Literacy Now

As much as children and adults look forward to the leisurely days of summer, many also eagerly anticipate the lower temperatures, the crisp air and frosty mornings as well as the pungent smell of apples and pumpkins being harvested that are associated with the autumn. As trees begin to dress themselves in golden and scarlet hues, their last hurrah before being shed for winter’s naked branches, fall beckons everyone to jump into a pile of freshly-raked leaves, to savor the taste and aroma of a marshmallow-filled cup of hot chocolate, and to trade summer linens for flannel sheets. This week’s reviews from members of the International Reading Association's Children’s Literature and Reading Special Interest Group feature books about the season’s turning, something that always happens around this time of year.

GRADES K-3

Duke, Kate. (2012). Ready for pumpkins. New York: Random House/Knopf.

Guinea pig Herky, short for Hercules, is the class pet of Miss MacGuffey’s first graders. He enjoys his lifestyle very much with regular food, water, shelter and lots of attention from all the children who love him. At Halloween he watches the students carve pumpkins, including one they call the Herk-o-Lantern. Herky observes the students and learns about seeds, and he notes how the students plant green beans the following spring. Herky warms to the idea of planting his own garden, and when he is taken home for the summer to the farm of the teacher’s father, he decides to plant the pumpkin seeds he stored over the winter. With his newly-found rabbit friend, Daisy, Herky plants the seeds and then impatiently awaits the plants’ appearance. As the summer weeks pass, Herky grows angry that his seeds aren’t sprouting. When he stamps his feet and digs up a seed to see what is happening, Daisy explains that gardens take a long time to grow. They spend the summer playing games and singing songs. When it is time to go back to school, the pumpkins have still not appeared. The book ends with the teacher’s father bringing a basket of pumpkins to school later in the fall, to Herky’s delight--although Mr. MacGuffey has no idea who planted these surprise pumpkins. Readers may want to visit the author’s website for more background. Teachers may want to choose from a plethora of pumpkin plans at A to Z for Teachers. They will find even more pumpkin ideas at The Virtual Vine website.

- Karen Hildebrand, Ohio Library and Reading Consultant

Enslow, Brian. (2012). Fall colors. Berkeley Heights, NJ: Enslow.

This nonfiction title for beginning readers introduces colors that are especially noticeable during the autumn season. The book opens with a note to parents and teachers discussing how this text introduces concepts and explains that there is an educator’s guide available at www.enslow.com. Each full-page spread contains a colorful photograph depicting an autumn object with two words. For example, one page shows an up close photograph of a maple leaf with its veins and stem. On the opposite page these simple words are included, “yellow leaf” (p. 11). This book is part of a series titled All about Colors of the Seasons. These titles are perfect for children who are learning the basics of reading: how to point to each word as they read, how the illustrations match the words and that reading has to make sense. In addition, this book contains a table of contents, index, websites and more information for early readers interested in learning more about the fall season.

- Deanna Day, Washington State University Vancouver

Farrar, Sid. (2012). The year comes round: Haiku through the seasons. Illus. by Ilse Plume. New York: Albert Whitman.

This first-time author states, “The haiku in this book depict little vignettes in the natural world to describe these changes across the seasons and months of the year” (p. 28). Each double-page spread displays one haiku and an illustration of the season.  The book begins with winter, depicting Jack Frost and a snowman and then continuing through the changing seasons, ending with a bear getting ready to enter his winter den. The author has included information at the end of the book explaining the pattern used in writing haiku and also the cycle of life depicted within each season of the year. The Caldecott award-winning illustrator has created the companion artwork for each haiku that complements each season and the emotion evoked in the poetry. Teachers might like to try “Haiku Starter” from ReadWriteThink.

- Karen Hildebrand, Ohio Library and Reading Consultant

Flatt, Lizann. (2012). Counting on fall. Illus. by Ashley Barron. Toronto, Canada: Owlkids Books Inc.

