It's Kind of a Funny Story by Ned Vizzini

Vizzini, N. (2006). It's kind of a funny story. New York: Miramax Books/Hyperion Books For Children.

Craig Gilner makes getting into the exclusive Executive Pre-Professional High School his life’s work, but once he is accepted and actually begins high school, he finds coping with the pressures of life and school increasingly difficult.  Medication and counseling don’t seem to be helping, and eventually Craig’s desire to commit suicide lands him in the psychiatric ward of a hospital where he encounters others struggling with their own problems and begins to deal with the anxiety and depression from which he is suffering.

            

Craig is a likeable and authentic character and narrator.  Readers will identify with his frankness and openness as he describes the events leading up to his hospitalization.  The subject matter is handled with sensitivity but also warmth and humor.  Even teens who have not struggled with depression will understand and empathize with the scenarios and angst-ridden situations that are a teenage rite of passage.

The novel is loosely based on the author’s experiences with depression and its treatment, which does add believability to the story overall.  However, aspects of Craig’s stay in the psychiatric hospital may come across as somewhat contrived with Craig’s romantic entanglements as well as poker games having as much to do with his recovery as the work of the doctors.  Early in the novel, Craig states that he is looking for a mental shift that will take away his anxiety and allow him to resume more normal habits, and in the end, his recovery may seem to some readers to have been a bit too easy. Despite these potential criticisms, the honesty and wit of the novel will likely charm many teen readers especially those who can find themselves identifying with Craig emotional journey.

You Read to Me, I'll Read to You by Mary Ann Hoberman

Hoberman, Mary Ann. 2004. You read to me, I'll read to you: very short fairy tales to read together (in which wolves are tamed, trolls are transformed, and peas are triumphant). Ill. by Michael Emberley.  New York: Little, Brown. ISBN 978-0316207447

Part of a series of books by Hoberman that feature poems written to be performed by two readers, this volume features poems based on familiar fairy tales.  Short lines, rhyme, and rhythm are an important to each poem.  The illustrations by Emberley add humor and support to the text.  

The volume contains a table of contents, with each poem titled with the name of the fairy tale.  An author's note discussing the purpose and origin of the concept provides guidance for the performance of the poetry.

Featured poem:

The Three Little Pigs

I'm Big Bad Wolf.

I'm Little Pig.

You're very small.

You're very big.
Bug now I've got you
In my pot.

The water's getting

Very hot.

I'll cook you up
And make a stew.

Why, that's an awful

Thing to do.

Now that's a silly
Thing to say.
You ate my brother
Yesterday.

Why, so I did!

I had forgot.

(This water's getting 

Really hot.)

And on the day before
It's you
Who ate my other
Brother, too.

Did I do that?

That wasn't nice.

(Could you put in 

A little ice?)

They built their houses
In the town.
You huffed and puffed
And blew them down.

Well, they were made

Of straw and sticks

While yours is made

Of good strong bricks.

First I built
My house of bricks,
And then I fooled you
With my tricks.

And now you've got me

In your pot.

This water's really

Really hot!

Say you're sorry
Loud and clear.

I'm sorry.  Let me

Out of here!

Louder!  Clearer!
Give a shout!

I'M SORRY, PIG!

NOW LET ME OUT!

Now do you promise
To be nice?

I promise Pig.

Then here's some ice.
Sit down and cool
Yourself a bit.
I'll read you something
While you sit.

What will you read?

A tale that's true.
A tale about
Both me and you.

Can I read, too?

If you know how.

Of course I do.

Then let's start now.

(Unison)

We'll read Three Little Pigs

Right through

You'll read to me.

I'll read to you.

Since the poem is meant to be performed by two people, I would enlist a second reader and rehearse the poem before presenting to students.  Because the animals are the speakers of the poem, I would use a pig and a wolf puppet to present the poem.

After modeling a performance of the style of poetry contained in the book, I would ask students to team up and present some of the  poems contained within.  Providing costumes, puppets, or props can allow students to create unique performance experiences.  

Button Up! by Alice Schertle

Schertle, Alice. 2009. Button up!: wrinkled rhymes. Ill. by Petra Mathers.  New York: Harcourt Children's Books/ Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. ISBN 9780152050504

Winner of the 2010 Lee Bennett Hopkins Poetry Award and multiple starred reviews from journals, Button Up! is a collection of poems told from the perspective of articles of clothing that are surprisingly articulate and witty.  The illustrations by Mathers depict animal characters as the clothing owners and add detail and humor to Schertle's verses.

