THE WORDS WE KEEP - YA Winner of the Schneider Family Book Award

Keeping with this year's theme of resilience, this week I'm sharing two award-winning young adult books. The Words We Keep by Erin Stewart won the 2023 Schneider Family Book Award this year for the best teen title. This award showcases books that highlight the disability experience. 

Lily embarks with a fellow student on a search to find poetry in unexpected places for a class project. In the process, she learns to use art and verse to deal with anxiety and depression.. The book speaks to anyone dealing with any sort of mental health challenge or any challenge at all. In addition to anxiety and depression, the story tackles bipolar disorder, self-harm, suicide, and OCD. Ultimately, through the voice of the protagonist, it lets teens know they are not alone in their struggles whatever those struggles might be. 

Breathe and Count Back from Ten, written by Natalia Sylvester, is a Schneider Family Teen Honor Title. It is also a Pura Belpre Honor Book. The latter award is given to Latina/Latino authors and illustrators. Like the author, the main character is a Peruvian-American who suffers from hip dysplasia. See the author interview at Publisher's Weekly where Natalia Sylvester talks about her own experiences with being an immigrant with hip dysplasia. The story is so personal, she could have written a memoir but decided to create a work of fiction instead. It's interesting to read her reasons for that choice. It helps us understand how much personal information can go into a work of fiction. It might be interesting for high school students to compare this book to the picture book memoir, Watercress by Andrea Wang which reflects on her experiences as a Chinese American.

In the novel, Breathe and Count Back from Ten, the main character, Veronica swims as a form of therapy. When she wants to become a "mermaid" at a local Florida attraction, she clashes with her traditional Peruvian parents. The book explores themes of immigration, body image, and disability justice. It also delves into mermaid mythology in a variety of cultures.

Wildoak - Middle-Grade Winner of the Schneider Family Book Award

The 2023 Schneider Family Book Awards were given out in January. The award honors an author or illustrator for "... the artistic expression of the disability experience for child and adolescent audiences." This week I'm sharing the 2023 middle-grade award winner, Wildoak, written by C.C. Harrington.

Maggie Stephens goes to stay with her grandfather in the country. Her parents hope that some time in Wildoak Forest will improve her stuttering. While Maggie is there she finds a snow leopard cub that had been purchased as a gift and then abandoned. It is set in 1963 when a wild cat like a snow leopard could actually be purchased at Harrods in London from the exotic pet department that they called Pet Kingdom. Fortunately, that ended in 1976 with the Endangered Species Act.

Although Maggie stutters when she speaks to humans, she is able to speak quite clearly to animals. The story is about communication on many different levels. Even the forest has a voice. It is ultimately a story about compassion and understanding. This is author C.C. Harrington's debut novel. She has experience teaching students with learning differences. Perhaps that is what makes her so empathetic to people who are different. One of the most poignant quotes is, "... there's room in this beautiful, complicated world of ours for all of us. Just as we are. In fact, there is a need for it."

Middle-Grade Honor Titles included Honestly Elliott by Gillian Dunn and Hummingbird by Natalie Lloyd. Honestly Elliott is a story of a boy starting middle school who struggles with ADHD while Hummingbird features a twelve-year-old girl who uses a wheelchair due to brittle bone disease.

For more stories of resilience, check out these books:

Listen: How Evelyn Glennie, a Deaf Girl, Changed Percussion written by Shannon Stocker and illustrated by Devon Holzwarth

It's My Whole Life: Charlotte Salomon: An Artist in Hiding During World War II  by Susan Wider 

Jubilee: The First Therapy Horse and an Olympic Dream written by KT Johnston and illustrated by Anabella Ortiz.

Keep up with my book reviews on more exciting stories of resilience by signing up for my newsletter. Visit the Sign Up Page on my website at www.wordtravelpress.com for details and discover free offers.

LISTEN and IN THE BLUE- Award Winning Picture Books Exploring the Disability Experience

Continuing with my theme for 2023 of sharing stories about perseverance, today I'm looking at award winning picture books exploring the disability experience. 

Every January the American Library Association (ALA) announces its most prestigious awards at its Midwinter Conference. These include the Caldecott, the Newbery, and the Printz Medals. In addition, there are several lesser known categories of winners that appeal to specific interest groups. One of these is the Schneider Family Book Award which honors an author or illustrator for "... the artistic expression of the disability experience for child and adolescent audiences." There are three categories for ages 0-8, 9-13, and 14-18.

