to show them where to find new books and give
them more choices. And so building those relationships,
especially on campuses, when you get to see them
for multiple years, it's really helpful and important.
On the pre -K campus, when it's a solid pre -K
campus, building those relationships is really
important. You just don't get to continue to
build them because they, so quickly go to another
campus where that librarian is going to have
to start the process over again. But it's really
nice to have that connection and those relationships
so you can help the kids and it becomes something
that what I found is the kids really like it
because it is freeing to be able to be like I
don't like that kind of book I like this and
I want this and knowing kind of what they want
and being able to find those books is really
nice. they don't always get that kind of freedom
to be able to make their own selections for things.
And so the library can be one of those places
where they can. And if you can help them to do
that, then you become one of their favorite people.
It's always cool because the pre -K kids know
that on their book checkout days, they get to
make those choices and they're always so excited
to come in and find the book. So it's really
nice to have that kind of a relationship with
all of those kids. Yeah, I love that idea. I
haven't tried that myself, but I think this will
be the year that I Do attempt that I love how
student -centered it is and it just really gives
the kids the power to Explore their interests
a little bit more. Yeah Yeah, it's great because
yeah, like like I said Each of those kids they're
they're their own crazy character of a kid and
they all have their own interests and I try to
explain to them up front I said you know like
your friend might pick this kind of book and
that's great for them but it might not be yours
and it's okay and like once they realize they
don't have to be like everybody else and they
can find the books that they are really interested
in it's just it's so cute to see how excited
they get to be like my friend got this book but
I found this and I think this is awesome you
know like It just, it makes me smile to see how
happy and excited they get to come into the library
so they can pick what they want for a book. Yeah,
that's absolutely, that's why we do what we do.
That's wonderful. Absolutely. The next book we're
going to talk about today is called Papa's Magical
Water Jug Clock. It's published by Minerva in
2023. The author is Jesus Trejo and the illustrator
is Eliza Kinks. This book has won a few awards.
It was an ALSC Notable Children's Book in 2025.
It got the Charlotte, do you see it in Zolotow
or Zolotow? I should know this and I don't. It
got two Pura Belprase, that's good. This book
got the ALSC Notable Children's Book for 2025
and it won the Pura Belpré Honor for Illustrator
in 2024, and the Pura Belpré Honor for the Author
in 2024. And it was on several lists. It's on
the District of Columbia Three Stars Book Award
for 2025, Best New Books for Missouri Students
in 2024 for Elementary Books, the New Mexico
Land of Enchantment Roadrunner Reading List for
2024, and a Texas 2x2 in 2024. And for author
history, Jesus Trejo is an American writer, comedian,
actor, and producer. He began doing standup comedy
in his early 20s. He has released two standup
comedy specials, one called Stay at Home Son,
which aired on Showtime in 2020. And his newer
one, Practicing, was released on his YouTube
channel in 2023. He's had several recurring acting
roles on TBS's sitcom Sullivan and Sons and on
Netflix's Mystery Lasias Papa's magical water
jug clock is his first book And He does have
one other book it is mama's magnificent dancing
plantitas And for our illustrator history Eliza
Keens developed a love of creating picture books
in kindergarten in a weekly rotation assignment
that allowed her to make picture books. She loved
creating the books so much that she lied to her
teacher and told her she hadn't done the assignment
yet so she could do it over and over again. She
later on attended UCLA's animation workshop in
order to explore storytelling through animation.
However, she found that she really didn't want
to tell other people's stories. She wanted to
tell her own. So, after having her own children,
she rediscovered her love of children's books
and she became a children's book creator full
-time. And some of her other books, she has written
and illustrated Miss Taco, A Tale of Tragedy
e Tortillas. And then she illustrated this book,
Papa's Magical Water Jug Clock by Jesus Trejo.
also Mama's Magnificent Dancing Plantitas by
Jesus Trejo, and Goldie's Guide to Grand Childing
by Clint McElroy. And in this book, Jesus, a
little boy, is excited because on Saturday he
gets to help Papa with the family landscaping
business. He even gets the extra important job
of caring for Papa's magical water jug clock.
