Two-year-old Sam doesn’t want to be called a tag-along—after all, he just wants to play with his older brother, Max—and his big brother’s Tag. So, when Sam gets his own Tag Junior he really doesn’t want to share.  Not a bit. 

At first, he has no idea what Tg Junior is for really; let alone what to do with it. But oh—the feel of it.  And the look of it.  So smooth.  So cute. All he wants to do is cover it up with a blanket and talk to it as if it were Billy, his little baby doll.

Eventually, when Tag Junior’s eyes don’t blink and when Sam figures out Tag Junior has no moveable arms and legs, well, something’s gotta give.  And give, it does as I slowly approach this desperate grandson of mine with the little tag-along book that comes with Tag Junior.
 
It’s called “If I Were..." but not in the vein of “If I Were a Rich Man,” but in the vein of “If I were "a lion," or "an elephant," or "a wild horse" or "brown bear,"  (Does LeapFrog have it right, or not?, I think to myself.)

And so, the play and learning begins.  I’m an educational buff—it’s been my life—and right from the start I can see a myriad of advantages for my own little doll. Sam is turning the book’s pages from left to right.  He is using Tag Junior right off the bat to explore every single page—multiple times, because all the “times” provide different learning opportunities. 

At first Sam’s just banging away.  Touching this and that on every page.  But soon he sees that if he wants to hear the story part, he needs to touch the words, not the pictures.  If he wants to learn about the animals, he soon realizes he can touch pictures of them and get some information.  Before you know it, this little book is asking him little questions.  And these little questions are important!  “Can you find the elephant?” is not just a cute question.  LeapFrog knows this.  Sam is already discriminating and getting feedback, ta’ boot.   I am enthralled and Sam is more so.  Turn the page. Turn the page.  Turn the page.  In minutes he’s dancing to the music.  He’s a really, really, really rich little boy! Thanks LeapFrog!

Ruth Nathan, Ph.D.
UC Berkeley, Research Specialist

-- Edited by: LeapFrog Paul
The Tag Junior Book Pal and board books were given to LeapFrog Learning Expert Ruth Nathan by LeapFrog in exchange for her honest feedback. The opinions expressed in this blog are her own.

There’s the value in not only reading stories in their modern renditions, but in their original form, as well. Now that’s an idea. Original works, like "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea," or "Pinocchio," or "Gulliver’s Travels" are great to enter via modern versions (they’re certainly easier to read), but the originals give us not only the best vocabulary lessons in the world, but fuller descriptions, little asides about the times, and sentence formations that lend a richness not to be denied. For fun, let’s look at an adaption of "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea" and then original, by Jules Verne.

Adaption (Sterling, NY, retold by Lisa Church, p.1):  

"The year 1866 will always be remembered for a strange event. For months, sailors around the world were reporting an odd sight. Each of them saw something that was faster and bigger than any sea animal."

The Original (Classic Press version, Santa Rosa, CA, by Jules Verne, p.1):

"The year 1866 was signalized by a remarkable incident, a mysterious and inexplicable phenomenon, which doubtless no one has yet forgotten. Not to mention rumors which agitated the maritime population, and excited the public mind, even in the interior of continents, seafaring men were particularly excited.”

And what about reading the same story, but that’s told in different ways? Consider the fable. Fables come in story form—from picture book versions to collections, from play form to poetry. Let’s have a look:

A picture-book format ("The Hare and the Tortoise," retold & illustrated by Helen Ward, Millbrook, Brookfield, Connecticut):

"There once was a very fast hare… and a very slow tortoise.

The hair hurtled everywhere causing havoc.

The tortoise was an altogether more thoughtful animal. …"

A collection format ("Aesop and Company," prepared by Barbara Bader, pictured by Arthur Geisert, Houghton Mifflin, Boston, p.18):

"A hare, boasting of his speed, was boldly challenged by a tortoise to a race. …"

As a poem ("Love and Folly: Selected Fables and Tales of LaFontaine," translated by Marie Ponsot, Welcome Rain Publishers, New York, p. 67): 

"Despite what you do, lost time disappears for good,
As the hare in this next fable learned to his cost.

“Will you race me?  Tortoise asked him.  “I wish you would.”

“Me race you!” Hare laughed. “Why run? you’ve* already lost. …"

Now, was that hare a trickster? Was he a boaster?  Or, was he just plain nasty? Well, that’s for the writer and the reader to decide.

• “you’ve” not capitalized in this poetic rendition

What could be better than a whole month devoted to loving books? That’s what March has come to mean across the country. March is reading month! While the author of Chicken Soup with Rice (Harper Collins, NY), Maurice Sendack, of course, reminds us that March winds blow down our doors, during this time of year I like to think of what William Faulkner once wrote, “Read,” he said, “read. Read everything!” Now, that’s a slogan for March!

