The OLD Top Shelf

Here are the award winners from the ALA Midwinter conference 2008:

2008 John Newbery Medal
(for the most outstanding contribution to children’s literature)

Good Masters! Sweet Ladies! Voices from a Medieval Village by Laura Amy Schlitz

2008 Newbery Honor Books

Elijah of Buxton by Christopher Paul Curtis

The Wednesday Wars by Gary D. Schmidt

and

Feathers by Jacqueline Woodson

Randolph Caldecott Medal 2008
(for the most distinguished American picture book for children)

The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick

Caldecott Honor Books 2008

Henry’s Freedom Box: A True Story from the Underground Railroad, illustrated by Kadir Nelson, written by Ellen Levine

First the Egg by Laura Vaccaro Seeger

The Wall: Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain by Peter Sís

and

Knuffle Bunny Too: A Case of Mistaken Identity by Mo Willems

2008 Michael L. Printz Award
(for excellence in literature written for young adults)

The White Darkness, by Geraldine McCaughrean

2008 Coretta Scott King Award
(recognizing an African American author and illustrator of outstanding books for children and young adults)

Coretta Scott King Author Award

Elijah of Buxton by Christopher Paul Curtis

Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award

Let It Shine by Ashley Bryan

Pura Belpré Award
(honoring Latino authors and illustrators whose work best portrays, affirms and celebrates the Latino cultural experience in children’s books)

Pura Belpré Author Award

The Poet Slave of Cuba: A Biography of Juan Francisco Manzano by Margarita Engle, illustrated by Sean Qualls

Pura Belpré Illustrator Award

Los Gatos Black on Halloween, illustrated by Yuyi Morales, written by Marisa Montes

2008 Robert F. Sibert Medal
(for most distinguished informational book for children)

The Wall: Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain by Peter Sís

For other award winners see the press release on ALA’s web site.

The following was posted to the Texas Library Connection (TLC) listserv today:

Mark your calendar and buy your tickets! Arts & Letters Live at the Dallas Museum of Art will present popular author Eoin Colfer (ARTEMIS FOWL) on Sunday, January 20, at 3:00pm. Because of renovations in the Museum’s Horchow Auditorium, Eoin Colfer will speak at St. Mark’s School of Texas in Dechard Performance Hall (10600 Preston Road; Dallas 75230). Tickets for this event are on sale now by phone (214.922.1818).

But wait, there’s more! This program is part of the BooksmART series (formerly arts & letters live, jr) of Arts and Letters Live. Other authors featured in this impressive BooksamART series are Gary Schmidt, Patricia MacLachlan, Mo Willems, and Brian Selznick! Check the BooksmART web page for additional information on dates and ordering.

Newbery medalist, Madeleine L’Engle died this past weekend. The Dallas Morning News has a brief article and an online guest book where readers can share their thoughts and feelings about this great author and her well-loved books.

Now that the Harry Potter saga is complete, Stephen King (writing for Entertainment Weekly) has the last word on the series.

Region XI Library Harvest
Thursday, September 6 , 2007
FREE, but registration is required
Register here
Click Calendar>Workshops>September 6, then follow the prompts
More information here

Star-Lit, children’s literacy festival
Saturday, October 20 from 10am-2pm
St. Andrew United Methodist Church
5801 W. Plano Parkway, Plano, TX