Teachers in search of an interactive math book that serves multiple purposes will enjoy this title. Not only does it focus on elementary mathematics concepts such as counting, estimating, adding, and subtracting, but it also enfolds them in information on the fall season and animals, making it a perfect choice to build text sets and unit plans centered on those topics. Each time readers return to the book, they will perfect their elementary math skills. Readers will be captivated by the text’s playful but challenging and evocative words with activity questions in sidebars. Inviting both aesthetic and efferent reading, the book presents a parade of animals from many ecosystems. Endangered animals such as humpback whales, picas, pronghorn antelopes, Canada geese, brown bats, and black bears are shown busily engaged in a way that invites readers to participate. The pictures are made with layered, tactile collage art, which presents flora and fauna creatively and in their native habitats in eye-catching and bright-colored spreads. A great addition to any classroom or home library, this book would be useful in challenging readers across curriculum areas in an engaging manner.

- Rani Iyer, Washington State University Pullman

Franklin, Linda Campbell. (2012). Into the pumpkin. Atglen, PA: Schiffer Pub.

The witch has invited you to take a “peek through the pumpkin” (unpaged) and join all the Halloween regulars at the festivities. Using beautiful and ethereal illustrations, all the eerie characters found on Halloween are busy with the preparations for the party. What should they wear? Costumes or just go as themselves? Witches are laboring over the cauldron, spiders are on websites, skeletons are dancing, and even more preparation and activity bustles as party time approaches. Told in rhyming text, this delightfully scary, but not too scary, picture book will make a great read aloud for primary students. Teachers can have a little fun with their electronic white boards and carve a virtual pumpkin with their students at www.theoworlds.com/halloween or at www.abcya.com/pumpkin_carving.htm, or enjoy Halloween fun and enter the haunted house at the Ben and Jerry’s website.

- Karen Hildebrand, Ohio Library and Reading Consultant

Goldstone, Bruce. (2012). Awesome autumn. New York: Henry Holt.

This nonfiction look at fall contains just about every fact and aspect of autumn that a classroom teacher could need. Designed in an oversize format and illustrated with collage pictures and colorful photographs, the book features autumnal features including the wide variety of temperature changes, fall sports, food ripening and harvesting, explanations of trees changing color and losing their leaves, animal migrations, and fall holidays such as Halloween and Thanksgiving. If that’s not enough, there’s even more. This colorful, comprehensive book will serve as an interesting read for primary students as teachers make Common Core social studies and science connections. Teachers might like to use the slide show at the publisher’s website or visit the author’s website or try a lesson place called “Shhh!” Bear’s Sleeping: Learning about Nonfiction and Fiction Using Read Alouds” on ReadWriteThink.

- Karen Hildebrand, Ohio Library and Reading Consultant

Greene, Stephanie. (2012). Princess Posey and the monster stew. Illus. by Stephanie Roth Sisson. New York: Penguin/G. P. Putnam’s Sons.

Six-year-old Posey is a little nervous about Halloween this year because the other students in her first grade class say that only babies carry flashlights. In addition, her teacher, Miss Lee, has announced they will be making “monster stew” (unpaged) for Halloween this year, and Posey is not looking forward to that either. However, when she gets home and pulls her tutu out and transforms herself into Princess Posey, she finds a little bit of courage, and she knows she can face any challenge. Posey’s family supports her brave image (and tutu) and help her face her fears to enjoy trick or treat night in her princess costume. Teachers might enjoy this detailed activity guide at the Debbie Gonzales’ website.

- Karen Hildebrand, Ohio Library and Reading Consultant

Latta, Sara L. (2012). Why is it fall? Berkely Heights, NJ: Enslow.

This fun book makes science and weather easy to learn. Full-page photographs along with simple text describe when fall begins, why leaves change colors, what happens to plants in the fall, and what animals do in the fall, concluding with what people do in the fall. One beginning illustration shows how Earth moves around the sun in one year and how it tilts as it goes around. The text then explains, “The tilt causes more or less sunlight to fall on different parts of Earth” (p. 6). In addition, the book contains headings and text boxes. The book also has a science experiment, table of contents, words to know and index. Primary teachers will find this picture book a perfect addition to their classroom library.

- Deanna Day, Washington State University Vancouver

McNamara, Margaret. (2012). Apples A to Z. Illus. by Jake Parker. New York: Scholastic.

Fox, Bear, and several other forest friends take young readers through the alphabet as they learn about everything related to apples. Each letter of the alphabet represents some aspect of apples, from the deciduous trees that they are, to “G”rafting new breeds, to “V” for the numerous varieties of apple. Comic illustrations make this fact-filled book an enjoyable look at information about apples. The end of the book shares information about Johnny Appleseed, jokes, science and fun facts. Teachers will want to check out this lesson idea entitled “Delicious, Tasty, Yummy: Enriching Writing with Adjectives and Synonyms” at ReadWriteThink.

