From: Monica R. Edinger <edinger>
Date: Sun, 20 Oct 2002 10:16:31 -0400

Most of the new voices mentioned write for older children. Earlier this month I mentioned picture-book writer/illustrator Chris Raschka. Since that post I have had a couple of experiences which reinforced my admiration for his work.

First of all, I recently saw Chris do a story hour with a group of pre-school and kindergarten-aged children. While I have enjoyed his presentations before this was the first time I saw him with children and it was wonderful. You could really see how his elegantly simple texts resonated with this very young audience.

Now I have read some of Chris's books to my fourth graders over the years.
 One year I tried Arlene Sardine out with them along with others of his books and it fell flat. I figured it was too sophisticated for them, but tried it again with last year's class which loved it. So, go figure. This year I have magnets on my board for Waffle (the magnets seem to be every word in the text) which the kids enjoy fiddling with, making up some sentences that make sense and many that do not. I recently read them the book itself which was fun as they were already so familiar with the words, but not the way he put them together. As he usually does, Chris only uses a few well-chosen words in Waffle, but with tremendous wit and sensitivity. I suspect smaller children will like the sound and story while older students (like mine) will additionally enjoy the more sophisticated tongue twister aspect of the text.

Then Friday I had the coolest of all Raschka book experiences. Because our Friday schedule is hellish (in other words, twenty lively fourth graders in a very-small-room just about ALL DAY LONG), I instituted for the very end of the day a Literary Salon which consists of the children imbibing in juice and cookies while involved in literature. Since I read to them on other days I started with the kids doing short readings from their own books as a change of pace. They enjoyed this, but I figured this could get old if we did it too much. (I actually have a sneaky hidden agenda of eventually getting them to memorize and recite poetry
 I loved doing as a kid --- but they aren't ready for that yet.) So, inspired by Chris I decided to try introducing them to a few of his music books along with the music.

I began with Charlie Parker Played Bebop. I knew this one would go over well as the language is so wonderful. We read it together once, listened to Charlie Parker, and then read it again with Charlie in the background. Next came the one I love, but wasn't so sure they would: Mysterious Thelonious I explained as best I could the relationship of musical scale to color scale and sort of read it and sort of sang it --- badly (I'm sorry, Chris and Thelonious). Fortunately, despite my lame effort, the kids were enraptured. I then played some Monk, but not Mysterioso. They were so taken by the book that I plan to by the CD today (and, frankly, I don't really even LIKE Monk that much! My taste in jazz is more of the Charlie Parker kind). I then did my current favorite, Giant Steps
(remixed by Chris Raschka). It was amazing! The kids were blown away by the book. I read half of it, played some of the CD, read the rest, and played more Coltrane. We ended (the day and the week) with a totally different sort of music, his book of the Shaker Hymn, Simple Gifts. The children all knew it and we just sang it along with Chris' beautiful images.

So I again just want to express my tremendous admiration for the way Chris Raschka plays with language in a way that completely engages and captivates children.

Monica


Monica Edinger The Dalton School New York NY edinger at dalton.org monicaedinger at yahoo.com
Received on Sun 20 Oct 2002 09:16:31 AM CDT