Join the Worlds of Words Center Middle School Reading Ambassadors (MSRAP) as we discuss our experience participating in a mock Randolph Caldecott Medal award event to determine our winner for the most distinguished artist of an American picturebook.
The mock Caldecott event was held in Worlds of Words by Dr. Kathy G. Short and Dr. Desirée Cueto. The American Library Association announced the awards on January 22, 2024, two days after we recorded this episode.
Books mentioned in this episode:
An American Story by Kwame Alexander and Dare Coulter (illus.)
Big by Vashti Harrison
The Skull by Jon Klassen
Jumper by Jessica Lanan
My Powerful Hair by Carole Lindstrom and Steph Littlebird (illus.)
For more information about the Randolph Caldecott Medal, including current and past winners, visit the Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC) website.
This podcast was recorded in the Digital Innovation and Learning Lab (DIALL) in the UArizona College of Education with assistance from the UArizona COE Tech Team.
Producer: Rebecca Ballenger, Worlds of Words Center Associate Director
Audio Engineer: Liam Arias, Worlds of Words Center Student Employee and Radio, TV, Film Major
For more information on MSRAP, visit wowlit.org.
We Can Promote Global Literature Together!
The Worlds of Words Reading Ambassador program is completely free for participants who receive a book for themselves and a book to share with their school librarian, ELA/English teacher, or other school entity. If you would like to support this program, please make a gift on-line through the University of Arizona Foundation.
Thank you for listening and keep reading!
Welcome to the WOW Reads Podcast of the Worlds of Words Center of Global Literacies and Literatures, who is committed to creating an international network of people who shared a vision of bringing books and children together, thereby opening windows on the world. We encourage thoughtful dialogue around global literature so that children can reflect on their own cultural experiences and connect to the experiences of children across the globe.
Worlds of Words Center of the Middle School Reading Ambassador Initiative offers middle school students a college experience with the University of Arizona College of Education that focuses on books for young people. Ambassadors learn about literature under the direction of faculty, staff with-- and staff with expertise in children's literature, education, library, science and marketing. We respectfully acknowledge the University of Arizona is on the land and territories of indigenous peoples.
Today, Arizona is home to 22 federally recognized tribes, which is on being home to the O’odham and the Yaqui. Committed to diversity and inclusion, the university strives to build sustainable relationships with sovereign native nations and indigenous communities through education offerings, partnerships and community service.
Today we're with our middle school reading ambassadors. We had an event, a Mock Caldecott Award event that we attended with Dr. Kathy Short and Dr. Desiree Cueto. We'll talk about that in a minute. But how about first we introduce ourselves? My name is Rebecca Ballenger, I'm the associate director of Worlds of Words Center.
I'm Tyler, and I like to read and swim.
I'm William.
I'm Nia and I like frogs. I'm Kenzie.
I'm Christian. I like the color blue.
Okay, so prior to getting together to talk about the Caldecott Award today, what did you guys think about illustrations in picture books, if anything?
I always thought illustrations were just to show what was happening within the book. I never thought any more of that.
I always have thought that illustrations are just like, they're just pictures. But now I realized that they have a deeper meaning.
I thought that they helped build the story and the characters and strengthen your imagination. I, I agree with Tyler. I never thought more than just helping show the story.
So let's talk about the process we went through today. Does anybody want to describe what Dr. Short and Dr. Cueto helped us in terms of thinking about the Caldecott Award specifically and how that process goes... oh?
Today, we had a mock Caldecott Award and essentially different different groups present who what they think is the best book, and that influences everyone's opinions, which they then vote for. And you have to win by a certain margin or else it's a revote.
Was there anything about the process that surprised you guys.
That you had to revote if one book didn't get enough votes, even if it was more than the others? You had to go again and again until it met the requirements that were needed. It was longer than I thought it was.
Everybody had the book had to have the requirements of the criteria. And yeah.
When you looked at the criteria that the Caldecott Committee used, did you think it was superficial? Did you think it was deep? What kinds of criteria surprised you?
Well, I think the criteria did like show-- did, like tell us what we should expect in a book. And it did really help me, like find out if I wanted to pick a book or another.
Talk about the books that you personally advocated for and you're within your small group.
I advocated for The Skull. It was-- the the illustrator used very few colors and showed a lot with only a couple colors. Most of it was like darker in like grayish colors. But when there was like a big moment of discovery, they would bring in like a really bright color. And I thought that really helped engage me and enhance the experience.
And to add on it was like a like the it was more of like gloomy and dark on the outside, but on the inside it's a really heartwarming and it's about friendship.
I advocated for a Day In The Life Of A Back Yard Jumping Spider Jumper, and I just really love the abstract drawings and how it's just a spider.
So Will at that point. Let's go ahead and talk about who won our Mock Caldecott Award competition, what what is one of the honor books that we chose?