- Karen Hildebrand, Ohio Library and Reading Consultant

Roode, Daniel. (2011). Little Bea and the snowy day. New York: HarperCollins/Greenwillow.

A good read aloud for young readers as the wintery months approach, this title celebrates in simple fashion all the delights of colder weather. Very young readers will enjoy reading the simple story of Little Bea, a bee who spends a day outdoors having fun in the snow with her friends. Since Bea and her friends busily skate, make angels in the snow, and throw snow balls at each other, children who love that time of the year will be able to relate and smile at the idea of Little Bea being covered in the snow and later nursing a mug filled with warm cocoa. Many of the words used are fun to say and describe exactly how Little Bea feels in the frosty air as she says, "Brrrrr" (unpaged) when cold air hits her face and "Wheeee!" (unpaged) as she flies through the snow. The ending will prompt smiles when Little Bea and her friends decide it’s time to make a new friend, and then they literally make one--a snowman, that is. The color-drenched illustrations were created with Adobe Illustrator and Adobe Photoshop.

- Barbara A. Ward, Washington State University Pullman

Rubin, Adam. (2012). Those darn squirrels fly south. Illus. by Daniel Salmieri. Boston/New York: Clarion Books.

As fall arrives and the leaves begin to fall from the trees, many of the local birds start heading south. Old Man Fookwire is sad to see them go since he loves watching their antics and painting them as they hang out in his backyard. But he’s not the only one who hates to see them go. Those pesky squirrels who seem to plague Fookwire want to know where exactly those birds are heading. They have somehow managed to craft various flying machines that enable them to follow the birds in order to follow those birds. Missing the birds--and, secretly, the squirrels too--Old Man Fookwire decides to climb in his hardly-used car and follow them too. Once he reaches their sunny destination, he is enchanted by the warm climate and relaxed atmosphere, not to mention the exotic birds and beach-front locale. It’s all too much for him, though, and all vacations must come to an end.  Eventually, he returns home with the squirrels in charge of the car and the driving. Readers are liable to laugh loudly at the illustration of the cranky old man with squirrels wrapped all around him, even hiding in his pants, draped on top of his head, and clutching his legs in welcome. Even the grumpiest reader will be unable to resist this sweet story about a surprising friendship and the watercolor, gouache, and colored pencil illustrations that accompany it. After all, everyone needs a break from work, and a vacation with those darn squirrels might just be the ticket to relaxation.

- Barbara A. Ward, Washington State University Pullman

Stead, Philip C. (2012). Bear has a story to tell. Illus. by Erin E. Stead. New York: Roaring Brook Press.

As leaves begin to fall from the branches of trees and the autumn comes to an end right before winter sets in, Bear has a story to tell. He knows he doesn’t have much time since so many of his friends are leaving, and he, too, will need to find a den for the duration of the wintery months. But every time he approaches someone, he is dismissed. As much as they’d like to make time for Bear’s story, Mouse, Duck, and Frog are busily preparing for winter, and they simply can’t stop for him. In fact, Mole is already fast asleep. Since no one has time for his story, and a story always needs an audience, Bear resolves to remember to share his story when spring returns. But the winter months are long, and he can’t remember what story he wanted to tell once he awakens. After several unsuccessful attempts, he must rely on his friends, each of whom makes a contribution to the story’s content. Readers will be engaged by the simple but precise text and the illustrations that show how tired Bear is as he wanders through the forest in search of a listener. Despite his own preoccupation, he still manages to help his animal friends, even lifting a paw into the air to see what direction the wind is blowing as Duck prepares to fly away. The rapidly-diminishing fall foliage, the falling snowflakes, and then the greens of spring on the book's pages show the passage of time.

- Barbara A. Ward, Washington State University Pullman

GRADES 3-5

Jenkins, Emily. (2012). Invisible Inklings: Dangerous pumpkins. Illus. by Harry Bliss. New York: HarperCollins/Balzer + Bray.

