Picture Book Addiction

I wasn't going to do it but I couldn't resist. I told myself I didn't need more books but walking by the book fair at school numerous times a day was more than I could take. One of the books I purchased was, My Brave Year of Firsts by Jamie Lee Curtis and Laura Cornell. I read the opening page and I was hooked.

The first time I rode a two-wheeler alone,
I crashed and my mom filmed it on her iPhone.
I crashed and I crashed. Dad ran out of steam.
He let go, I went straight.
Mom filmed as she screamed.

As I read, I laughed and memories of teaching my own kids to ride a bike flooded my head. As the title suggests, each page is a memory of a first time experience told from a child's point of view. I think this would be a great mentor text to spur writing from students of all grade levels. Below is my attempt at writing a "first" of my own using this book as a mentor text. Curtis and Cornell used rhyme throughout their book but I chose not to in my draft.

The first time I walked to school alone, I looked both ways before crossing at the corner. I stayed on the sidewalk, swinging my plaid Aladdin lunchbox the whole way. At the school entrance, I turned and waved to my mom as she crawled by in our station wagon.

Mentor Sentence Monday: The Incredible Journey

Amazon Link

When I was in 5th grade, one of my favorite books was The Incredible Journey by Sheila Burnford. I remember wanting to read the book because one the characters was a Siamese cat. Burnford's descriptions of the characters are filled with lengthy sentences with multiple commas and semi-colons. Admittedly, I've never felt very confident about teaching young writers to use semi-colons but with Burnford's words as a model, it seems a little easier. Her detailed descriptions of the animal characters are great snippets for teaching snapshots.

The following sentences are from Burnford's The Incredible Journey, page 4:

On the floor, his scarred, bony head resting on one of the man's feet, lay an old white English bull terrier. His slanted almond-shaped eyes, sunk deep within their pinkish rims, were closed; one large triangular ear caught the firelight, flushing the inside a delicate pink, so that it appeared almost translucent.

I generated the following sentences using Burnford's words as a model:

On the bed, his plump, wide head resting on one of the woman's feet, lay an orange domestic short hair. His yellow-green eyes, half-closed within their furry rims, were glowing; one triangular ear caught the sunlight, making the hairs inside glisten.

Mentor Sentence Monday: Missing May

Amazon Link

Cynthia Rylant’s Missing May, won the Newbery Award for 1993. Her words flow together so easily and there is a lovely rhythm to her sentences. The following paragraph is a description of the house of Uncle Ob and Aunt May. The opening sentence of this paragraph (page 5) would be perfect for kids to imitate and would also be a great model for a hook.

Home was, still is, a rusty old trailer stuck on the face of a mountain in Deep Water, in the heart of Fayette County. It looked to me, the first time, like a toy that God had been playing with and accidentally dropped out of heaven. Down and down and down it came and landed, thunk, on this mountain, sort of cockeyed and shaky and grateful to be all in one piece. Well sort of one piece.

I generated the following paragraph using Rylant’s words as my model:

Home was, still is, a sprawling brick ranch pushed back from the road, half-way down Parker Street. It looked to me, the first time, like mismatched shoe boxes pushed together to form an “L” . I figured it had been added on to at least three different times, given that each of the three sections of the house had slightly different kinds of bricks. 

Mentor Sentence Monday: Nicola Davies

Amazon Link

I love the way Nicola Davies combines beautiful description with informative facts in her book Bat Loves the Night. Her sentences are great for showing kids how to use commas in compound and complex sentences. Davies also uses great verbs.
The following are sentences from Bat Loves the Night:

Bat shouts as she flies, louder than a hammer blow, higher than a squeak. She beams her voice around her like a flashlight, and the echoes come singing back.

The following sentences were generated using Davies' words as my model:

Cat wails as he wonders, louder than a baby, deeper than screech. He vibrates his voice like a bad opera singer, and the other cats join in.

Mentor Sentence Monday: More Cynthia Rylant

Amazon Link

One of my favorite books by Cynthia Rylant is An Angel for Solomon Singer. I love the unapologetic way she weaves the story of a lonely man’s life. Her words are simple and direct and beautiful. Several places in the book Rylant describes her character by what he doesn’t have or doesn’t like which is a technique that kids can imitate and will quickly change up the flow of their writing and add voice to their pieces. It is also a way of describing that young writers can use when writing across genres and in all content areas.

The following sentences are Cynthia Rylant’s:

His room had no balcony (he dreamed of beautiful balconies). It had no fireplace (and he knew he would think better sitting before a fireplace). It had no porch swing for napping and no picture for watching the birds.

