We had a great celebration yesterday with the families in our community, and the kids got to take home two books each.
Our party was carnival themed with craft and game stations, each inspired by a different bilingual or multicultural book. Kudos to the organizer for coming up with such great ideas! Here are some examples:
Día de los Niños / Día de los Libros is Thursday, April 30th this year. Check here to see if your local library has any Día celebrations planned during the next few days!
Día began in 1996, when the marvelous children's author Pat Mora decided to bring El Día de los Niños -- Children's Day, a Mexican tradition -- to the US and add the element of "bookjoy," or love of the written word. Now we observe Children's Day / Book Day every year on the last day of April with community festivities and lots of reading.
Pat Mora's Book Fiesta -- read it!
If you'd like to find a Día celebration near you, check out the American Library Association website and just enter your zip code. I'm going to be celebrating with some kiddos I work with, so I'll be sure to post pictures of our event next week.
Because this tradition originated in Mexico, I want to let y'all know about two of my favorite Mexican picture books that I'll be bringing to our Día party. The first is Girando la Vida, written by Fiona del Mar and illustrated by Claudia de Teresa, a colorful, dreamy book about the motion of life.
Then there's Domitila y el Mar, by Nina Basich and Teresa Martínez, about a woman who's always busybusybusy but finally succumbs to relaxation by the sea.
These books just make me feel good. And they're great for kids who already speak Spanish or are learning Spanish! If you'd like your own copies, you can purchase them (either straight from the publishers or possibly on Amazon) and keep them for yourself or donate them to your local school or library.
Recently, a McDonald's commercial about their coffee started popping up at the beginning of videos on a YouTube channel I'm subscribed to. At first, I ignored the content of the ad as I impatiently waited for it to finish and the real videos to begin, but eventually, I started paying attention. What I saw definitely bothered me.
The description of the video says that the ad is "shedding light on the process" of coffee growing and harvesting that leads to each individual cup of McDonald's coffee. While I didn't really learn much about the process from watching, the ad definitely shed light on something. Take a look:
Now watch it again with this question in mind: Whose faces do I see in this commercial?
The truth is, we don't see anyone's faces until we're shown the (probably rich) dude tasting the coffee at the end. But all of the (probably not so rich) workers who grow, harvest, and prepare the coffee beans remain faceless.
We need to ask ourselves why that is. Does McDonald's want us to think that the people who make our coffee aren't important? On a broader note, does this commercial reflect our desire -- as affluent, privileged people -- to ignore people living in poverty?
If you're a teacher or parent, watching and analyzing this ad with your kids can be a great critical literacy exercise. As I've mentioned before, critical literacy is more than just reading. We can turn our critical eyes on anything we consume visually and mentally: television, movies, books, posters, paintings, graffiti, etc.
Companies are constantly barraging us with advertising in our society, and kids need to become critical consumers so they don't fall for every marketing ploy they encounter. Therefore, it's incredibly important for us to teach our children how to question what they see and hear in the media.
So have you seen this commercial? How could you work critical analysis of advertising into your lesson plans? How could you take action to address the problematic elements of commercials? Let me know what you think!
Happy National Library Week! I want to pay a tribute to all of the libraries that have made a difference in my life over the years, so here we go:
I'll start with my elementary school library, where Mrs. Rosencranz -- our wonderful librarian who did great read-alouds and wore lots of perfume -- encouraged my love of non-fiction. It's also where I discovered my first Most Favoritest Book, Secrets of the Mummies by Joyce Milton -- I checked it out year after year after year, from Kindergarten all the way through fifth grade.
Complete with terrible black-and-white photographs
Next is Kendall Branch Library, part of the Houston Public Library system. (They just built a gorgeous, light-filled new home, which is fantastic because the building I grew up with was pretty dang ugly.) Anyway, this library saved me from boredom every summer and also provided me with great sources for school projects.
Old Kendall: gross.
New Kendall: yay!
Then comes the Davidson College Library, home of avocado green carpet and orange pleather chairs -- we were convinced that those colors helped us concentrate better. In this library, I discovered the wonders of interlibrary loan and researched and wrote a paper on The Canterbury Tales in twelve hours the day before it was due (got an A, boo ya). While studying for finals there one semester, a friend and I fell into giggle fits after considering prank-calling our philosophy professor and pretending to be the ghost of René Descartes. Also of note: random, mysterious trails of gummy bears. See, libraries are fun!
Then they ripped up our beloved puke green carpet (seen here in patches) and put down "tasteful" blue carpet :(
And finally, there's the Athens Regional Library System. Our main library is a cheerful place that draws people from all over the community, and they ALWAYS have what I need. Most recently, I checked out Sherman Alexie's Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, and I'm so grateful that I finally read it.
So that's my hopefully-not-too-boring account of the libraries that have made my world brighter.
What are some of your favorite library memories? Go visit your favorite biblioteca this week and hug a librarian! Also, consider volunteering or making a donation -- libraries do so much good for so many people, so let's give them our support!
It's not perfect, but it's a huge step forward -- and it's wonderful that districts now have the explicit support of the Board of Education. Hopefully, students will now have better access to courses on Mexican-American, African-American, Native American, and Asian-American Studies as electives.
As I've mentioned before, my youthful experiences with history focused pretty much -- with token exceptions -- on white European-American people and events, and, as you know, this trend continues today all over the country. These courses will ideally allow any kid, regardless of ethnic background, the opportunity to learn about how people from different ethnicities and cultures contributed to our nation's history. Because Mexican-American, African-American, Native American, and Asian-American history IS EVERYBODY'S HISTORY.
All in all, I'm excited to see what kinds of textbooks and materials the publishing companies submit to the Board of Education -- hoping for some great stuff!
Happy International Children's Book Day! I'm really digging the poster this year -- love the drawing style, the colors, and the cute, castle-headed monster :)
Every year, a different country hosts the celebration, and this year's host is Ireland! In honor of Irish children's literature, I'm throwing a spotlight on the work of Ciara Ní Dhuinn, who has created beautiful, multilingual picture books with text in Irish, English, French, and Spanish. How's that for international? Here are some selections from her books (all images via Elie's Books):
Is Maith Liom / I Like / J'aime / Me Gusta
Conas Tá Tú? / How Are You? / Comment Allez-Vous? / ¿Cómo Estás?
Tá mé i ngrá. (I'm in love.) (Special thanks to Google Translate.) Tell me: What are some of your favorite international children's books? Related Posts and Links: Seeking International Children's Literature