This is the second book in the new middle grade series about Hank Wolowitz and his invisible bandapat friend, Inkling. In this latest adventure, fourth-grader Hank has lost his best friend when he moved away. Now there is no one to go trick or treating with and because of the strange way he has been acting due to his invisible friend Inkling, Hank is lonely. In addition, Inkling has cultivated a fondness for the taste of pumpkins. In fact, he likes pumpkins so much that he even eats Hank’s sister Nadia’s hand-carved pumpkin art projects, leaving Hank to take the blame. Trying to keep Inkling fed, Hank is going broke from his meager earnings at the family’s ice cream store. From imaginary friends to the trials and triumphs of real friendships, this early chapter book provides a story with which intermediate age kids will identify. Teachers may enjoy having an inside view of the book at the publisher’s website. For a fun way to introduce an Inkling watch and listen to the author talking to an inkling, teachers may want to take a look at the author's website. Also see In Other Words: Emily Jenkins (Invisible Inkling series) Finds Her Protagonist on the Engage blog.

- Karen Hildebrand, Ohio Library and Reading Consultant

These reviews are submitted by members of the International Reading Association's Children's Literature and Reading Special Interest Group (CL/R SIG) and are published weekly on Reading Today Online. 

The International Reading Association partners with the National Council of Teachers of English and Verizon Thinkfinity to produce ReadWriteThink.org, a website devoted to providing literacy instruction and interactive resources for grades K–12.

The Weird series (Free Spirit Publishing)
Written by Erin Frankel and illustrated by Paula Heaphy
Grades 1 through 5

The Weird series introduces readers to Luisa, Jayla, and Sam—three girls intertwined in a bullying experience. Each story is told from their own viewpoint—the victim, the bystander, and the bully. In the first book, WEIRD!, we meet Luisa who is the target of the bullying. She endures relentless putdowns aimed at her unique style and personality. This causes her to emotionally suffer and become confused as to why this is happening and how to make it stop. She finally reveals the truth of what is going on to her mother who helps her reclaim her former self-confidence.

In the second book, DARE!, we are introduced to Jayla the bystander of the bully problem. In the beginning, Jayla does nothing to stop Luisa being tormented because she is afraid of the bully. Readers discover Jayla was also once a victim of the girl's taunts. Author Erin Frankel shows us the danger of becoming a bystander in the second book when Jayla joins in the bullying because she feels intimidated and pressured into doing so. One day Jayla dares herself to take a stand and have courage to fight this problem. She learns to cope with her past fears by befriending Luisa and standing up for her.

In the concluding book of the series, TOUGH!, we meet Sam who has been behind all of the bullying. But readers also discover what is underneath all of the mean behavior. Sam is exposed to television programs depicting bullying behavior, bullied by her brother at home, and has also been picked on at school. The only way she feels she can regain control is by hurting others and acting tough to cover up her own secret pain. Sam finally loses her bullying ways when a teacher intervenes and offers to help. Her anger and desire to lash out at others subsides when she begins to use kindness and compassion.

The illustrations in this story will definitely spur discussion. It is illustrated in black and white except for the characters in each book who are in color. Two of the same pages overlap and appear in each book. Each book in the series also includes an activity guide and helpful information for adults. The Weird! series is a powerful teaching tool about bullying. It's insightful, creative, and will touch students' hearts and minds and empower them to stop bullying.

Cross-curricular connections: Character Education, Writing, Art, Language Arts

Ideas for Classroom Use:

Character Study through Illustrations

Lead a discussion around the use of color in the books. Divide the class into three groups and give them each a different book to study. Allow them to take notes on their observations by using sticky notes. On a white board, write the names of each different book and allow each group to put all of their observations under each title. Students can also take it a step further and try to interpret why they feel color was used this way.

Some observations students should look for and discussion points:

• The story is black and white except for the main characters.
• The main characters are in color.
• Luisa's colors fade as the bullying continues.
• Jayla's colors fade as she stands by silently watching Luisa being bullied and joins in on the bullying.
• Luisa's polka dots float away, Jayla's stars fade, and Sam wears hearts under a hoodie.
• Luisa's polka dots come back bigger and brighter than ever.
• Jayla's stars come back in full color.
• Sam stops hiding behind her hooded sweatshirt and we see her hearts as we see her kindness begin to grow.