All of the poems use rhyme and a strong rhythm that make the poems interesting to read aloud.  Repetition and refrain are also frequently employed in the collection.  The language is appealing, full of enthusiasm and humor.  Even when the articles of clothing take their jobs seriously, the whimsy involved in the concept, illustrations, and poetic language make these poems uniformly entertaining and engaging.

Each poem is titled with the owner's name and the article of clothing and is listed in a table of contents to provide access points into the text.  Each poem gets a two-page spread for poem text and illustrations.

Featured poem:

Joshua's Jammies

We are the jammies that Joshua wears,

not jammies for penguins,

not jammies for bears,

not jammies for tigers with knots in their tails,

not jammies for chickens,

not jammies for whales,

not jammies for elephants going upstairs,

we are the jammies that Joshua wears.

We don't fit iguanas,

we're not for the gnu,

we won't suit the llamas

(they never wear blue).

Hippopotamus can't get us over his head.

We're JOSHUA's jammies.  We're going to bed.

Although the illustrations add such an interesting element to the poem, I would share this poem without showing the illustration to the students.  After reading the poem several times and possibly provided a copy of the text, I would ask students to illustrate this poem.  After students have envisioned their own drawings for the poem, I will share Mather's pictures and compare them to the student's works.  We will discuss how the illustrations affect the meaning of the poem.

The President's Stuck in the Bathtub: Poems about the Presidents by Susan Katz

Katz, Susan. 2012. The president's stuck in the bathtub: poems about the presidents. Ill. by Robert Neubecker. Boston: Clarion Books. ISBN 9780547182216

In forty-three poems, each President of the United States is acknowledged and celebrated for some distinct aspect of his life or presidency.  Although Grover Cleveland is counted as two Presidents because of his nonconsecutive term, he only gets one poem here.  Katz focuses on the more whimsical and lighthearted stories and characteristics of the nation's leaders and provides a few sentences accompanying each poem that give more information on the poem's topic.  The simple cartoonish illustrations by Neubecker add to the humor and playfulness of the poems.

Nearly all of the poems contain some sort of rhyme and occasional approximate rhyme.  Unusual word choices and figurative language also add to the impact of the poems.  One poem particularly that describes Warren G. Harding's alliterative oratory employs impressive alliteration very effectively.  Lincoln's poem, about his trademark stovepipe hat, is a concrete poem with the text set in the shape of the hat.

Many of the poems are narratives describing a particular event.  As this style of poetry has been found to be popular with students, this feature will make the overall book more appealing to young readers.  The variety of topics from Presidential nicknames, pets, and physical oddities to the more noteworthy achievements grants readers a glimpse into the lives of men who have played a fascinating part in American history.  The poems are informative in presenting an overall picture of the lives of the Presidents but also underline the humanity of the larger-than-life characters, allowing readers to find common ground with these famous men.

The poems are presented in chronological order by President, and Katz has maintained a consistent tone throughout, informing, sparking interest, and amusing through vivid and engaging language and careful selection of topics.  All the poems are new and original to this collection.  Each poem and accompanying facts and illustration get their own page or spread.  The table of contents provides access points by poem name as well as by President, and the book ends with a list of additional information about the Presidents including birth and death dates, a quotation, nickname, and one distinctive fact.

Featured poem:

Overdue Mail (Zachary Taylor, 1849-50)

The Whigs have nominated you

for president,

the letter sent

to Zachary Taylor said.

but the Whigs

mailed it

                  postage due.

Taylor didn't want to spend

ten cents,

so he refused that mail,

dispatched it

back to the dead

letter office.

                  There it sat.

After waiting 

for quite some time,

the Whigs decided to invest

a dime

for a second letter,

postage paid.

                  That worked better.

Taylor happily agreed

and led the Whigs

to victory,

the only man in either camp

who won

the presidency

                  by a stamp.

Before or after reading the poem, I might discuss methods of long distance communication with students:  phone calls, text messages, video chat, email, snail mail, etc. and how the avenues available today were not always accessible.  As so much communication is done through more immediate electronic means, the idea of sending a letter and waiting for a response may be new or unusual to students.