This year’s outstanding authors and illustrators include Laura Numeroff, Will Hillenbrand, Kimberly Willis Holt, Bryan Collier, Dee Scallan & Daniel Myers, Kim Brown (inspiration for D.W. in the Marc Brown’s ARTHUR series), Cynthia Leitich Smith, Greg Leitich Smith, and Tracy Dockray.
Event activities include presentations by all attending authors, an on-site bookstore sponsored by Borders, book signings by all authors, food, face painting & balloon animals, and a scavenger hunt to win prizes such as a Nintendo Wii, I-Pod, Webkinz and more. One very neat aspect of this literary event is that participants are able to attend small group gatherings with the authors/illustrators with plenty of time for questions, personal interaction, and books signing.
And here is the really great part – in honor of its 5th anniversary, this year Star-Lit is FREE to the public!! Concessions will be available for purchase throughout the event.
An extra bonus to the festival is the chance to join the authors and illustrators for the AUTHOR BREAKFAST, held before the festival begins. Only 100 tickets will be sold to the breakfast which includes breakfast with the authors before Star-Lit, a book to have signed by one of our guest authors and an event goodie bag filled with fun prizes. The breakfast takes place from 9:00 to 10:00 a.m.
Tickets to the Breakfast are $30 each and may be purchased online at the Star-Lit web site.
For more information, contact Gina Eckerman at gina@eckermangroup.com / 214-868-7500 (cell).

Need to spice up your booktalks? Booktalking has moved into the realm of digital video. Publishers, universities and even public school students are now producing “book trailers.” These are similar to movie trailers, but are used instead to promote books. Here’s an example from University of Central Florida’s Digital Booktalk. Click Play to watch the trailer.

Download My Sister’s Keeper by Jodi Picoult

In her Neverending Search blog on SLJ.com, Joyce Valenza highlights several sites where you can locate these “trailers” for use in your library program.

Can you think of other ways that these trailers could be used? Share your thoughts in the comments.

I have five bookplates autographed by Phil Bildner, winner of the 2004 Texas Bluebonnet Award for Shoeless Joe and Black Betsy. If you have a copy of this book and would like a bookplate for it, post a comment below. The first 5 to comment will be the only 5 to win!

Congratulations are in order for Marnie Cushing and Teresa Wells. They each contributed a collaborative unit to Toni Buzzeo’s new book, Collaborating to Meet Literacy Standards: Teacher/Librarian Partnerships for Grade K-2.

Collaborating with Teresa to write the unit “Life Under the Big Top” were Thompson Kindergarten teachers Jana Burchett, Tracy Work, Bridget Kline, Angela Mead, and Amanda Tyler.

Mackey 1st grade teachers worked with Marnie to create the unit “Black Americans Who Changed Lives.” They are Nakisha Cluff, Laura Hernandez, Amber McMillan, Rebekah Richter, and Lisa Zellmer.

The book was published in January by Linworth and is currently available from Follett.

Way to go, ladies!

Winners of the Newbery, Caldecott and other awards were announced at ALA’s midwinter meeting earlier this week. The winners are:

Newbery Medal for the most outstanding contribution to children’s literature.

• The Higher Power of Lucky (S & S/Athenuem/A Richard Jackson Bk.) by Susan Patron, illustrated by Matt Phelan

Newbery Honors:

• Penny from Heaven (Random) by Jennifer L. Holm
• Hattie Big Sky (Delacorte) by Kirby Larson
• Rules (Scholastic) by Cynthia Lord

Randolph Caldecott Medal for the most distinguished American picture book for children.

• Flotsam (Clarion) by David Wiesner
  

Caldecott Honors

• Gone Wild: An Endangered Animal Alphabet (Walker) written and illustrated by David McLimans
• Moses: When Harriet Tubman Led Her People to Freedom (Hyperion/Jump at the Sun) illustrated by Kadir Nelson, written by Carole Boston Weatherford

Michael L. Printz Award for excellence in literature written for young adults.

• American Born Chinese (Roaring Brook/First Second) by Gene Luen Yang 

Printz Honor Books

• The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation; v. 1: The Pox Party (Candlewick) by M. T. Anderson  
• An Abundance of Katherines (Dutton) by John Green 
• Surrender (Candlewick) by Sonya Hartnett
• The Book Thief (Knopf) by Markus Zusak

Coretta Scott King Book Award recognizing an African American author and illustrator of outstanding books for children and young adults.

