Home » Posts tagged "children’s books" (Page 29)

Tell-Tale Art– Spooky Illustrations with the Power to Change Lives

How cool is this? I learned about it from a tweet from Jon Scieszka, the mind behind Guys Read. All kinds of well known children’s book illustrators are participating in an art auction that you’ll want to be sure to check out, called Tell Tale Art. It’s all original spooky art from these illustrators, and if you’ve ever picked up a children’s picture book some of these names ought to sound familiar. Maybe you’ve heard of Lane Smith, David Shannon, Brett Helquist, Mo Willems, Paul O. Zelinsky, Dav Pilkey, Adam Rex, or Tony DiTerlizzi? All of them have donated their own scary illustrations to this auction, which is a fundraiser for an organization called 826NYC.

826nyc.org is a nonprofit organization dedicated to supporting students ages 6-18 with their creative and expository writing skills, and to helping teachers inspire their students to write, structured around the belief that great leaps in learning can happen with one-on-one attention and that strong writing skills are fundamental to future success. With this in mind we provide free drop-in tutoring, field trips, after-school workshops, in-schools tutoring, help for English language learners, and assistance with student publications, intended to ultimately strengthen each student’s power to express ideas effectively, creatively, confidently, and in his or her individual voice (Most of that is straight from their mission statement)

Even if you can’t afford to participate, go look! It’s a great opportunity to see what children’s authors and illustrators can do with a spooky theme.

Librarians – I Desperately Need Your Input!

I have been asked to write a chapter for a book on the intersection of children’s literature with horror fiction. The book’s editor wants a librarian’s perspective.  I am looking to get additional input from children’s librarians and elementary school media specialists. So far  the research I can find regarding the value of scary stories and horror fiction in engaging readers and in the library is incomplete, at best (so if you know of any academic research I can use, please let me know). I am hoping to collect some input from you here.

The topic is: Where are the scary books? The place of scary stories in reading and at the library.

If you are a school librarian in a K-8 school or a children’s librarian in a public library, or feel like you have something that you’d like to add to help shape what I write I would really appreciate it. I would be interested to read responses here.  A request for this information from the children’s librarians at my local public library was met with disinterest, and that’s part of what I am writing about, but I know that’s not representative of all children’s and school librarians! So please help, and spread the word to others if you know them.  Here are the questions I am looking to have answered:

1.) What do you think constitutes “scary books” in the elementary or children’s library collection?

2.)Do you purchase scary books and horror fiction for your elementary, middle school, or children’s collections? Why or why not?

3.) What criteria do you use when making purchasing decisions?

4.) How do you answer the question “Where are the scary books”?

5.)Where are your “scary books” physically located?

6.) What titles, subjects, or genres would you consider looking in to find “scary books”?

Anyone who would like to contact me personally about this topic, please email me at monsterlibrarian@monsterlibrarian.com and title your subject line: Scary Books for Kids.

Thank you!

Poison Apple Books Alert! Check Your Kids’ Scholastic Book Club Flyer

In a recent post, I mentioned the Poison Apple Books as a series for the beginning reader who is looking for something spooky. Lo and behold, the books showed up on parent/teacher radar in the November book order from Scholastic. If you are the parent of a child who brings home Scholastic book orders from school, and would like to acquire these for your newly independent reader, they are available as a set in a slipcase in the” Holiday Gift Books” flyer for November 2012 at 55% off (the flyer is a little odd, in my opinion, as it contains both Goodnight Moon and The Hunger Games, but nobody hired me to market to kids and their parents and teachers, either).  A six-pack of  the Goosebumps Hall of Horrors books(which I know nothing about, except that it’s written at a 2nd-3rd grade reading level) is also available at 50% off. Parents are encouraged to order online, where the entire family of flyers for all the book order books at all grade levels are available, but unfortunately these are time sensitive. So if your child did not bring home a book order, you might want to contact the teacher, find out the classroom code, and see what’s available there.