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STEM: One Gorilla
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From: Megan Schliesman <schliesman_at_education.wisc.edu>
Date: Thu, 14 Mar 2013 10:05:36 -0500
We had a book discussion here at the CCBC yesterday and one of the titles (the list was a mix of new picture books and fiction) was Anthony Browne's "One Gorilla: A Counting Book" (U.S. edition: Candlewick Press, 2013).
When I read it the first thing that struck me was the beauty of his paintings of different kinds of primates. It begins with 1 gorilla. A turn of the page offers 2 orangutans, then 3 chimpanzees .... Finally, we reach 10 lemurs. On every spread, the animals are beautifully rendered with exquisitely detailed features. And whether there are 1 or 2 or 10 of them, they are all individuals. Not only is there variation in coat color and facial structure and expression, but wow, there is personality in those eyes!
After "10 lemurs" comes a stunning reveal--at least it was stunning to me. I absolutely did not see it coming, and it was one of those moments when a book makes me shiver. And suddenly this became much more than a counting book and a book of beautiful primate paintings. It became a book about science, too.
Young children, of course, may not have the same sense of excitement I felt at this moment in the book, because the way it shifts to being something more than a counting book is matter of fact in the narrative (arresting visually). But we had quite a bit of disagreement at the discussion on whether this shift works. Some of us thought it did, while others thought the turn was drastic and should have been more subtle, or not there at all.
Personally, I found the fact that humans are another primate is expressed simply and beautifully and accessibly, something many families will appreciate.
Megan
-- Megan Schliesman, Librarian Cooperative Children's Book Center School of Education, University of Wisconsin-Madison 600 N. Park Street, Room 4290 Madison, WI 53706
608/262-9503 schliesman_at_education.wisc.edu
www.education.wisc.edu/ccbc/
Received on Thu 14 Mar 2013 10:05:36 AM CDT
Date: Thu, 14 Mar 2013 10:05:36 -0500
We had a book discussion here at the CCBC yesterday and one of the titles (the list was a mix of new picture books and fiction) was Anthony Browne's "One Gorilla: A Counting Book" (U.S. edition: Candlewick Press, 2013).
When I read it the first thing that struck me was the beauty of his paintings of different kinds of primates. It begins with 1 gorilla. A turn of the page offers 2 orangutans, then 3 chimpanzees .... Finally, we reach 10 lemurs. On every spread, the animals are beautifully rendered with exquisitely detailed features. And whether there are 1 or 2 or 10 of them, they are all individuals. Not only is there variation in coat color and facial structure and expression, but wow, there is personality in those eyes!
After "10 lemurs" comes a stunning reveal--at least it was stunning to me. I absolutely did not see it coming, and it was one of those moments when a book makes me shiver. And suddenly this became much more than a counting book and a book of beautiful primate paintings. It became a book about science, too.
Young children, of course, may not have the same sense of excitement I felt at this moment in the book, because the way it shifts to being something more than a counting book is matter of fact in the narrative (arresting visually). But we had quite a bit of disagreement at the discussion on whether this shift works. Some of us thought it did, while others thought the turn was drastic and should have been more subtle, or not there at all.
Personally, I found the fact that humans are another primate is expressed simply and beautifully and accessibly, something many families will appreciate.
Megan
-- Megan Schliesman, Librarian Cooperative Children's Book Center School of Education, University of Wisconsin-Madison 600 N. Park Street, Room 4290 Madison, WI 53706
608/262-9503 schliesman_at_education.wisc.edu
www.education.wisc.edu/ccbc/
Received on Thu 14 Mar 2013 10:05:36 AM CDT