• Copper Sun (S &S/Atheneum) by Sharon Draper

King Author Honor Book

• The Road to Paris (Putnam) by Nikki Grimes

King Illustrator Book

• Moses: When Harriet Tubman Led Her People to Freedom (Hyperion/Jump at the Sun) illustrated by Kadir Nelson, written by Carole Boston Weatherford

King Illustrator Honor Books

• Jazz (Holiday House) illustrated by Christopher Myers, written by Walter Dean Myers 
• Poetry for Young People: Langston Hughes (Sterling) illustrated by Benny Andrews, edited by David Roessel and Arnold Rampersad

Coretta Scott King/John Steptoe New Talent Author Award

• Standing Against the Wind (Farrar) by Traci L. Jones

Robert F. Sibert Informational Book Award for most distinguished informational book for children.

• Team Moon: How 400,000 People Landed Apollo 11 on the Moon (Houghton) by Catherine Thimmesh

Sibert Honor Books

• Freedom Riders: John Lewis and Jim Zwerg on the Front Lines of the Civil Rights Movement (National Geographic) by Ann Bausum
• Quest for the Tree Kangaroo: An Expedition to the Cloud Forest of New Guinea (Houghton) by Sy Montgomery, photographs by Nic Bishop
• To Dance: A Ballerina’s Graphic Novel (Novel (S & S/Atheneum/A Richard Jackson Bk) by Siena Cherson Siegel, artwork by Mark Siegel

Schneider Family Book Award for books that embody the artistic expression of the disability experience for child and adolescent audiences.

• The Deaf Musicians (Putnam) by Pete Seeger and poet Paul DuBois Jacobs, illustrated by R. Gregory
• Rules (Scholastic) by Cynthia Lord
• Small Steps (Delacorte) by Louis Sachar

Theodor Seuss Geisel Beginning Reader Award for the most distinguished beginning reader book.

• Zelda and Ivy: The Runaways (Candlewick) written and illustrated by Laura McGee Kvasnosky

Geisel Honor Books

• Mercy Watson Goes for a Ride (Candlewick) by Kate DiCamillo
• Move Over, Rover! (Harcourt) by Karen Beaumont, illustrated by Jane Dyer
• Not a Box (HarperCollins) written and illustrated by Antoinette Portis

Margaret A. Edwards Award for lifetime achievement in writing for young adults.

• Lois Lowry, author of The Giver (Houghton/Lorraine)

Laura Ingalls Wilder Award for a substantial and lasting contribution to literature for children.

• Author-illustrator James Marshall for his George and Martha books, the Fox easy reader series, The Cut-Ups, and Goldilocks and the Three Bears

Andrew Carnegie Medal for excellence in children’s video.

• Author/illustrator Mo Willems and Weston Woods Studios, producers of Knuffle Bunny, a DVD based on Willems’ book Knuffle Bunny: A Cautionary Tale. The
  DVD is performed by Willems, his wife Cheryl and their daughter Trixie.
  It is directed and animated by MaGiK Studio, with music by Scotty Huff
  and Robert Reynolds.

Mildred L. Batchelder Award for the most outstanding children’s book translated from a foreign language and subsequently published in the United States.

• Delacorte Press is the winner for The Pull of the Ocean. Originally published in France in 1999 as L’enfant Océan, the book was written by Jean-Claude Mourlevat and translated by Y. Maudet.

Batchelder Honor Books

• The Killer’s Tears (Delacorte)
• The Last Dragon (Hyperion/Miramax)

Alex Awards for the ten best adult books that appeal to teen audiences.