Insightful questions:

• What color do you feel when you are happy?
• What color do you feel when you are bullied or when you see someone else being bullied?
• What happens to your color when you feel powerless?
• What happens when you are empowered?
• How can you protect your color?
• How can you protect other people's colors?

As a closing activity for this lesson, have students write and illustrate their own story about bullying from their point of view. Were they the victim, bystander, or maybe even the bully? Encourage students to use color in a similar fashion as it was in the Weird! series to represent their power and how they overcame their problem. Allow students to share their stories with the classroom community. For younger students, allow them to do a drawing using colors that make them feel courageous, confident, and kind.

Additional Resources and Activities:

PACER
This website contains information from the creators of National Bullying Prevention Month and The National Center for Bullying Prevention that helps promote awareness and teach effective ways to respond to bullying.
Kids’ site: www.pacerkidsagainstbullying.org
Teen site: www.pacerteensagainstbullying.org

NEA Bully Free Schools
This website provides information on NEA’s bullying prevention campaign. There are also tips and resources to help you address the issue of bullying in your classroom.

Choose Kind
This is a blog inspired by R.J. Palacio’s WONDER. It contains links to anti-bullying resources and opportunities to use the novel in conjunction with efforts to get your students to “choose kindness.”

Teaching Tolerance
This website by the Southern Poverty Law Center offers a documentary, classroom activities, and teaching kits that promote tolerance.

The Trevor Project
This website is a companion to the Trevor Lifeline, a 24-hour, national crisis and suicide prevention lifeline for gay and questioning teens. The site offers teacher resources, tips, and training. The number for the hotline is 1-866-4-U-Trevor.

Bully Free Program
This website offers a range of tips for dealing with bullying for teachers, students, and parents.

Claim Your Rights
The Claim Your Rights program is designed to help everyone understand that they have the right to safer schools. This resource helps students, parents, and teachers report incidences of bullying, particularly when schools deny that bullying exists.

Roxanne Davidson has been working as an elementary school counselor since obtaining her Master's Degree in Education in 2005. Bibliotherapy has always been a passion of hers as she has witnessed the healing power of books in her students' lives. She has made it her mission to help teachers, children, and parents find contemporary books to help them address the many issues kids currently deal with in the classroom and at home. This inspired her to start the popular book review blog, Books That Heal Kids. Besides writing for her blog she enjoys running, reading and spending time with her husband and daughter.

© 2012 Roxanne Davidson. Please do not reproduce in any form, electronic or otherwise.

by Judith Hayn

Hogan, Edward. Daylight Saving. Somerville, MA: Candlewick, 2012.

Rupp, Rebecca. After Eli. Somerville, MA: Candlewick, 2012.

Two teen boys both named Daniel struggle with loss, and two different stories chronicle the journeys. Daniel Lever is an overweight, troubled lad whose Dad forces him on a week long holiday at Leisure World. Daniel’s mother has left them for another man, and the son is convinced he caused the break-up when he reported seeing her with the family doctor. His depression has led to bursts of anger and defiance at home and school while Dad drinks himself into a nightly stupor. At the resort, Daniel meets Lexi, a girl whose inexplicable injuries worsen at each encounter as her watch ticks backward. Is she real or just another hallucination so Daniel can hide his self-hatred? The climax occurs as Daylight Saving adds another hour; the tension and sense of doom are almost visceral as the author leads us to redemption for Daniel and his parents.

Daniel Anderson’s older brother Eli was killed in Iraq, and his death has ripped the family apart. His mother wallows in grief, seldom leaving the house while his dad demands more and more of Danny to replicate the success of the heroic son who is gone. Danny’s old life no longer makes much sense to him either; he compiles a Book of the Dead to force himself to look at others who died without much cause. He falls for a neighbor girl who is in town for the summer and befriends the high school dork Walter. His brief infatuation and new relationships threaten his status with the popular crowd at school, but somehow he moves on—aided by memories of Eli’s tutoring him in the art of living and surviving.

Both books, although occurring in two different locations (Great Britain and the United States), are tributes to the resiliency of the human heart when faced with unbearable hurt.

Dr. Judith A. Hayn is an associate professor at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock.

