Hello, I'm Patrick Adams. And I am Caroline Legere.
And this is Librarians of Littles, a podcast
where we discuss books, give makers space ideas,
and give tips and tricks for working with our
youngest students in the library setting. This
episode will be published in early August. And
this is the time of year when we start thinking
about getting ready for back to school. Phineas
and Ferb promised us 104 days of summer. They
lied. We are getting ready for that back to school
stuff. And so today we're going to be reading
some beginning of the school year books. We're
going to be discussing some beginning of the
school year books. The first of which is a fantastic
book called The Day You Begin. It is a Penguin
Random House book. published in 2018. The author
is Jacqueline Woodson, the illustrator Rafael
Lopez. This book has won multiple, multiple awards.
It is a We Are Kid Lit Collective Summer Reading
List from 2019 book. It is a CCBC Choice Selection
for 2019. the jane adams children's book award
books for young children winner for 2019 notable
books for global society selection for 2019 charlotte
zolotow award commended list 2019 charlotte huck
award commended list 2019 alsc notable children's
book commended list 2019 School Library Journal
best book of the year selection for 2018 and
the publisher's weekly best picture book selection
for 2018. So quite a few accolades to go with
this book for sure. Our author Jacqueline Woodson
is an American author. As a child, Jacqueline
loved to write. She wrote everywhere, even on
her clothes and shoes. She also loved to tell
stories or Lies and she often would get in trouble
for that but she didn't stop until fifth grade
in fifth grade she began to realize that lies
on the page were different and much more acceptable
and Her fifth grade teacher she talks about on
her webpage that her fifth grade teacher It told
her, you know, this is really good and that feeling
kind of stuck with her and so she continued to
write and she has gone on to Win like the MacArthur
grant and all sorts of other Amazing things.
She's very successful at what she does and she
is is amazing at it. She is She's done so many
so many books that I we can't we'd spend the
whole podcast Just listing all of the books that
she's done. But a few of them would be Brown
girl dreaming harbor me each kindness before
the ever after remember us The Other Side, The
Year We Learned to Fly, The World Belongs to
Us, which was illustrated by Leo Espinosa, and
Pecan Pie Baby, illustrated by Sophie Blackall,
and like I said, many, many others. And the illustrator
of this book is Rafael Lopez. He's an internationally
recognized illustrator and artist. He is a founder
of the urban art trail movement in San Diego's
East Village, creating a series of large scale
murals that brought the community together. His
murals can be found in urban areas, at children's
hospitals, public schools, under freeways, at
the farmers markets, around the country. Lopez's
community work with murals is the subject of
the children's book, Maybe Something Beautiful,
How Art Transformed a Neighborhood. I didn't
know that! That's cool! Yeah. I like that book.
In 2022, He served as the first guest artist
of the Smithsonian Postal Museum, teaching workshops
to children and families. That same year, he
created 57 portraits for the Smithsonian National
Museum of the American Latino. He lives and works
in an industrial loft in downtown San Diego and
at his home studio in the colonial town of San
Miguel de Allende, Mexico. And some of his other
books include Drum Dream Girl, How One Girl's
Courage Changed Music by Margarita Engle, Maybe
Something Beautiful, How Art Transformed a Neighborhood
by F. Isabel Campoy and Theresa Howell, Dancing
Hands, How Teresa Carreno Played the Piano for
President Lincoln by Margarita Engle. Just Ask,
Be Different, Be Brave, and Be You by Sonia Sotomayor,
The Year We Learned to Fly by Jacqueline Woodson,
Tito Puente, The Mambo King by Monica Brown,
and many more. Yes, and so this book, again,
is amazing. I loved it a lot. The summary is
It's the story of many children. It focuses on
one specific girl throughout the story, but it's
their experiences of fitting in or not, of feeling
different because of either their culture, their
skin color, their abilities or experiences. And
it's the story of feeling proud of yourself and
your family and finding your place in the group.
It is an amazing, amazing story. I love it. The
illustrations are so breathtaking, so colorful,
vibrant. I love the illustrations. They will
definitely keep the students' attention. The
lyrical quality to the story, the way it's written,
is just welcoming and just has that comforting
feeling as you're reading. It just makes you
feel warm inside. It's a wonderful story that
reminds students that... we're different and
we can celebrate those differences, but there's
a lot of things about us that are the same and
you might have to dig a little deeper to find
those similarities, but we can embrace those
as well to just embrace the whole of everyone
and I think that this is just such a important
reminder for students of all ages that just because
someone looks different or may act different
or may eat different kinds of food or, you know,
have different experiences, there's still people
that we can befriend and learn from and just
accept into our communities to be happy and let
everyone feel safe and comfortable. And for a
first week of school kind of book, I think it's
a brilliant one that would be beneficial to everyone.