• The Book of Lost Things (S & S/Atria) by John Connolly
• The Whistling Season (Harcourt) by Ivan Doig
• Eagle Blue: A Team, A Tribe, and A High School Basketball Season in Arctic Alaska (Bloomsbury) by Michael D’Orso
• Water for Elephants (Algonquin) by Sara Gruen
• Color of the Sea (Thomas Dunne Bks.) by John Hamamura
• The Floor of the Sky (Univ. of Nebraska) by Pamela Carter Joern
• The Blind Side: Evolution of a Game (Norton) by Michael Lewis
• Black Swan Green (Random) by David Mitchell
• The World Made Straight (Holt) by Ron Rash
• The Thirteenth Tale (S & S) by Diane Setterfield

May Hill Arbuthnot Honor Lecture recognizing an
individual of distinction in the field of children’s literature, who
then presents a lecture at a winning host site.

• David Macaulay will deliver the 2008 lecture. Macaulay’s work varies from the Caldecott Medal-winning Black and White to the satiric fiction of Motel of the Mysteries.

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The following was posted on LM_NET regarding suggestions for books and activities to use with elementary level book clubs:

FOOD FOOD FOOD! If you feed them something fun related to the book, you will win them over. Another strategy is to incorporate a game, craft project, or guest relating to the book. –

My suggestions would be: Gregor the Overlander (a Bluebonnet nominee last year); Ghost of Fossil Glen; Hot and Cold Summer; Lois Lowry’s “Sam” books; Nothing’s Fair in Fifth Grade, or other past Bluebonnet winners. As these were books voted on by students, a lot of kids enjoy them (but they might not be great literature). You could also consider Newbery winners and honor books.

My suggestion is that you think in terms of themes. But series and author really set the kids on the road to reading. You can kill alot more birds if you read the following authors: Beverly Cleary I believe Ramona the Pest is an award winner. My Cleary favorite is The Mouse and the Motorcycle. Phyllis Reynolds Naylor’s Shiloh (an award winner) Roald Dahl’s The Witches or Esio Trot may be fun if they are already reading his books in class. James ad the Giant Peach and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory are major classic and should be required reading. Just before summer vacation you may do the first Lemony Snickett A series of Unfortunate Events. They may be inspired to finish off the series over the vacation.

Hollywood just happens to turn really good books into movies, we can’t help that. I put out a brochure “if you liked the movie, you’ll LOVE the book”

I shall post something on my personal favorite “the cat who went to heaven” by coatsworth. It’s a newbery. I won’t take four weeks to read but you can get some good discussion . . . you can supplement the reading experience with other shorter stories of Japan . . . or . . Read also Sadako and the 1000 paper cranes by Coerr. That’s a relatively short one too and it has to do with Japan.

The Axle Galench books by Rooster Morris are a great Book Club choice! You can read the first chapter at www.axlegalench.com

Last year my theme was Florida. We read some Florida history and ecological novels (Strawberry Girls, Oonawassee Summer, Deadly Waters, Missing Gator of Gumbo Limbo, Cypress Tree Island, seems like there was one more but I can’t remember it now.)

This year I am featuring Historical Fiction based in the US. We are studying Sign of the Beaver, George Washington’s Socks, Freedom Crossing, Ghost Cadet, Riding the Flume and Under the Blood Red Sun Next year I will mix the genres but all books will be Newbery winners.

I have found it difficult to know whether the kids read the book or not. I tried to make it fun and low pressure (They seem to get enough of that) but towards the end, especially, many weren’t reading the book. I give a couple weeks (5-6) weeks this year between books, hoping that helps. Last year, I brought in food that pertained to the books, but not doing it this year.

This year I have gone on United Streaming and burned video clips pertaining to the topic and that really brings the time period into perspective for the kids.

At first, I was going to have the kids pass the AR test on the book to assure that they read it, but many are reading above their level and were struggling, even though they read the book, so now, I hide the AR questions in the discussion at our meeting, but I still don’t have a way to get them to read before the meeting.

One of my recent favorites is Clementine by Pennypacker. It may be a bit young for 5th grade, but it is so much fun! Please feel free to check out my website for other suggestions. http://www.bookwink.com <http://www.bookwink.com/>

What ideas do YOU have? Post a comment and share!