Maybe Faulkner meant we should read all sorts of things, like narratives, newspapers, pamphlets, magazines, plays, poetry, biography, jokes, essays, commentary, reviews, and so on. Or, the saying could mean for us to just read everything we can get your hands on. I like both ideas, don’t you? But, why? Why read everything? Maybe if we read everything we’ll be smarter. Or, wiser. Or, more entertaining. Maybe more curious, knowledgeable, or even critical. What do you think?

I have a few ideas of my own. When I think of reading everything, I think about the value of understanding all sides of a story. What great insight that gives! For example, have you or your children ever read the wolf’s side of Little Red Riding Hood? If not, you can read, and hear, ten-year-old Kelly Sagar’s version (which I accessed via the Storybook Online Network: A Story Telling Community for Children). Our greatest children’s authors see the value in point-of-view, too. Jon Scieszka, of The Time Warp Trio (Puffin, 1991) fame, wrote The True Story of the Three Little Pigs (Puffin, 1996); but, like Kelly, he tells the tale from this wolf’s point of view. You and your children won’t want to miss this "true story," which is surely in your local library or at your local book store. Then, make certain to tell your own versions of, say, Jack and the Beanstalk, but from the giant’s point-of-view. What a fun way to celebrate reading month!

Roses are red.

Violets are blue.

Sugar is sweet.

And so are you.

This is what Valentine’s Day is all about. Nowadays there’s a lot of glitz attached to the day that could, if you let it, sort of ruin the fun. But that doesn’t even begin to have to happen. Here are few wonderful ideas that have worked in our family for over forty years.

Tip One: It’s fun for kids to wake up on Valentines Day to a special breakfast. When my three were little, my husband and I decorated the breakfast room. We made it a rule that the kids could not leave their bedrooms after 8PM on the 13^th. (They could only hear us having fun downstairs.) We began by hanging a few red ribbons with some red and white crepe paper attached. We made sure that everything on the table was red and white, too: a red-checked table cloth, red paper napkins, that sort of thing. We scattered chocolate kisses all over the table, and in the morning we’d tell the kids they could eat those kisses whenever the pleased, even before—you’ve got it—their red cranberry/apple juice. Bread always came with strawberry jam, eggs with ketchup on the side (they loved this). And, most importantly, each child got a Valentine and tons of real hugs and kisses all during breakfast. We also played one of Bill Cosby’s albums to celebrate the day. Do you know his great chocolate cake story? If not, go watch it together!

Tip Two: It’s cool to make your own Valentines for family members. Take a day this next weekend and just do it! Get some watercolor paper, some glue, some paint and sprinkles, and go for it. Look up Valentines Day poems on the Internet, or make up your own verses. Family pictures are great to attach, too.

Tip Three: Make sure to read a few Valentine’s Day books to your children before the 14^th! We loved Marc Brown’s Arthur’s Valentine (Little Brown, 1980)! If you have time, visit your local book store or go the library and check a few that touch YOUR heart, or funny bone.

Tip Four: Make up a Valentine’s day poem together. Here’s one of ours.

While sugar IS sweet

And Violets ARE blue.

Our family’s the best.

So LOVE to YOU,

and YOU,

and YOU,

and YOU, two, too.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Martin Luther King had a dream—a dream that has changed America and the world forever. In his dreamscape, all little children would someday be able to join hands as sisters and brothers.  Differences in skin color or religious beliefs would not divide mankind. That reality would be hard work. It was then, and it continues.

In America one of many starting points that lead to the fruition of Martin’s dream occurred on a cold December day in 1955. The place was Montgomery, Alabama, and the central figure was Rosa Parks. Rosa was tired. As she sat comfortably on a city bus, a man approached her and told her to get up so he could sit down. Rosa was black and the man was white. At that time, white people could make such a request. Out of sheer exhaustion, Rosa simply said “no.” Because Rosa was arrested, black citizens decided not to ride the buses until they were free to sit where they pleased. 

For almost 400 days, these citizens walked! They walked to work, to school, to church, and to shop; and they protested in this peaceful way through rain, blistering heat, and biting cold. Most importantly, the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. marched with them until the city leaders finally gave in.

For ten long years black citizens marched and marched. They were jailed and beaten. Some were even murdered. While some blacks wanted to fight with fists, Martin said, “Love is the key to the problems of the world.” Then, after ten long years, the congress voted to end segregation. “White Only” signs came down across the United States. It’s no wonder that Martin Luther King, Jr. won the 1964 Nobel Peace Prize: People all over the world admired him. He won because he taught us all to fight with words, not fists.