And it just, like I said, it just, I just, once
I was done reading it, I just felt so good. Like,
like there's hope in that book. It just, you
know, it just, it's such a good book. It made
me just smile at just the message that it had.
And I know that this is the kind of book that
so many students need and would be comforting
to them as well. So many of our students are
very very aware of what makes them different.
Because differences are so much easier to see,
you know? And so our students are very aware
of what makes them different. And so being able
to point out that differences are okay, because
there's plenty of similarities too. And we can
learn from each other's differences and move
from there. It's just, I love this story. It
was wonderful and I'm looking forward to using
it again this year. Yeah, this one's a really
sweet one. It's really I would say it's already
a classic It's very I love those illustrations
and they are really does a great job of celebrating
diversity and showing a lot of different parts
of different cultures It's very sweet. It's very
like you said, it's very comforting I would give
this one a five out of five It's a lovely book.
And it's really the way it's written, too. It
doesn't even necessarily have to be a beginning
of school book. It could really be at any time
of the year. Absolutely. Yeah. It does fit in
really well with the beginning of school, but
it doesn't necessarily have to be. It's just
and I don't think it actually mentions school
a whole lot. It's just you're going somewhere
new and people are different and you might feel
like you might feel like you're not. You don't
fit in as well at first, but you know, you will,
because we're all, we are all different, but
that's okay. We're kind of meant to be different.
That's kind of what makes us all, that's the
beautiful thing about the world, is our differences.
It really just celebrates that. And while we
are different, there are lots of other similarities
between each other as well. it yeah you're right
it doesn't specifically say it implies kind of
school because it does have the kids talk about
like different trips that they went on and then
it implied like there's a part where like mom
packs you your lunch and people are looking at
what mom packed you and so it was like it kind
of implies school but it doesn't necessarily
have to be and it's definitely something you
could use at any point in the year i just think
it works really well with the beginning of the
year for sure you know it does work really well
with the beginning And I think with pre -K, because
pre -K, I think with this one, I would read it
like first week of school to maybe any other
grade actually. With pre -K, I would probably
do it in September or October after they've already
settled in a little bit because our pre -K kids
are naturally. a little bit more egocentric,
that's just the stage of life that they're in,
and they may not notice differences yet. They're
kind of so focused on themselves when they're
three and four years old that they may not even
really notice that there is anything different
about them versus the other kids in school or
what's going on there. That might be something
that needs to be pointed out to them. and that's
because that's kind of a social construct that
kind of comes a little bit later on and that's
you know you know so it might not be that's a
that's a really thing yet yes but with our older
kids really anyone else even kindergarten i think
is already noticing those differences and such
because they're just that's just their stage
of life no i think that's a that's a really good
point that i didn't i was just thinking just
in general but you're absolutely right our pre
-k kids probably they might not notice the whole
year if anybody was different necessarily, but
the older kids definitely would. But yeah, no,
that's a very good point. But it's a really good
one to introduce anything like that. If you have
any kind of unit where you're learning about
yourself or you're learning about other people
or learning about other cultures, this is a great
one for Pre -K to kind of introduce that and
just be like, well, there are differences, but
it's good. We like the differences. We're down
with them. Absolutely. So yes, definitely. Five
out of five for this one. I love this story.
It's wonderful. As far as a makerspace activity
to connect with this book, I thought it would
be fun to just give the kids a blank sheet of
paper, give them some coloring materials, crayons,
markers, colored pencils, and have the students
draw a self -portrait of themselves. Have them
draw them either... doing something that they
enjoy or pointing out something that makes them
special, you know, something that they're proud
of about themselves. So they could draw a picture
of themselves, highlighting something that makes
them unique and special, something that they're
proud of about themselves. And so it'd be kind
of a cool way just to see what they see in themselves
and see what they're happy about and what they're
proud of. And, you know, then you could kind
of have all the kids kind of share what they've
done. It'd be kind of cool to see all the things
that everyone is proud of about themselves and
what they find special in themselves. You're
really cool. I love that. Yeah, that kind of
brings another layer of noticing, like introspection
and just noticing what they're good at and what
makes them special. Love it. That's great. Yeah.