The following are sentences I generated using Rylant’s words as inspiration:

Her office had no window (she dreamed of the warmth of natural light). It had no way to control the temperature (and she knew she would think better without shivering). It had no filing cabinet and no bookcase for all of her books. 

Mentor Sentence Monday: Cynthia Rylant

Word cloud created using text from
When I Was Young in the
Mountains by Cynthia Rylant.

Cynthia Rylant’s books are swimming with wonderful craft perfect for teaching kids to write compound and complex sentences with commas. Her book, When I Was Young in the Mountains is chock full.

Rylant’s words:

When I was young in the mountains, we walked across the cow pasture and through the woods, carrying our towels. The swimming hole was dark and muddy, and we sometimes saw snakes, but we jumped in anyway.

I generated the following sentences using Rylant’s words as the pattern:

When I was young in Green Valley, we rode our banana seat bikes across the railroad tracks and through the back alleys, carrying our towels around our necks. The city pool was crowded, and sometimes little kids peed in the shallow end, but we jumped in anyway.

Mentor Sentence Monday: More Brian Selznick

Amazon link

Another one of my favorite books by Brian Selznick is The Boy of a Thousand Faces. His sentences are fun to imitate and give young writers great models for creating more complex sentences of their own. The opening line from The Boy of a Thousand Faces is a wonderful hook to mimic.

Selznick’s words:

After the crowd lit their torches and chased the phantom into the river, after the hunchback met his death in the darkness of the tower, and after the creature disappeared back into its black lagoon, Alonzo King went to bed.

 Sentences I generated using Selznick’s words as inspiration:

After the grandparents finished their cheesecake and coffee, after the cousins played unruly games of Scrabble, euchre, and spoons, and after the aunts and daughters washed up most of the dishes, everyone left and house went quiet.

After her hair was washed and conditioned, after it was dried and straightened, and after the blond strands were sprayed in place, Samantha sat in the red chair in the living room and waited for the doorbell.

Mentor Sentence Monday: More Hugo Cabret

Text for word cloud came from page 165 of
The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian
Selznick

I've always loved the look and feel of Brian Selznick’s The Invention of Hugo Cabret. It is one of those books that rests beautifully in your lap and the black and white pages are delicious to turn. Sorry, but there is no way I would want to read Hugo as an ebook. The structure of Selznick’s sentences and paragraphs are also perfect for imitating.

The following sentences are from the opening paragraph to the eighth chapter on page 165.

After making his morning rounds with the clocks, Hugo showed up at the toy booth the next day prepared to work. He could feel the cogs and wheels in his head spinning in different directions. On moment he felt hopeful that he'd get his notebook back, the next he felt angry and resentful.

The following are sentences I generated using Selznick’s patterns:

After collecting the empty cups, dessert plates, and pop cans downstairs, Mary headed to the basement prepared to face an even bigger mess.

After making the rounds at the usual bars, Ray showed up at the Someday Saloon prepared to deepen his level of inebriation. He could feel the boozy blanket begin to warm and calm his brain.

After making their morning rounds with the litter boxes, Roxy, Fred, and Tiger showed up in the kitchen prepared to eat breakfast. 

Mentor Sentence Monday: The Invention of Hugo Cabret

This week I’ve chosen to use The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick as the mentor text for generating my practice sentences. The following sentences can be found on page 50.

Hugo crept through the walls, came out through an air vent, and hurried down the hall until he reached the toy booth. Nervously, he rubbed the notebook one last time, then cautiously lowered his hand around the windup toy he wanted.   

  

Using Brian Selznick’s sentence patterns, I generated the following sentences:

Sebastian padded down the stairs, stood in the foyer, and looked out the sidelight of the front door. Nervously, he flipped the deadbolt one last time, then cautiously stepped out to the front porch and scanned the front yard.

Sylvia pulled up to the condo, turned off her headlights, and hunched down in her seat. Nervously, she steadied the zoom lens of her camera one last time, then snapped the picture of her husband and the woman.

Eve Bunting's Dandelions: From the Sound of the Wind to the Taste of Truffles

Yesterday, I posted about using a page out of Eve Bunting’s book, Dandelions as a model for creating some sentences of my own. Today, I used the same snippet of text but played with some different sentences.  Below are some of Bunting's lovely lines:

Text from Dandelions and Lindor's extra
dark chocolate truffles. Both are very
delicious!

The sound of the wind in the grass was like the sound of the rivers we’d known back home. Day and night the sound was in our ears.

Below are some sentences I wrote using page 4 from Dandelions as my mentor text. Somehow I started off with the sound of wind and ended up with the taste of truffles.