This article is part of a series from the Special Interest Group Network on Adolescent Literature (SIGNAL).

by Dana Grisham and Jill Castek

Results of the 2011 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) computer-based writing assessment, administered to students in grades 8 and 12 throughout the United States, are now available. The NAEP assessments have occurred since 1969 and provide a reliable snapshot of educational progress in the U.S.

The 2011 writing assessment is the first one that has used technology as part of the assessment. Because of this, new scales and achievement levels were established, which means the findings cannot be directly compared to past years’ results. Preliminary findings suggest however that students in 8th and 12th grades have a similar pattern of achievement as revealed in the past by pencil and paper tests. At both 8th and 12th grades, only about 24% of students assessed scored at the “proficient” level. About half the students scored at the “basic” achievement level.

A Closer Look at the NAEP Writing Assessment

The types of writing required of students on the NAEP assessment aligns with the Common Core State Standards and stresses the reinforcement of three writing capacities: persuasion, explanation, and conveying an experience. Scores on the NAEP assessment were based on six performance ratings and scored as “first drafts” rather than polished writing samples. The full set of ratings and results may be found in the report.

Writing prompts were displayed on a computer screen divided vertically like the pages of a book (see figure 1). The left half contained the prompt with specific types of multimedia, including an audio prompt at 8th grade and a video prompt at the 12th grade. For 12th graders the technology was a little more sophisticated, as the prompt included video as well as audio. Adhering to the principles of Universal Design for Learning, there were a number of digital tools that students could elect to use as they word-processed their response. Students who used the tools available (cut/paste, text-to-speech, spell check, thesaurus) scored higher than students who did not use these tools.

Figure 1. The 8th grade writing prompt included an audio file (on the left). On the right, students word processed their responses. Digital enhancements included the text-to-speech function, spell check features, and copy and paste, and thesaurus).

Implications

For all educators, there is an urgent need to embrace technological tools for communication and composition in our homes and schools. Questionnaires were given to teachers of 8th grade students completing the NAEP writing assessment. The survey asked how frequently they had students using computers to write and revise drafts.Only 44% reported using technology regularly to further writing instruction. Students of these teachers scored higher than those whose teachers did not use technology as often in writing instruction. Both 8th and 12th grade students who said they used a computer more frequently to edit their writing scored higher than students who did not.

Luckily, there are an increasing number of resources for learning about and using technological tools in the classroom. See for example, the Literacy Beat blog, Transforming writing instruction in the Digital Age: Techniques for Grades 5-12, and The Digital Writing Workshop.

Recommendations

Given the results of the NAEP writing assessment, we have ventured to suggest some recommendations for educators.

Teachers need to:

1. Find ways to incorporate technology into their classrooms with the tools (however limited) that they already have.

2. Argue on behalf of technology, using the research evidence at hand—such as the 2011 NAEP Writing Assessment outcomes.

3. Seek workshops and professional development opportunities to develop their own expertise in technology use.

Administrators need to:

1. Support teachers’ use of technology in the classroom.

2. Argue at the district level on behalf of technology use.

3. Seek workshops and professional development opportunities for themselves and their teaching staff.

Teacher Educators need to:

1. Work collaboratively within the university to distribute technological use across the teacher preparation programs instead of relying on  “Ed Tech” courses.

2. Seek workshops on technology use for themselves.

3. Where possible, seek student teaching placements for teacher candidates where technology is being used productively.

Dr. Dana L. Grisham (dana.grisham@gmail.com) is Certified Core Adjunct Faculty of National University, is noted for her research on teaching, particularly the intersection of literacy and technology. Jill Castek (jill.castek@gmail.com) is a Research Assistant Professor at Portland State University working with the Literacy, Language, and Technology Research Group.

This article is part of a series from the International Reading Association Technology in Literacy Education Special Interest Group (TILE-SIG).

I have problems with authority. Which is a pretty funny thing for an author to admit.

I learned this about myself while I was writing IVY AND BEAN MAKE THE RULES, the latest installment in the Ivy and Bean series. It was a very difficult book for me to write, not because of the subject, which is childhood camp, or the storyline, which is about my girls, Ivy and Bean, setting up their own camp, but because—as I discovered—I am not mature enough to write a book about camp that doesn’t advocate total mayhem.

It’s not rules that bother me. I adore rules. Rules of punctuation—love those! Rules of etiquette? Great! I am a big fan of rules of the road (How many miles per hour when crossing a railroad track? Fifteen!) and safety rules (Mostly). As a parent, I have rules galore, and as a child, I followed my parents’ rules on many, many occasions.