This poem could easily fit into a lesson about the historical time period of Taylor's life or the method of mail delivery in 19th century America, but I would probably use it in a writing lesson as a jumping off point to have students write their own letters to the President, a fun way to learn about the form and parts of a letter, addressing an envelope, and most importantly, not forgetting the stamp.

A Funeral in the Bathroom

Dakos, Kalli. 2011. A funeral in the bathroom: and other school bathroom poems. Ill. by March Beech. Chicago, Ill: Albert Whitman & Co. ISBN 978-0-8075-2675-0

This collection contains poems all centered around an often-unsung center of life and learning--the school bathroom.  From the expected bathroom humor to the secrets of student life that take place away from teacher's observing eyes, the poems paint a comprehensive picture of school life.

The first poem in the collection "Bathroom Poems" describes a teacher who hangs poems on the walls and stalls of the bathroom causing the students to unintentionally read, experience, and learn poems encompassing a wide range of emotions and forms.  These bathroom poems are referenced in a few poems throughout the collection and seem to serve as the inspiration for the student-narrated poetry that fills the book.

Many of the poems employ rhyme or a strong rhythm which make them enjoyable to read or recite aloud.  The bathroom setting also lends itself to onomatopoeic words that describe the water-filled world.  Thankfully the poet limits most of the sense imagery in the poems to the sights and sounds rather than the smells of the bathroom.

At first glance, a book about bathrooms would appear to have all the slightly taboo appeal needed to draw in young readers.  One might expect the entire book to consist of potty humor and silliness, and while there are such poems in the collection, they are tempered by more serious or imaginative poems that depict the school bathroom as a place that is so much more than its humble purpose:  a place to hide, to seek comfort or solitude, a place to daydream or escape the mundane, a place to for students to be themselves.  Young readers will respond to the images and experiences depicted in these poems.

For the most part, the collection is formatted with one poem per page.  A few poems are long enough to take up an entire two-page spread, and a number of the shortest poems share a page.  No matter the length, each poem is illustrated by Mark Beech.  The simple but colorful drawings give as much life to the toilets and mirrors as to the students who appear in the poems.  Many of the illustrations help to further the humor of the poems but they are not crude, which is a fine line to walk given the subject of some of the poems.  Of course, not all the poems are humorous, but the Beech's drawings support the poems no matter the topic or meaning.  The table of contents at the beginning of the book provides access points to the forty-one poems that make up the collection.

With her background as an educator, it's not surprising that  Kalli Dakos finds inspiration for her poetry in the school setting.  In addition to this anthology, she has published more school related poems in If You're Not Here, Please Raise Your Hand and The Bug in Teacher's Coffee and Other School Poems as well as contributing poems to other school poetry anthologies such as There's No Place Like School:  Classroom Poems.  

Featured Poem:

Stuck in His Shoe

He didn't have
a single clue
when the toilet paper
stuck to his shoe.

And followed him
in a looooooooooong line
down the hall
past the office sign,

and right into
our spelling class,
where everyone

laughed

and laughed

and laughed!

The poem could be introduced by sharing a personal story of an embarrassing moment or by asking students to share embarrassing anecdotes.

Dead End in Norvelt by Jack Gantos

Bibliographic Information:
Print:
Gantos, Jack. 2011. Dead end in Norvelt. New York: Farrar Straus Giroux. ISBN  0374379939
Spoken Recording:
Gantos, Jack. 2011. Dead end in Norvelt. Read by the author. New York: Macmillan Audio. ISBN 1427213569

Plot:
In what is described as a melding of "the entirely true and the wildly fictional," the historical novel, set in Norvelt, Pennsylvania in 1962, tells the story of eleven-year-old Jack Gantos whose summer plans are derailed when he is grounded for life for disobeying his mother.  His mother does allow him out of the house to help their elderly neighbor Miss Volker, the town's nurse, medical examiner, and historian who writes obituaries for the last of the town's original residents as they die off.  Coping with frequent nose bleeds when he's nervous or scared, Jack has quite a bit about which to be nervous:  Hell's Angels with a grudge against the town, a best friend who's always trying to shock him with gruesome stories from her father's funeral parlor, a not-so-secret airplane that his father is rebuilding, houses that are vacating Norvelt to move to another town, and a string of mysterious deaths of the old ladies of the town.  