Memories of struggle and freedom define whole sections of our glorious libraries—real and virtual. For a magnificent story about the yearning for freedom combined with a profound survival story, read Circle Unbroken by Margot Theis Raven, with pictures by the artist E. B. Lewis. For a fine book about Martin Luther King, Jr., enjoy Martin’s Big Words, by Doreen Rappaport, illustrated by Bryan Collier. Older readers (a fairly easy chapter book) will want to read F is for Freedom, by Roni Schotter. It’s an historical novel about justice and the power of the pen! You can feel the tension in the voices of two children, one white and one black, hiding from slave catchers:

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“We’re safe here,” Manda whispered to Hannah, hoping that what she was saying was true. “No one can see us, so no one will find us.” 

“Don’t know one need to see us,” Hannah reminded Manda in a whisper. “They got a dog. He can smell us.”

In closing, I urge adults to enjoy a work published in 1903! The Souls of Black Folk, by W.E.B. Du Bois, is nothing short of a manifesto calling for a program of change that would transcend the veils that divide us. Like King, Du Bois had a dream. His would inspire generations of readers, and now all of us, to remember the past, question the status quo, and keep fighting for a just tomorrow. 

Today Stevie Wonder works tirelessly toward the same program of change. In 1981 Stevie wrote, performed, and produced Happy Birthday, which helped secure the third Monday of January each year as Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. Wouldn’t Dr. King be amazed to hear Happy Birthday, know what it helped do, and to be aware that our country just elected its first black president? Dr. King had a dream, yes, and that dream is finally seeing the light of day.

This is what we know:

Kids really like to choose their own books to read.

This is what I can do:

Resolution One:  I will take my child or teenager to the library or local bookstore and/or let my child shop on-line for a book of choice at least twice a month.

This is what we know:

Reading aloud to our preschool and elementary children changes their lives forever. Says the famous writer, Mem Fox (Reading Magic, 2008), “Reading aloud to our babies and our young children will make the entire country better off.  Governments now realize that by providing attention, time, and funds to promoting early literacy, less of their budgets later will need to be spent on illiteracy, crime, depression, unemployment, and welfare benefits” (page xii). When we pick the right books chosen for age, experience, and interests, our children learn to love reading.

This is what I can do:

Resolution Two:  I can read the same book to my pre-school or elementary school child in many different ways.  I can read it to my child or with my child.  We can act out a small part of fun story.  We can talk about what we read, too, and connect to our own experiences a lot. 

This is what we know:

Our children often like to read books that are made into movies, but it’s worth finding out if our child prefers to see the movie first or read the book first.  When kids read the book first, they have the enjoyment of visualizing the characters for themselves.  On the other hand, some students find reading a book is easier once they’ve seen the movie.

This is what I can do:

Resolution Three: I can discuss this with my child whenever we know we want to see a movie that’s in book form, too.  Then I can follow his/her lead.

As parents our goal is the same as William Faulkner’s (Meriwether & Millgate,1999): [1] We want our children to Read, read, read. Read everything.

[1] Meriwether, J. B., & Millgate, M. (Eds.). (1999). Lion in the garden: Interviews with William Faulkner, 1926-1962. Jackson, MS: University of Mississippi Press. 

A few years ago I got a call from my sister telling me she had multiple sclerosis. We had just been together attending a writing conference for a full week with no hint of any illness. We’d not seen each other for several years, though no one on those blissful conference grounds would have known it, what with our laughing nonstop, writing and sharing drafts, and all those late-night pajama chats with the other women staying in our cottage. What saved me on the day of that call, amazingly, was a poem by Stephen Dunn. I knew of the poem, my sister and I had actually read it during our week together, and something pulled me to the collection when I hung up the phone. “Sweetness” begins like this: 

Just when it has seemed I couldn’t bear
     one more friend
waking with a tumor, one more maniac

with a perfect reason, often a sweetness
        has come
and changed nothing in the world

except the way I stumbled through it,
         for a while lost…          Between Angles, Norton Publishers, p. 43

During this holiday season it’s gratifying and sweet to ponder how language saves us every day.  The unexpected call from a long lost friend. The e-mail we’d been waiting for and finally gotten. And what about all those stories we love, the songs we remember, the poems we know by heart, the feeling we have when a new book rests in our hands that we’ve been so eager to read? The “I’m sorry.” The, “I know I was wrong.” The, “Will you forgive me?” Language, our gift, protects, enlivens, educates, challenges us; language helps us live through trials and works its magic over and over again when hear words from a great speaker, be it a preacher, a rabbi, a candidate for public office, a party host, one of our children or grandchildren. Remember those first words? That first two-word sentence? 