The 2023 winner of the Young Children's (0-8) category was Listen: How Evelyn Glennie, A Deaf Girl, Changed Percussion written by Shannon Stocker and illustrated by Devon Holzwarth.

Evelyn loved music from a very young age. When she was eight, she could play songs on the piano by ear. At ten she tackled the clarinet. But soon she began to lose her hearing. A doctor told the family that the nerves in Evelyn's ears were degenerating. By the time she was eleven, she could barely hear the phone ring, but there was something she could hear - percussion. She loved the marimba, the timpani, and the snare drum and she found an understanding music teacher who helped her learn how to "feel" the different sounds in her body. She went on to attend the Royal Academy of Music and become an award-winning solo percussionist. To this day she performs barefoot so that she can feel the musical vibrations as they move through the floor and into her feet. 

As a speech-language pathologist, I especially enjoyed the explanation of how sound and touch are similar. Air vibrates and travels through the human ear before that vibration is converted into an electrical signal that we perceive as sound. 

Evelyn was featured in a BBC documentary called, The Will to Win and a second documentary called Good Vibrations. She has created a film entitled Touch the Sound and the TED Talk, "How to Truly Listen." She has a solo album entitled Rhythm Song and more than 40 CDs. 

Read more about Evelyn at www.evelyn.co.uk. Check out her website where you will find videos of her discussing "Feeling Sound" and other topics. You can also listen to samples of her music.

The 2023 honor title for Young Children was In the Blue written and illustrated by Erin Hourigan. It is a picture book for young children (ages 4-8) about depression that handles a sensitive topic and makes it accessible through the use of art and color. The book provides a sensitive and thoughtful way to begin conversations with young children about mental illness.

For more stories of resilience, check out my January 28th post on It's My Whole Life: Charlotte Salomon: An Artist in Hiding During World War II  by Susan Wider as well as Jubilee: The First Therapy Horse and an Olympic Dream written by KT Johnston and illustrated by Anabella Ortiz.

Keep up with my book reviews on more exciting stories of resilience by signing up for my newsletter. Visit the Sign Up Page on my website at www.wordtravelpress.com for details and discover free offers.

Celebrating Dyslexia Awareness Month with A Walk in the Words

October is Dyslexia Awareness Month and I always like to celebrate by sharing children's books about kids with dyslexia. This October, I'm featuring A Walk in the Words, an autobiographical picture book written and illustrated by Hudson Talbott about his struggles with learning to read. 

Drawing was always easy for Talbott, but reading was a challenge.  His love of creating stories was one of the things that inspired him to persevere. He compares learning new words for his stories with finding new colors for his art. He learned that it was okay to tackle words at his own pace which is a lesson that can be hard for many kids to learn. He describes the words he knew as "Stepping stones leading me onward." One of my favorite illustrations is his "Slow Readers Hall of Fame," which includes people like Albert Einstein, Leonardo DaVinci, George Washington, and William Shakespeare. 

A Walk in the Words was a 2022 Schneider Family Honor Book. This award honors an author or illustrator for, "A book that embodies an artistic expression of the disability experience for child and adolescent audiences." Read about this award and find other titles featuring children with a variety of disabilities on the website for the Schneider Family Book Award. 

Hudson Talbott is the creator of over 20 children's books including We're Back! A Dinosaur's Story which Steven Speilberg turned into a full-length animated film.

To find other titles about kids with dyslexia, visit last October's Post on Children's Books Featuring Young People with Dyslexia.

NEW DECODABLE BOOK SERIES

I'm also celebrating Dyslexia Awareness Month by giving away a free PDF of the first book in my Decodable Series, No Gift for Man. The PDF is text only. It also links to an online audio version of the book. The illustrated version will be available on Amazon in November. This is the first installment in the HOT ROD Series (Higher Order Thinking Through the Reading of Decodables.) 

Visit the Sign Up Page on my new website at www.wordtravelpress.com for details. Then explore strategies like Pair and Share Reading. Find downloadable activities to go with the book on my page for COR Instruction. If you already receive my newsletter, a link to the free PDF will be available in the November edition. If you are attending the International Dyslexia Association Annual Conference in San Antonio, be sure to check out my session on decodable books. See details below:

International Dyslexia Association - November 10-12, 2022 in San Antonio, TX
1. Live presentation - #93 - The Goldilocks Effect: Finding the “Just Right” Books for Struggling Readers - Saturday morning, 11-12 pm, November 12, 2022.
2. Recorded Presentation - #165 - Heracles vs. Hercules: The Importance of Cognitive Flexibility (I will be doing this presentation with Kelly Cartwright Ph.D.)