I CAN DRAW A WEEPASAUR AND OTHER DINOSAURS

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I CAN DRAW A WEEPASAUR AND OTHER DINOSAURS

Name: I CAN DRAW A WEEPASAUR AND OTHER DINOSAURS
Author: Eloise Greenfield
ISBN: 0-688-17634-8

by Eloise Greenfield & illustrated by Jan Spivey Gilchrist ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 31, 2001

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Frequent collaborators Gilchrist and Greenfield (Angels: An African American Treasury, 1998, etc.) capture a budding artist's enthusiasm and compulsion to paint: "My room is full, / but my hand won't stop, / won't stop, / putting paint on paper / paint on paper, / paint . . ." What this child paints is dinosaurs of her own invention, including a Speedasaurus ("She never speaks to carnivores"), a (male!) Shoppersaurus, a Weeposaurus, a Sleeposaurus, a Messysaurus, and a Babysaurus: "He's his Mama's little baby, / Smiling sweet in Tennessee, / But his middle's in Montana, / And his tail's in Waikiki." The dark-skinned child in Gilchrist's illustrations positively radiates joy as she presides over an array of smiling, simply drawn cartoon dinosaurs rendered in bright paintbox colors. Children will easily catch the breezy, bouncy mood here, and few will be able to resist the invitation to create more new dinos, in pictures, words, or both. (Picture book/poetry. 5-7)

Pub Date: March 31, 2001

ISBN: 0-688-17634-8

Page Count: 32

Publisher: Greenwillow Books

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2001

Categories:

CHILDREN'S POETRY

- BOOK REVIEW
ALAINA AND THE GREAT PLAY
by Eloise Greenfield ; illustrated by Colin Bootman

- BOOK REVIEW
THE WOMEN WHO CAUGHT THE BABIES
by Eloise Greenfield ; illustrated by Daniel Minter

- BOOK REVIEW
THINKER
by Eloise Greenfield ; illustrated by Ehsan Abdollahi

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ON THE FIRST DAY OF FIRST GRADE

by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Sarah Jennings ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 19, 2018

For places where the first-grade shelves are particularly thin.

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The traditional song “The Twelve Days of Christmas” gets a school makeover as readers follow a cheery narrator through the first 12 days of first grade.

“On the first day of first grade / I had fun right away // laughing and learning all day!” In these first two spreads, Jennings shows the child, who has brown skin and a cloud of dark-brown hair, entering the schoolyard with a diverse array of classmates and settling in. In the backgrounds, caregivers, including a woman in hijab, stand at the fence and kids hang things on hooks in the back of the room. Each new day sees the child and their friends enjoying new things, previous days’ activities repeated in the verses each time so that those listening will soon be chiming in. The child helps in the classroom, checks out books from the library, plants seeds, practices telling time and counting money, leads the line, performs in a play, shows off a picture of their pet bunny, and does activities in gym, music, and art classes. The Photoshop-and-watercolor illustrations portray adorable and engaged kids having fun while learning with friends. But while the song and topic are the same, this doesn’t come close to touching either the hysterical visuals or great rhythm of Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of Kindergarten (2003).

For places where the first-grade shelves are particularly thin. (Picture book. 5-7)

Pub Date: June 19, 2018

ISBN: 978-0-06-266851-6

Page Count: 32

Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins

Review Posted Online: May 13, 2018

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2018

Categories:

CHILDREN'S POETRY | CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS

- BOOK REVIEW
ON THE FIRST DAY OF KINDERGARTEN
by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Laura Hughes

- BOOK REVIEW
FIVE LITTLE BUNNIES
by Tish Rabe ; illustrated by Dan Yaccarino

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DEAR SUBSTITUTE

by Elizabeth Garton Scanlon & Audrey Vernick ; illustrated by Chris Raschka ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 19, 2018

Substitute teachers are a rite of passage for students; this narrator’s change of heart provides a good example of handling...

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A rough day with a sub slowly improves as the child narrator gets to know her and is introduced to new things.

Each double-page spread is a letter addressed to some aspect of the day: “Dear Substitute, / Wow. This is a surprise. / What are you doing here? / Where’s Mrs. Giordano, / and why didn’t she warn us?” Opposite, Raschka’s watercolor-and-gouache portrait is appropriately grim and forbidding. Other addressees include “attendance” (the sub can’t pronounce some of the names), the homework the narrator labored over (a waste), and the class turtle (it’s “Tank Tuesday,” but it won’t get cleaned today). But after admonishing the narrator for lunch-trading (an allergy risk), the sub gives the class extra storytime, only with “strange little poems” instead of their chapter book. It turns out the narrator loves them, even making one (with the sub’s help) about the turtle, and just like that, the day is turned around. The narrator, depicted as a pale-skinned child with brown pigtails, has a new outlook on subs (and maybe new experiences): “Sometimes you’ve got to / mix things up a little.” Raschka’s characteristically splashy, modern-ish illustrations, while expressive and with colors that match the changing moods, are casually childlike and sometimes hard to decode.

Substitute teachers are a rite of passage for students; this narrator’s change of heart provides a good example of handling it with aplomb. (Picture book. 5-7)