Books of Information - Week 4

 

Farmer Will Allen and the Growing Table by Jacqueline Briggs Martin and Illustrator Eric-Shabazz Larkin.  Ages 8-10, AR Level 3.5, Lexile AD620L

Author Jacqueline Briggs Martin has written multiple nonfiction works about harvesting farms to table foods from the ground up, literally. She herself grew up on a dairy farm and knows the work involved in farming. Hence the love of farming in odd places, like pots, buckets, small patches of ground and unlikely places like cities (author note, p. 35). The perfect amount of information for a 3^rd-4^th grade learner is presented in sequential format of Mr. Allen’s beginning trials and triumphs that he experienced with success that took around 20 years to come to fruition. The author notes her relation to farming and how she came to love it as an adult, and she encourages children through her many books about food to get involved with their parents, friends, and other family members to start growing anywhere and to see a vision as Mr. Will Allen did.  Children will not miss the message with a writing style that involves enlarging words or phrases so that even if a reader doesn’t read the full text, the main point will be expressed by just reading the enlarged text that is dispersed throughout the pages.  Chronological order is the sort of organization of the life events of Will Allen from farming as a child, leaving the farm and achieving other goals, then back to farming with more orderly detail in between.  Not only is a bibliography listed on page 36, but the author provides websites for further information about Will Allen, Ms. Martin herself, and the illustrator, Mr. Eric-Shabazz Larkin.  The format of this work is appropriately done with a mix of regular font text and enlarged font text, noting a “whimsical” kind of narration, which identifies with this playful age group.  Color is abundant in every page, captivating the richness of farm produce, various shades of brown to give readers a sense of being dirty and working on the farm, down to the bright, primary blue cut-off shirt Mr. Allen wears when farming.  Many ages may enjoy this book and possibly be inspired to start planting something large or small, especially if the readers are a foodie!

Jacqueline Briggs Martin. Farmer Will Allen and the Growing Table. Readers to Eaters,                 September 10, 2013. 32 pages. Tr $19.95  ISBN 9780983661535.

Separate Is Never Equal: Sylvia Mendez & Her Family's Fight for Desegregation by Duncan Tonatiuh, 2014. 40 pages. Grades 1-5. ISBN 9781419710544.

Duncan Tonatiuh, is an author illustrator of many award-winning children’s informational books related to the images and stories that honor the past, but are relevant to children especially today (duncantonatiuh.com, copyright 2019).  It does not appear that the author experienced segregation or immigration issues growing up, but Tonatiuh presents the Mendez family fight for desegregation well with multiple formats of resources using interviews, transcripts, films, books, websites, articles and reports, that are built into his bibliography.  The depth of the topic of segregation is advanced in prose, due to conversations taken directly from court transcripts, as Tonatiuh explains, were shortened and edited for clarity in the resource section of the book. An index is also included for easy reference for a class topic and discussion.  It helps that a glossary was included in the back for those readers who want to know more about words, phrases, and organizations.  After reading again, the writing style is written for a more mature audience, i.e., a mature 4^th grader and up, with longer sentences and phrases or organization names that the reader may be hearing about for the first time.  The writing style also examines the easy to follow chronological order of what the Mendez family endured to successfully achieve desegregation in California schools.  The pattern is easy to follow and allows the reader to flow from page to page.  The illustrations are an eye-pleasing addition that matches the words perfectly allowing to visualize what is happening in the story.  Readers naturally want to get a close up view of the color digitally used to enhance the drawings.   Author, also Illustrator, is inspired by Pre-Columbian art (duncantonatiuh.com, 2019), in particular the Mixtec codices resembling a one-dimensional shape to images of people. Tonatiuh uses digital images of real human hair as opposed to choosing a simple black or brown plain color.  Interesting also, is the facial features are all conforming to one another, no matter what color the skin, all facial images have a “pouty” or “puckered” lip appearance, almost like a “kissing fish” face and readers can get a visual of understanding the tone of what sort of communication is occurring in the text based on the lips being closed, slightly open, or coming across in a more direct, stern manner.  Readers might enjoy this work as an audiobook or a “movie” book in a read-a-long format from their local library as well.

 

Works Cited

 

https://duncantonatiuh.com/, copyright, 2019.

Tonatiuh, D. Separate is Never Equal : Sylvia Mendez & Her Family’s Fight for                              Desegregation. New York: Abrams Books For Young Readers, 2014. 40 pages. Tr $19.99.        ISBN 9781419710544.

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