How would our children thrive without those lines from literature they beg to hear over and over again: “Are you my mother?” “Little Pig, little Pig, let me come in.”

Sweetness……
Have a wonderful holiday season!

Today is my 42nd wedding anniversary.  I’m 63 years old.  LeapFrog has asked for a short memoir about transitioning to kindergarten.

I remember the moment I entered the kindergarten doorway and saw a big yellow circle on the floor.  I knew I wanted one.  Soon I’d learn that we were to sit on this circle-of-all-circles when we entered the room and stay there until attendance was taken.  We also headed there whenever the class needed “to talk,” had a visitor, or when we played Duck-Duck-Goose. On that line we had to learn to cross our legs just so (I can see my cotton dress make a little bowl as I write this) and put our hands on our knees.  Then we were to sit still and follow directions.

No one at my house said much about going to kindergarten, but there was a nice fuss over shortening my sister’s dresses to fit me and getting a new pair of saddle shoes.  This was essentially my “transition.”  Getting new shoes was always a big deal because my sisters and I got to put our feet on a machine that made our bones look bright blue. (I believe these x-ray machines were outlawed in the fifties.) The shoe salesman (always a man) would measure our feet with a heavy metal platform that had funny lines and a moving part that would go up and down until it hit the bone sticking out of the inside of each foot, right below our big toe.  Then he’d push on all our toes to see how long each foot was.  Soon he’d disappear into a back room (always mysterious) and come out balancing tens of boxes and—oh my gosh—what fun that was trying on all those shoes!

Just before school started we all got our hair cut, too.  I got bangs for the first time before entering kindergarten, and I loved them!  Every hair lay flat and together each one managed to fall such that together they’d make a fine, straight line right over my eyebrows.  We were all to look neat and clean, and I surely did.  Each sister also got a new lunchbox.

I suppose there was one more thing that helped my transition into school, but I’m not sure it was meant for that purpose.  In the basement of our home, our Dad had a little office where he’d do his engineering work in the evening and on weekends.  I loved watching him draw lines and make plans for dams, or buildings, or truck parts before my very eyes.  And he always had to write reports.  Because I liked hanging out with him, he’d give me paper and pencil and encourage me to draw and write little notes (probably to stay out of his hair!).  I remember feeling big and grown-up and happy to a part of the writing “club.” So, new cloths, an expectation to be neat and clean, and an introduction to writing and drawing through playing office was what I got.  And, boy, that first day of kindergarten was amazing.  Yellow circles still have a fascination. 

The title of my blog this week suggests a learning tool that stands tall and delivers essential literacy skills in a fun and engaging way. Parents—and grandparents who care for their grandchildren, as I do two days a week—respect a learning device that children request over and over again and that delivers essential literacy skills. Unless you’re a reading teacher, you might not know what those “essential literacy skills” are, so my purpose today is to outline how the Tag Reading System delivers on helping children learn to read and write.

1. Listening carefully is a crucial skill when it comes to learning to read and write. In both reading and writing, children must be able to listen carefully to the sounds within words, which is very hard to do! A word, like “dad” for example, isn’t heard in tiny sound bites, /d/ /a/ /d/, but as one pulse, “dad.” But “dad,” eventually, has to be read or written sound-by-sound. Any tool that helps children break words apart promotes this segmenting ability. Throughout the Tag library, activities in every book involve children taking words apart and putting them together again. Bravo.
2. Knowing the names and sounds of all 26 letters of the alphabet enables reading and writing development. Letter names often contain the sounds they stand for (as the sound /b/ in B), so knowing letter names, and being able to say them quickly and automatically, promotes literacy. Many Tag stories (such as Ozzie and Mack and Chicka Chicka Boom Boom) through story line and/or book activities include opportunities that promote alphabet mastery.


3. Stories have different structures, and when children experience different structures, it’s easier for them to read with understanding and to predict upcoming events. Many books in the Tag library have the problem/resolution structure. In The Golden Paddleball, the main character, Bloo, isn’t good at the sport. That’s his problem, which he solves. In The Little Engine that Could, our little gal suddenly “couldn’t.” Miss Spider, in Miss Spider’s Tea Party, can’t seem to get a bug to join her! Problems, all. But solutions are plentiful, and fun to discover.
4. Vocabulary knowledge is crucial to understanding, and not considered a “tag-along” at LeapFrog. The Tag Reader introduces children to new vocabulary and includes word explorations, both within stories and in end-of-book activities. In Fancy Nancy at the Museum, children can learn the meanings of words like overjoyed, masterpieces and spectacular in particularly endearing ways.

So, for me, it’s Terrifically Tag! Bravo, LeapFrog.