All right. So for our Library of Littles management
tip, We're gonna discuss a little bit about since
it's the beginning of the school year. We're
getting ready for that. We thought Discussing
seating charts for the beginning of the school
year would be a great way to Introduce some of
those management skills and help get to learn
students names all that kind of stuff. So you
want to start this conversation for us? Yeah,
so especially for pre -k is that Libraries that
I was on previously were all pre -k kids, which
means that I get to learn 300 brand new names
every single year. Actually, last year is about
600. And that's a lot of kids. That's a lot of
different classes. And it's really exceptionally
hard. Like I know in elementary libraries, you're
going to have a little bit of, you know, your
kindergartners are going to come back as first
graders. So you're all going to already going
to know some names. You may forget a couple over
the summer, but for the most part, you're going
to take it back up eventually anyway. But with
Pre -K, it's all brand new kids, all the time,
every year. So for me, to help me learn my kids'
names, I would always start out with a seating
chart. And it was mostly just to help me learn
who the kids were, just because there were so
many. And it's kind of overwhelming to get to
know all of them. it's kind of important for
us to learn their names right because that's
that's their identity that's who they are and
um the kids notice if you don't you know really
know who they are so for me i would always um
start the school year with one of the first books
that i always read was um chica chica boom boom
i'm sure i'll do it again this year and because
they're that's a good book because it starts
with Letters I talk about how all the books have
letters in them. So we're going to get to know
letters really well in the library because that's
kind of the basis of reading and I read it and
then it has a really that really good YouTube
song that goes with it. That's the same thing
over and over again and it has it's just an animated
version of the book pretty much and that's about
a three minutes. Video so I've read the book
put on my three -minute video And it's just long
enough to kind of get there get their attention
have them sitting still and just wherever they're
sitting I go ahead and I have a pre -printed
sheet that is like a little map of my reading
rug and I write down where all the kids are sitting
and that's where I tell them like that's their
spot for the first at least the first several
weeks of school just because then I have a spot
written down with all of their names on it where
everybody is so that when they come into the
library next time I can say okay Jonathan needs
to go sit over here Ashley needs to go sit over
here and then when I'm reading the book I can
kind of refer back to my seating chart and I
know who all the kids are and it really helps
me a lot because then I'm writing everything
down so that's another you know pathway in my
brain that's helping me form that connection
so I can remember who the kids are and when they
come back in I can refer back to it and you know
like kind of just notice at least the names and
match the names with the students so I can know
who everybody is. So just I mean, just as long
as I can do that for at least like a month or
so, then I can usually get the names down pretty
well. And then it's not as big of a deal. And
then we might be able to relax the seating chart
a little bit. And depending on the class, there
might still be some kids who just absolutely
need to be separated for whatever reason. But
after that point, once I know the kids names,
I do relax a little bit and kind of give them
a little bit more freedom with where they sit.
But that just really, that's a really good way
for me personally to learn all those pre -K kids
because they're sure are a lot. Absolutely. Yes.
Um, so yeah, having it written down to go back
to and reflect on and be able to kind of put
the name to the face, to the spot definitely
helps, especially for the first couple of weeks.
I tend to do the same for Usually honestly, I'll
usually do it until the first grading period
and so we do like six week grading periods and
so by the end of September I've usually got most
of the names down and at that point we can kind
of move let them move around and pick a new spot
or Come in each week and just sit down whatever
works at that point for that group But yeah,
absolutely having the first couple weeks of consistently
having them sit in one spot so that you can learn
those names and you honestly the other thing
is you start to learn some of those behaviors
and some of those friends that are going to need
a little extra help and a little extra guidance
um and so absolutely i agree with you having
a seating chart for the first couple weeks i
do this honestly i do this for all of the grade
levels even through like my fifth grade students
because yes that most of them have been there
all year and been there for a couple years and
so i've gotten to know them but there's some
new kids every year And so it just kind of helps.
So having a seating chart, having some consistency,
some rigidity for the first couple of weeks just
to, it also just kind of helps to set some of
those expectations. If you already know where
you're going to sit, you don't have to like,
there's no arguing over that. We can just come
in and you can sit down and we can get going
with the rest of what we need to do. building
those foundational routines and stuff. And so,
it's definitely worth doing for the first couple
of weeks. If you wanna keep it going all year,
that works too. It just depends on the group.
Cause there are some times when you're just like,
this group needs to have an assigned spot because
if they don't, it takes 20 minutes to get sitting
on the carpet correctly and that kind of thing.
And that's fine. But yeah, starting the year
with it just to... I find that if you can set
those expectations from the start of come in,
sit down so we can get started and build those
routines at the beginning, it's definitely, it's
such a huge help. So I agree with you completely.
Seating charts are the way to go. And I even
made just like, I have a carpet that has the
alphabet on it. So it's like four, the four corners
or something, and then the rest of it's the alphabet.