We chose Jumper as a honor book.
Right. Okay. So talk a little bit about Jumper, who is the illustrator and what kinds of things stood out for you.
The illustrator is Jessica Lannan and her drawings are just just so abstract and like, they're just they're so beautiful.
They are beautiful. Yes.
Tyler, I can add, I really like the way she showed perspective where one scene, like on one side of the page, there could be a whole action movie between a spider and bugs. And on the other side, there could be a family just having a picnic like unaware, completely unaware of what was happening.
Tyler What was another honor book?
Another honor. Another honor book was My Powerful Hair by Carol Lindstrom. And the illustrator was Steph Little Bird, who combines traditional aesthetics with contemporary materials. She wrote about the importance of hair in native, indigenous and indigenous cultures and how it was like a manifestation of spirit.
Yeah. What was our third on our book?
Our third on her book was An American Story by Kwame Alexander and the art or the illustrator was Dare Coulter.
So that's an amazing illustrations in that book because she used different kinds of materials in addition to regular sort of two dimensional medium. She also used sculpture. So that was unusual. And our big winner was Christian, or should we do a drumroll? Christian? Big!
And it was made by Vashti Harrison. It's about well and she uses like procreate and chart to show like all the different colors and what happened in the book and mostly it's like about people drawing bad or like mean words at her because of how she is big which is underestimating what she could do. She always could have done a lot of other things like ballet, but they didn't really they misunderstood her for it.
So once she figured out that people were like, Once you figure it out that those words didn't mean anything to her, and she could keep going. She threw them back at people and she started using gentle, good, creative, imaginative and other words that like, helped her get through her day.
I love that the book is so pastel and so those colors are so sort of soft. And and then she's doing this really powerful thing of collecting these words and then presenting them back like, I don't need these words, these are your words and not mine. And for her to be holding those in her fists and then just rejecting them and coming up with her own words, I think Vashti did a beautiful job illustrating that moment.
Does everybody did everybody agree? So it was the five of you plus a roomful of educators from like classroom teachers and librarians all the way through teacher educators who are professors at universities. Do you feel that that group accurately presented how you feel about illustrations in these books?
No.
What was different? Christian?
Was different was because, like, they focused on like, books that interested them and what didn't really interest like younger readers because like, let's say like Jumper that would that would actually very well interact with younger readers and Big would interact with readers that couldn't really do things. So but it also focused on a younger audience. But like an American story.
And my. Powerful. Powerful Hair was like more of like, like this is how you should, like, treat others or like, this is like what they used to depict the story.
I felt like being with a more advanced group really helped because the there was a lady in our group who was a Ph.D. student and very well versed within like arts in books, and she was able to help us identify key features within the illustration better than what we could have just done by ourselves.
Okay, let's go to reverse order, and I'm going to ask the final sort of follow up question. Did your perception of illustrations change in any way after this event?
Christian? Yes, because like I said, I could never depict anything with illustrations until today, because I figured out that they brought deeper meaning into what the story is. And it just like shows the bigger picture.
I did learn more about illustrations than just like a plain picture in a book. They do show like a deeper understanding and they bring a lot of life and color to the book. Yes, because they don't just tell the story. They can also show the mood of a story. The colors could say, what's going on, not just show what's going on.
Yes, because I it's not just a picture anymore. It has such a powerful meaning.
It helped me understand. Picture books aren't just for kids.
So we don't know what the Caldecott winner yet. I think we'll find that out on the 22nd. So are you guys going to just are you guys going to be interested to see who actually wins?
Yeah, absolutely.
Heads nodding yes. Okay. Well, we will see if how close we got to picking the winner. This podcast was recorded Saturday, January 20th, prior to the American Library Association Youth Media Awards. Did we get it right? Let's take a look. Four Caldecott books Four Caldecott Honor books were named In Every Life, illustrated and written by Marla Franzi. Jovita
Wore Pants: The Story of a Mexican Freedom Fighter Illustrated by Molly Mendoza, by Ida Salazar. There was A Party for Langston illustrated by Jerome Pumphrey and Jarrett Pumphrey, written by Jason Reynolds and The Truth about Dragons, written by Julie Leung. Did we match with Randolph Caldecott Medal for the most distinguished American picture book for children? Why, yes, we did.
Big illustrated and written by Vashti Harrison is the 2024 Caldecott Medal winner. Congratulations. And we look forward to seeing her at the 2024 Tucson Festival of Books this march. This podcast was recorded in the Digital Innovation and Learning Lab at the University of Arizona College of Education. I want to thank the COE tech team for assisting us with this.
Liam Arias, our sound engineer, Vianey Torres, and Aliayah Johnson, who helped keep us all together, and Dr. Kathy Short and Dr. Desiree Cueto for helping the middle school reading ambassadors through this Caldecott selection process.