Analysis:
The quirky cast of characters that inhabit Norvelt add humor and conflict to the story from Jack's diminutive but fiery friend Bunny to crotchety, tricycle-riding, and ultimately sinister Mr. Spizz to opinionated, history-loving Miss Volker.  The feuds, friendships, and foibles of the town's inhabitants vividly depict small-town-America in a way that's engaging instead of patronizing.  The town itself, is as much a character in the story as it is setting, a former utopia that has fallen on difficult times, a place that is attempting to establish its identity just as much as Jack is.  Jack's love of history is something he shares with Miss Volker, and the pair of them manage to pass along a wealth of historical facts to the reader through their reading and obituary-writing, and as Jack learns his history, he is figuring out how the past creates the present which will create the future.  Death permeates the book, Bunny's funeral parlor, the obituaries, a dead deer, the dying town, even the looming death of Eleanor Roosevelt who founded the town.As the story progresses, Jack learns to deal with death and life with an authenticity that will resonate with young readers.

The author narrates the audio version of the book in an engaging way but without some of the polish that might be expected of a voice actor.  The vivid descriptions, absurdities, and drama are brought to life in the recording in an appealing way.

Awards & Reviews:
2012 Newbery Medal
2012 Scott O'Dell Award for Historical Fiction
Publisher's Weekly, starred review:  "wildly entertaining"
Horn Book, starred review:  "This is a richly layered semi-autobiographical tale, an ode to a time and place, to history and the power of reading."
Starred review, Kirkus Reviews:  "Characteristically provocative gothic comedy, with sublime undertones."

Connections:

• Explore the author website (jackgantos.com) for book discussion guide and author interviews
• Research historical Norvelt and other towns that were founded during the Depression as cooperative communities.
• Write obituaries for something lost, not necessarily a person, using the house and deer obits from the story.
• Other books by Jack Gantos:

Joey Pigza series published by Farrar Straus Giroux

Jack Henry story collections

Rotten Ralph picture books

The Pigeon Finds a Hot Dog by Mo Willems

Bibliography:

Willems, Mo. 2004. The pigeon finds a hot dog! New York: Hyperion Books for Children. ISBN 0786818697

Plot:

The pigeon, a beloved character from Willems’s earlier book, finds a hot dog, as the title suggests.  Duckling comes along and is immediately interested in the find.  Through uncluttered illustrations, the story unfolds, with Duckling’s questions showing an ever-increasing desire for the hot dog and Pigeon demonstrating a rising frustration.  In the end, the two share the hot dog, just as it seems the Duckling intended all along.

Analysis:

As a sequel to the Caldecott Honor Book Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus, this installment features the same emotive, wily Pigeon.  He may have met his match in the Duckling, whose sly questioning provokes but ultimately leaves the Pigeon with only once choice:  to share.  The simplicity of the crayon drawings, the pastel colors, and the lack of background scenery highlight these characters and complement the sparse dialogue that is the book’s only text.  Willems is able to convey much humor and expression despite the lack of complexity in both drawing and text. 

Awards & Reviews:
Publishers Weekly Best Book of the Year, Editor’s Pick, and Starred Review:  "Readers of all ages won't be able to resist miming the sly conversation in this satisfying sequel.”

School Library Journal review: “Willems's deceptively simple cartoon drawings convincingly portray his protagonist's emotional dilemma.”

Horn Book Magazine review:  “Maybe the pigeon's shtick isn't as original this time around, but he's such an engaging character that it's still a treat to see him again.”

Connections:

•  Use with preschool children in storytime or lesson about sharing.  Ask if they can predict what the Duckling’s idea is before the last page.  Eat hot dogs as a snack.
•  For older children, use in conjunction with comic strip collections and compare to Willems’s cartoonish characters.  Have children write their own comic panels.
• Allow children to visit www.mowillems.com or www.pigeonpresents.com to find out more about the author or to play Pigeon games.
• Other Pigeon books by Willems:

Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus ISBN 078681988X
Don’t Let the Pigeon Stay Up Late ISBN 0786837462
The Pigeon Wants a Puppy ISBN 1423109600
The Duckling Gets a Cookie ISBN 1423151283