When the jug is empty, it's time for them to
go home. Unfortunately, there's a lot of thirsty
animals along the way and naturally Jesus has
to help all of them. So the water jug is emptied
a little bit early. Papa helps Jesus learn some
important life lessons as their family works
together and solve their problem and finish out
their day. This book was a lot of fun. It was
really, there were a lot of fun little jokes
that were written like in the sidebar. when I
was reading it and I love that it's told in first
person from little boys perspective and he's
like I get to do this with my dad and we're gonna
go do this so I really like that it made it just
that much more relatable for kids reading the
book and the illustrations kind of going along
with that were I mean they were great illustrations
they were bright and they were colorful but they
were just a little bit were written, drawn kind
of like a kid would draw them. They were not,
I don't want to call it sloppy or anything, but
just the way that they were colored it, like
they were kind of colored outside the lines just
a little bit. And maybe it wasn't quite so neat
and perfect. So it just looked a little bit more
like a kid could have done it. So I liked that
it was like kid language, like in that first
person mixed with that. illustrative style that
was just a little bit more childlike kind of
making it so that kids could relate to it a little
bit better and it did really kind of sound and
look like a child could have made this book obviously
professional book so that didn't happen but it
was just made a little bit better connection
for kids who are reading it and I love that that
was a very close -knit family but it did have
that bigger emphasis on the father -son relationship,
which was great for Father's Day. And then at
the very end of the book, like it has like a
picture of the truck, the landscaping truck,
and it has like Trejo and then little Anne's
son next to it. So it was just very family focused.
And how can we work together to kind of get all
of our chores done and make our whole family
successful? And we're going to work hard. but
we're also going to have a lot of fun along the
way. So I just enjoyed it a whole lot. It was
really cute. It was very sweet. It was kind of
like the other one where it was still kind of
sweet, but very funny as well. I haven't read
it to a class yet, but I'm looking forward to
it. I think kids would enjoy it a whole lot.
Yeah, I agree. I hadn't read this book until
this week and I love it. Like you said, it's
a sweet story. The word choice and the illustration
style make it very approachable for the students.
It's very much like a welcoming kind of like
kid book. And the story is like there's some
really silly parts, but it's really heartwarming
in that you can feel that connection between
father and son throughout the story, which is
really nice. it's very relatable as a parent
when you're like okay when this happens then
we'll be done and so as Jesus is continuing to
just like splash water in his own face and give
water to all the animals you're like oh i already
see where this is going kind of thing and when
in the story when it's like Jesus is like we're
almost done with the water and the dad's like
it's 10 30 and we have 11 more houses to do it's
just very relatable It was just a fun story and
I agree it's excellent and I look forward to
sharing it with students because I hadn't yet
but I really like this one. This is a great story.
I really like as well that you could tell that
the family had really big Latin roots and it
did have a few Spanish words sprinkled here and
there so that was another great component of
this book as well. When I was reading through
this one my 11 year old was reading with me and
we were about halfway through and I told her
it was time for her to go she had to go get ready
for bed and she was like before I finish this
book and she kept talking how cute it was I mean
just the 11 year old thinks it's cute it's gotta
be cute so it was just very engaging very entertaining
I think I would probably give this one a 5 out
of 5 as well I think so it was it was great I
love it I'm definitely gonna use it with my students
And as far as a makerspace activity with this
one, I think you could probably, actually I think
pair really well with Dandy. We did not do that
on purpose, but as we tend to do, we accidentally
pair two books that go amazingly well together,
being that it's both about a father and a child
and just plants in general. So I do think that
either of the activities that you picked earlier
could tie into this one really well. But there
was also with this one, there was the added component
of when Jesus was giving up, when they run out
of water. And then the dad wants to know like,
well, how on earth did that happen? It was a
full water jug, and that was a big water jug.
And the boy had to explain, well, I gave water
to these thirsty animals, and you drank this
many. And it didn't have a written out numerically
math problems on it, but it did pictorially have
some math problems where it was like one glass
of water plus one glass of water plus one. glass
of water for these animals. So you could tie
it into like an addition lesson if you wanted
to or some kind of a measurement. Anything with
like volume would pair really well with this
because you have to measure the number of cups
that were going into the jug. So anyway, you
could either do any of the activities that you
mentioned earlier or you could pair it with a
measurement activity like that with either volume
or addition. But this was a really fun book and
there's a lot of ways to use it in the classroom
as well. So, really enjoyable. Highly recommend.
Very good. I think both of these are excellent
books for Father's Day. I think they're really
good stories. Yeah, they're both a lot of fun.
Very entertaining and heartwarming and just really
focuses on a good positive relationship with
families. specifically one with fathers. Alright,
well thank you all for joining us today on this
episode of Librarians of Littles and we hope
you found some fresh ideas for inspiring young
readers. Please be sure to subscribe and connect
with us on social media. Happy reading! Thank
you for listening to this episode of Librarians
of Littles. We hope that you've enjoyed it. Check
back each Wednesday for a new episode. Librarians
of Littles is a podcast produced and hosted by
Patrick Adams and Caroline Ligier. Editor, Patrick
Adams. Our theme song is performed by J .D. Adams.
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