And so, yeah, I made like a generic, PowerPoint
slide file that that's what it is and so I print
that and it's like kind of I have it all in gray
and then I can just write in pencil right over
it the kids names and I can erase when I need
to or move a kid when I need to and just so I
just buy over by my story time area where I do
all my lessons and everything I have a binder
that's split up by grade level And so each class
has their seating chart in that for the beginning
of the year. And I just keep it right there so
that I can flip to it for whatever grade and
whatever class I'm seeing. And I know where everybody
is and it helps to learn all the names. It helps
to just kind of give some structure at the beginning
of the year. It's excellent. It does help a lot.
Yeah. I need it. Yes. Yeah. I mean, Like I try
to explain to the students like there's one of
me. It's easy for you guys to learn one name
I'm trying to learn 300 like it's just like it's
not the same, you know It's a lot of work it's
hard All right. Well the other beginning of school
book that we're going to talk about today is
we don't eat our classmates It's published by
Disney Hyperion in 2018, and the author and illustrator
is Ryan T. Higgins. And I did not know how many
books or how many states had this on a list.
This is on 37 state lists. That's the highest
number I've seen yet. I know. 37. Dang. I know.
A few of those are the Arizona Grand Canyon Reader
Award for 2021, Florida Sunshine State Young
Readers Award for 2019, Georgia Children's Book
Award for 2020, and the Pennsylvania Young Readers
Choice Award for 2019. This is also on a couple
of lists, including the Charlotte Zolotow Award
for 2019. It's a CCBC Choice Book for 2019 and
EB White Read Aloud Award 2019 and a Junior Library
Guild selection. And Ryan T. Higgins was greatly
influenced as a child by Calvin and Hobbes comics.
Initially that's what he wanted to do. He wanted
to become a comic writer. However, after reading
Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus, he became
intrigued by early readers and decided to try
his hand at that genre. He currently lives in
Maine with his wife and three children. He has
quite a few books and most of them are in different
series. Mother Bruce series is easily his most
popular one. There's 19 books total in that.
The Penelope Rex books including this one. has
four books total right now. He started a new
one called the Norman book series, and right
now that only has two books in it. It's Norman
Didn't Do It, Yes He Did, and Norman and the
Smell of Adventure. I have to say before you
even start the summary, I have to say that Ryan
T. Higgins is one of my favorite author -illustrators
of picture books. I love to read the Mother Bruce
books with my students. They are so much fun.
They're so absurd and silly and the kids just
love them. The Norman books are wonderful. And
even like Penelope Rex, I think that they're
just so entertaining. So like, he just, for someone
who didn't plan to do this and had other ideas,
like he came in and just did exactly like he's
just doing he's just doing an amazing job with
it these books are so wonderful they really are
the kids love them so much and so yeah yeah they're
really good and you can tell he wanted to be
a comic writer in the books like they've always
got those little word bubbles going on in there
and that like that actually helps move the story
along a little bit so this is actually probably
a really great introduction to graphic novels
in general because like you could kind of you
could actually I think most of them you could
read it with or without the word bubbles that
are inserted in there but it does like that's
where most of the jokes are hidden and I guess
not most that's not fair but I think more of
the adult humor is hidden in there and you could
you could kind of take it or leave it but it
does help move the story along. quite a bit,
especially for older kids. Like I think that's
what makes these books really good for like most
elementary age kids actually. Like it works really
well. And I think it's because they're kind of
written like comics, but not really written like
comics. Cause you're like, you could just read
the words on the page for our younger kids or
like with the older ones, you could, you know,
point out the word what they're probably noticing
it, but. Make sure they're not being lazy and
actually reading the word bubbles and it adds
a whole nother layer to the story It's great.
They're wonderful and on his website. He has
a couple of Little clips of him like at home.
It kind of shows you his studio and Like his
process a little bit for you know when he's writing
which is really cool. Like that's a really I
know that's kind of a great introduction to authors
in general. Those are really cool. I think he
did those during COVID that looked like a COVID
thing, but he left them up, which makes me happy.
Yeah. So anyway, I'm going to focus now. Here
we go. Yes. The book summary. Okay. Penelope
Rex is very nervous about starting school for
the first time. She has many of the typical fears
like people won't like her and she won't do well,
but it's all exacerbated by the fact that she
is T -Rex starting school with human children.
And initially she struggles to remember that
she can't eat her classmates until their class
goldfish teaches her a lesson and he bites her
in the end and she kind of... becomes terrified
of him. And that's what the other books are about.