The sound of the snoring through his nose was like the sound of the motorcycles we’d heard on the highway. All night, every night, the sound was in our ears.

The sound of the yowling in the basement was like the sound of singing cats in heat. Day and night the cried were in our ears.

The fan blew around the smell of the room. Day and night the rotting stench was in our noses.

The taste of the fudge in my mouth was like the chocolate truffles I’d known back home. One by one, piece by piece, the squares of fudge disappeared behind my lips.

Mentor Sentence Monday: Eve Bunting's Dandelions

Today I’m continuing my study of some of Eve Bunting’s wonderful words. The following paragraphs from Dandelions beg to be read over and over:

We cooked our meals outside the wagon and slept on Mama’s quilts spread on the ground. Papa told us the names of the stars and about the moon, how it rose and set, and how the moon and the stars were the same ones that shone over Grandma and Grandpa’s house. The very ones we used to see through our bedroom window.

When he told us that I cried a little, but I didn’t let Rebecca see. The sound of the wind in the grass was like the sound of the rivers we’d known back home. Day and night the sound was in our ears.
 

I used Bunting’s words as my mentor text and generated the following sentences of my own:

We grilled the burgers on the hibachi and slept in sleeping bags on the deck of the pontoon boat.

We baked the cutout cookies in the oven and slept on quilts spread on the floor under the Christmas tree. Grandma told us about each ornament, who made it or who gave it to her, and how the angel at the top was her favorite. The very angel their mother used to play with like it was a doll, when she was a little girl.

We made our sundaes with Hershey’s syrup and two scoops of vanilla and sat on Susie’s front porch glider.

From Paragraph to Story

Yesterday I wrote a post about using Eve Bunting's words as a pattern for writing several paragraphs of my own. From those paragraphs, I let the words go where they wanted and grow into the beginning of a story. I'm thinking about a possible ending but I can always change my mind.

(I don't have a title yet)

      Once a small brown mouse got into the basement and couldn’t get out. It scurried into a corner, hopping and clawing at the wall. It found the shabby sofa, got a grip on the upholstery, and climbed to the arm, where it perched. Waiting. Nose twitching.

      “Don’t stop running,” I told it silently. “Don’t! You can outsmart Roxy the cat!”

      For days the mouse scuttled around, successfully hiding from Roxy. And then, thwack went the trap! I feared the worst. In an instant I saw a flash of brown run under the sofa. The mouse was okay.

      “Run mouse,” I whispered. “You are indeed brave.” Though I couldn’t see it, I know it was hiding, twitching, waiting to respond to the next hazard.

I don't yet have a name for my  
basement cat character.

       I had been living in the Tackett’s basement for about a year when the mouse appeared. But before that, before Roxy that is, I had the run of the house. One week after the Tackett’s brought Roxy home, I started marking my territory upstairs, occasionally spraying the living room drapes or flooding the corner by the litter box. I don’t know why I did it. It just seemed like the thing to do. Roxy had invaded my home, taken over my people, and my litter box. At first, I felt sorry for Roxy. She had spent her life caged up at the Humane Society shelter.  Although she had been fed well and her cage kept clean, she was only periodically petted. Roxy had spent her life sleeping, grooming, and watching other cats sleeping and grooming.  Her life at the shelter had been, well . . . sheltered.  She'd never experienced watching the birds from the dining room window or taking a nap in a sun patch on the red chair in the living room. Roxy had never slept snuggled in blankets on Michael’s bed in the winter. Poor thing. Pathetic kitty. Pitiable youth. My sympathy for Miss Roxy, queen of the house, changed to jealousy within days of her arrival.

       The tubby calico ate a lot and as a result pooped a lot. And she was a slob. Half the time, she backed up too far to do her business and missed the litter box entirely. Her deposits ended up on the floor or balanced on the edge of the box. The Tackett’s tried to remedy Roxy’s toileting challenges by providing a bigger wider litter pan. She still somehow managed to unload on the floor. As you can imagine, it didn’t smell too sweet. I had no choice but to relieve myself in the corner. There was no way I was going to try to tiptoe around her turds to use the facilities. The Tackett’s placed a second receptacle, right by the first one and Roxy the cat-pig somehow managed to spoil them both. This did not make Michael’s parents happy. But evidently, my urine was deemed more objectionable than Roxy’s turds and I ended up in the basement, with my own litter box.

Going From Sentences to Paragraphs

Over the weekend, I posted about using Jeff Anderson’s concept of imitating great sentences from favorite authors as a way to improve the complexity and coherence of student writing. After seeing positive results from young writers at school, I wanted to try it myself.  I chose one of my generated sentences that I liked and tried to imitate the pattern and structure of the paragraphs of the mentor text. Below are Eve Bunting's words and then after that are the paragraphs I created using her writing as a model.