What put me in a snit are rules dressed up as fun. Rules that organize, militate, and regiment fun, particularly kids’ fun, cause me to behave very badly. They always have. This is an enormous character flaw, because everyone knows that you can’t have a good game without rules. Where would baseball be without the Infield Fly Rule? Okay, that’s a bad example because I have no idea where baseball would be without the Infield Fly Rule.

Let’s take card games, let’s take Scrabble, let’s take Monopoly. I can’t stand any of them. I was one of those kids who knocked over the board in the middle of the game because I couldn’t bear it any more. I used to rob the bank in Monopoly so the game would just END already. Nowhere do rules and fun coincide more oxymoronically than at camp. Every camp, from the three-weeks-of-fresh-air-and-dirt camps of my youth to the five-day, four-hundred-dollar Gourmet Groupies camps of today bill themselves as big fun. Maybe educational, but also fun. Fun, fun, fun! More fun than a barrel of monkeys! Just look at all the smiling kids in the brochure! You never saw so much fun in your life!

And yet, once the kids actually get to the camp, there are lots and lots of rules. There are safety rules and instructions about how to do things. Usually, there are lots of group activities and everyone has to do them, plus tasks and clean-up, not to mention rousing songs that you’d better learn or you won’t get to participate.

And I am inside my tent, plotting a revolution.

Actually, I am not, because I never went to camp. (Also, I would hate a revolution. So noisy.)

I never went to camp because, no matter what the grownups said, I knew that if I went, they’d make me follow rules. They’d make me join. They’d make me sing. They might even make me play games. I’d be part of the gang, part of the team, part of the big, happy family. Yuck.

I refused. And what kind of wild, ungoverned behavior did I engage in while everyone else was in camp? I read. I read and read and read. Every once in a while, my mom would take the book out of my hand and tell me I had to run around the block, but that, thankfully, was rare.

Reading, to me, was—and is—perfect freedom. Sure, there are a few rules: left to right, and you’ll probably get more out of it if you hold the book right side up. I can’t think of anything else. Once you know how to read, you don’t need an adult’s help to do it. You don’t have to negotiate with anyone. You get to find out stuff on your own. You get to have your own experience. You decide when to do it and when to stop doing it. It’s not competitive. There’s no show at the end. It is absolutely unlike camp.

This is why I am an advocate of Free Reading, Drop Everything and Read, Sustained, Silent Reading, whatever you want to call it. I call it reading. More than anything else, I want reading to be a rule-free zone for kids. In my perfect world, kids would be able to read and run. They’d be able to read any book, at any lexile level, on any subject (okay, almost any subject) they desired. There would be no tests, no notes, no questions, no reading logs, and no response journals, nothing at all that regulated, militated, or organized the experience for them. Without all these mediations and interruptions, maybe reading would regain its status as a freedom, rather than a task, for kids.

I bet you’re asking yourself why, if I am a reading liberationist, did I write a book about camp? Why, you ask, didn’t I write a book about reading? Well, I did. Of course, a book in which nobody does anything but read is going to be a tad dull, so I transplanted the act of interpretation, which is the essence of reading, to the subject of camp. Bean and Ivy, bless them, are giving their free-verse rendition of the idea of camp, with accompanying good times. Their version, Camp Flaming Arrow, is their reading of “camp,” and their reading of “camp rules” is the most glorious possible: none at all.

Obviously, there are lots and lots of kids who have a great time at camp. They like being part of the gang, on the team, one big happy family. Ivy and Bean, being reasonable human beings, don’t want to change those kids. They don’t want to rain on anyone’s parade. They want to live and let live. That is the one rule they follow at their camp, and it’s the one that’s the hardest for all of us grownups to learn.

Maybe there should be a camp for that.

Annie Barrows is the author of the Ivy and Bean children’s series, which has sold over 2 million copies, as well as of THE MAGIC HALF. She is also the co-author, with her aunt, Mary Ann Shaffer, of THE GUERNSEY LITERARY AND POTATO PEEL PIE SOCIETY.

© 2012 Annie Barrows. Photo: Annie Frantzeskos. Please do not reproduce in any form, electronic or otherwise.