But I absolutely love this book. This is always
the book that I start out reading to pre -K at
the very beginning of the school year. I usually
do skip the word bubbles with pre -K at the very
beginning, because at the very beginning, when
they're fresh into school, their attention span
is like, tiny it's miniscule and The sooner we
can I do want to do story time and I do want
to make it engaging for everybody and We do lengthen
it throughout the school year, but at the very
very beginning When all the kids are terrified,
but they're more terrified because like a lot
of them have never Left their home before some
of some of them have and some of them haven't
the kids who have been today here kind of know
they're not gonna live at school but some of
the some of those four -year -olds they really
do think that their parents have dropped them
off and they're never going to pick them up and
like what is happening and they don't know what's
going on so a lot of them anyway they're extra
squirrely at the beginning so i do skip the word
bubbles a lot um just to kind of make it move
a little bit faster um But the illustrations
are so vibrant, it kind of catches their attention.
It's got a read. This book has an exceptionally
good sound, soundscape on the novel effect app
that really hooks my students in pretty quickly
and really doesn't let go for the whole book.
It's pretty great, like. I love it a lot. But
it's kind of because Penelope Rex is nervous.
Like all the kids are very much relating to that
because they're all nervous too. But because
she's nervous about like making friends and it's
there, they all think it's hilarious that she's,
you know, she might eat her classmates because
they all know that they're not going to eat their
classmates. That's not what they're nervous about.
So it's like, it's relatable. but it's relatable
in a very silly way. So that I think helps draw
the kid's attention in really, really well. I
just, I don't know. I love it a lot. And there's
a fun disclaimer at the beginning that's like,
hey, you know what? This book is about a T -Rex
and they're extinct. So you don't need to be
worried about being eaten at school. It's all
good. Like, and that kind of helps too. I think
that it's, you know. It kind of sets the tone
for the book and lets the kids know this is gonna
be silly. It's okay So I think this one for me
is a five out of five. There's a reason it's
on 37 state lists. Yeah Yes, this is such a fun
and kind of silly story and it's really it really
is a great book for students I I need to remember
to try the novel effect with it. I haven't done
that before but I'm gonna do it this year I gotta
make a mental note to to do that because I keep
forgetting to use the novel effect so I need
to do that um because I think it's a really good
one for this one in particular like that that
app I'm not gonna lie sometimes it's hit or miss
sometimes I'm like okay that is making it worse
but this one oh man it's a good one do it yeah
so I'm looking forward to that to using this
to use this book this year and to use the novel
effect with it this year um to to share the story
with the kids because it is such a good book
and it really is just something that all the
kids enjoy so yeah great book great book yeah
i love this one a whole lot and i think for a
makerspace activity because it's theoretically
the beginning of the school year when you're
reading it it probably is because i just don't
see another reason way that this book would fit
in anywhere else. There's other Penelope Rex
books will definitely fit in elsewhere, but this
one, I don't know. This is kind of where it belongs
for sure. So I think for this one, since you're
just establishing routines and procedures, I
think for a makerspace activity, this is where
I would introduce makerspace and I would just
keep it as simple as possible. because really
all you're doing is teaching routines and procedures
at the very beginning of the school year. So
I usually keep it extra simple and only have
maybe, depending on the size of the class, maybe
three makerspace centers. at the most. I do kind
of move it around so that there's more room at
each of the makerspace centers so that there's
plenty of space for the kids to get at everything.
But the entire goal for me at the very beginning
of the school year is letting the kids know that
they are safe and they are loved and we are going
to have a predictable routine that they'll be
able to rely on throughout the school year. And
part of the routine is going to be going to the
Maker Space Centers and cleaning up after themselves.
And cleanup is gonna take a little bit longer
than usual and minimizing the number of choices
that they have at this point in the school year
is gonna help with cleanup because there's not
gonna be as much to do and they'll kind of get
through that a little bit faster. So yeah, just
keeping it simple. and just whatever you think
it will be most engaging for your students. I
might throw in some dinosaur toys in there if
I have enough just because Penelope Rex is naturally
a Tyrannosaurus Rex. That would help kind of
with a tie into the story, but yeah for this
one I would just teach routines and procedures
within the library. Yeah which is super important,
so important to get those routines set up at
the beginning so that the students know what
to expect for the rest of the year, absolutely.
Yeah. Yeah, that's your basis for the whole school
year. So, yeah. That's what I'm going to do.
Gotta put in the time up front to make sure that
everything else runs smooth the rest of the year,
for sure. Absolutely. Because yeah, if you don't
do that, oh boy, you're gonna have problems and
then you won't be able to have any fun for the
rest of the year. So, yeah. Yeah. Excellent.
Love it. 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 Legere. Editor, Patrick
Adams. Our theme song is performed by JD Adams.
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