Eve Bunting’s words from p. 16 of Fly Away Home:

Once a little brown bird got into the main terminal and it couldn’t get out. It fluttered in the high, hollow spaces. It threw itself at the glass, fell panting on the floor, flew to a tall, metal girder, and perched there, exhausted.

            “Don’t stop trying,” I told it silently. “Don’t! You can get out!”

            For days the bird flew around, dragging one wing. And then it found the instant when a sliding door was open and slipped through. I watched it rise. Its wing seemed OK.

“Fly, bird,” I whispered. “Fly away home!”

            Though I couldn’t hear it, I knew it was singing. Nothing made me as happy as that bird.

My words using Bunting’s sentences as patterns:

Roxy wasn't particularly thrilled to be
cast as the villain in my story.

Once a small brown mouse got into the basement and couldn’t get out. It scurried into a corner, hopping and clawing at the wall. It found the shabby sofa, got a grip on the upholstery, and climbed to the arm, where it perched. Waiting. Nose twitching.

“Don’t stop running,” I told it silently. “Don’t! You can outsmart Roxy the cat!”

For days the mouse scuttled around, successfully hiding from Roxy. And then, thwack went the trap! I feared the worst. In an instant I saw a flash of brown run under the sofa. The mouse was okay.

“Run mouse,” I whispered. “You are indeed brave.”

Though I couldn’t see it, I knew it was hiding, twitching, waiting to respond to the next hazard.

The next step is to take the paragraphs and use them to produce more writing, possibly a story. I’m going to let the words take me wherever they want to go. And if my internal editor gets too loud and begins to prevent me from getting my words on the paper, I will shush it because it is time to write.

Mentor Sentence Monday: More Sentences from Fly Away Home

Image from Microsoft Word

I’m enjoying creating my own sentences using the patterns of authors. I’ve always loved playing with words and this exercise of generating sentences has been growing hooks and igniting new writing for me. And it’s fun!

The following are Eve Bunting’s words on page 14 from Fly Away Home:

Everything in the airport is on the move—passengers, pilots, flight attendants, cleaners with their brooms. Jets roar in, close to the windows.

The following are my words based on Bunting’s sentence patterns:

Everything in the room is motionless—the fan, the curtains, the air, and the cat stretched out on the tile floor. Yellow jackets hum, close to the window screens.

Nothing in the school is still—not teachers, kids, parents, secretaries on the phones. Buses roll in, breaks squeaking to a stop.

When she lays down to sleep, her thoughts keep firing—pack lunches, pick son up at the high school, chicken in the crock pot, husband cheated. Memories roar in and line up next to tomorrow’s to-do list.

Using Mentor Texts: Fly Away Home by Eve Bunting

I’ve been a big fan of Jeff Anderson’s book Mechanically Inclined for a couple years. Not only does the book have excellent teaching ideas, it is written with so much voice, it is just enjoyable to read. And in person, he is pretty darn funny.  As I’ve played with Jeff Anderson’s lessons, I’ve noticed that imitating sentence patterns makes a significant impact on the complexity and coherence of student writing. So if it works for kids, why not me? If I want to improve the quality of what I put on the paper, I need to work at it. So I made a stack of books I love and I started looking through them. I grabbed Eve Bunting's Fly Away Home. I marked pages, sentences, or paragraphs that I felt were powerful or I just liked the sound of when read aloud. Below is one section I marked as my mentor text and below that are sentences I generated as I worked at using some of Bunting's sentence patterns.

From, Fly Away Home by Eve Bunting (p. 16)

Once a little brown bird got into the main terminal and it couldn’t get out. It fluttered in the high, hollow spaces. It threw itself at the glass, fell panting on the floor, flew to a tall, metal girder, and perched there, exhausted.

                “Don’t stop trying,” I told it silently. “Don’t! You can get out!”

                For days the bird flew around, dragging one wing. And then it found the instant when a sliding door was open and slipped through. I watched it rise. Its wing seemed OK.

“Fly, bird,” I whispered. “Fly away home!”

                Though I couldn’t hear it, I knew it was singing. Nothing made me as happy as that bird.

Below is some of my work using Bunting's writing as a mentor text:

Though I couldn’t see her, I knew she was dancing. Nothing made me as happy as hearing the sound the Tele Tone taps made against the wood floor.

Though I couldn’t see her, I knew she was scared. Nothing made me as miserable as knowing her hand was just out of reach.

Though she didn’t seem to know my name, her eyes said she remembered my face.