There was an interesting short series of articles in the Washington Post Food and Home sections earlier this month on the possibility of transforming the South Lawn of the White House into a working farm, or at least creating a Victorian-style walled kitchen garden on the White House grounds. That's the South Lawn on the cover of the wonderful Our White House: Looking in, Looking Out (Candlewick, 2008), which features at least one related entry: "White House Colonial Kitchen Gardens" by Stephanie Loer, accompanied by S.D. Schindler's illustration of Thomas Jefferson taking a bite out of a tomato. I love the idea of growing food at the White House (I suspect kids would, too) and am pleased that there are presidential precedents for it: if you're interested, find out more at www.thewhofarm.org. And even more about the White House in the book and at its companion site. Welcome home!
Nonfiction Monday: A Second is a Hiccup
How long is a minute?
Sixty seconds to a minute,
Sixty hiccups, sixty hops.
Or if you sing just one small song
Chorus, verses, not too long
That's just enough to fill
A minute.
From A Second is a Hiccup: A Child's Book of Time by Hazel Hutchins, illustrated by Kady MacDonald Denton (First American edition, Arthur A. Levine/Scholastic, 2007). Hutchins describes measurements of time, from seconds to minutes, hours to days, weeks to months to years, in terms children will recognize from experience. Parents will be reminded of just how quickly that time passes. A delight to read aloud and to look at together.
[Kady MacDonald Denton's illustrations of children here are just as charming and expressive as her work in this year's A Visitor for Bear by Bonny Becker (Candlewick, 2008). According to her website, a sequel to that book (A Birthday for Bear) is now in progress. How long do we have to wait?]
Nonfiction Monday: Note by Note
If you took piano lessons as a child, or if you have a child who is taking them now, then you'll want to read Note by Note: A Celebration of the Piano Lesson by Tricia Tunstall (Simon and Schuster, 2008). I like Tunstall's description of music lessons: "weekly session[s] alone together, physically proximate, concentrating on the transfer of a skill that is complicated and difficult, often frustrating and frequently tedious, but that every now and then open suddenly and without warning into joy" (3). And the chapter on recitals is particularly, sometimes painfully, well-observed.
Recommended at Read Roger (see the comments for what readers remember from past piano lessons; Spinning Song, anyone?). I only wish there were something comparable for violin lessons--that's what Leo takes. Although Little Rat Makes Music by Monika Bang-Campbell (illustrated by Molly Bang; Harcourt, 2007) comes close, from a child's perspective. So that's what elementary violin playing looks like!
Nonfiction Monday: The wolves of Yellowstone
When the Wolves Returned: Restoring Nature's Balance in Yellowstone by Dorothy Hinshaw Patent; photographs by Dan Hartman and Cassie Hartman (Walker, 2008).
The Wolves Are Back by Jean Craighead George; paintings by Wendell Minor (Dutton, 2008).
These two nonfiction picture books cover the same topic in very different, equally effective ways. We have a soft spot for wolves; so we read both of them.
When the Wolves Returned is illustrated with historical and contemporary photographs of the park, its human visitors and its wild inhabitants. Patent's text is dual-level: one sentence in large type on the left hand page, a more detailed paragraph in smaller type on the right. Back matter includes a note about the photographs, a bibliography, and an index; there is also a diagram of "The Wolf Effect" that tests your memory of how the wolves' return has impacted other plants and animals at Yellowstone.
The Wolves Are Back is illustrated with Wendell Minor's realistic watercolor-and-gouache paintings. George's text tells the story of Yellowstone's wolves in the context of one wolf pup's adventures (not surprisingly; George is a novelist, author of the Newbery Award-winning Julie of the Wolves); it is more poetic, punctuated by the refrain "The wolves are back." There is no back matter apart from the artist's list of sources.
I think these two books--these two types of books--are complements rather than substitutes. I was interested in which type of book appealed most to which of my kids (I had some ideas, although they both generally prefer fiction to nonfiction read-alouds); but there was no comparison: the kids saw them as two different, equally appealing books.
[The Nonfiction Monday round-up is at Picture Book of the Day. Thanks, Anastasia!]