Sidman Poetry

Book Review: Red Sings From Treetops: A Year in Colors.


Sidman, Joyce. 2009. Red Sings from Treetops: A Year in Colors. Ill by Pamela Zagarenski. Boston. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. ISBN 9780547014944

1. Review of Book:
In Red Sings from Treetops: A Year in Colors, Joyce Sidman writes a collection of poems about the different seasons of the year but uses colored words to describe the senses, feelings, or images one might experience during that season. Throughout she describes how each color personifies the season and highlights each color by using bold and colorful font. For instance when discussing fall she describes the color yellow by saying,

"Grows wheels
and lumbers
down the block,
blinking:
Warning-classrooms ahead."

The poems are then paired with Pamela Zagarenski's bright illustrations. In poems such as the one above, a big yellow school bus is pictured. Her illustrations also add to each poem and connect with children because they reflect the color and season being described. The illustrations show a whimsical character on each page floating through the seasons along with her pet dog, and she along with her surroundings almost look like they were pieced together to look like a collage filled with bright colors. The poems will get kids as young as 7 years old thinking and their senses and environment. After reading and hearing the poems read aloud several times children can and will begin to learn how to tap into their sensory imagery knowledge and begin to make connections with what Sidman envisions when she thinks of the colors of spring, summer, fall, and winter.

2. Classroom/Library Connection:
This book could be shared throughout the school year as each season is being experienced first hand. For instance, right before summer vacation the Summer poem could be shared aloud.

Summer
In SUMMER,
White clinks in drinks.
Yellow melts
everything it touches...
smells like butter,
tastes like salt.

As a follow up activity, each time a poem is read about a certain season during the year, children can try their hand at writing their own sensory and colorful poems about that season. After reading the poem about summer children can then try describing what they personally saw (including colors), smelled, felt, touched, and heard during their own experiences in summer.

3. Review Excerpts/Awards Won:
Claudia Lewis Award, 2010 Winner United States
Cybil Award, 2009 Winner Poetry United States
Minnesota Book Awards, 2010 Winner Children’s Literature United States
Randolph Caldecott Medal, 2010 Honor Book United States

Kirkus (Kirkus Reviews, February 1, 2009 (Vol. 77, No. 3))
Describing seasons by colors is not an original concept, but this whimsical color calendar sparkles with creativity. Zagarenski's mixed-media paintings on wood and computer illustration have a European folk-art style. The described hues are block-highlighted in the text while the artwork details the imagery in the words. A woman and her white dog, both wearing paper crowns, wander through the four seasons, observing nature's palette: "In summer, / BLUE grows new names: / turquoise, / azure, / cerulean." A red bird flying across the pages becomes a continuity motif. In summer,RED is a delicate hummingbird; in fall, "RED swells / on branches bent low. /RED: crisp, juicy, / crunch!" In winter, "RED hops to treetops / ...begins to sing: / and each note drops / like a cherry / into / my / ear." The seasons flow into each other, bringing readers full circle. Fresh descriptions and inventive artistry are a charming inspiration to notice colors and correlate emotions. Details in the artwork will invite repeated readings and challenge kids to muse about other color icons.

Hopkins Award Poetry

Book Review: Jazz



Myers, Walter Dean. 2006. Jazz. Ill by Christopher Myers. New York. Holiday House. ISBN 9780823415458


1. Review of Book:
In the book Jazz, Walter Dean Myers presents a collection of fifteen poems that celebrate the musical genre of jazz. Each poem takes readers on a musical journey from jazz's beginnings to today. In the introduction of the book readers learn a about the history of the genre. After reading each of the poems, a glossary of terms and a timeline beginning in the 1800s are provided to give more information to readers. The poems range in topics from jazz music heard at a funeral procession, to the blues, to the music of the famous Louie Armstrong. Each poem is engaging and energetic and readers will feel the rhythm of the poem and the music while reading the poems aloud. Walter Dean Myers creates that feeling through the words but also by using a colorful and cursive font to off set the sounds and feelings the music can make one feel. For instance in the poem, BE-BOP, Walter Dean Myers writes:

Oh be-bop be-bop, oh whee,
OH WHEEE!
Oh be-bop be-bop,
don't you dig I'm free?
Oh be-bop be-bop,
do you dig my jive?
This jazz that I'm playing
is keeping me alive!...

And the ax that I'm grinding
And the melody I'm finding
Goes screa-----min',
goes screamin,
goes screa---screa---screamin'
To the moon!

Each poem is accompanied by Christopher Myers' large bright paintings in which the figures are seen playing their large and powerful instruments or are dancing or singing to the music. The illustrations are a must to be shown to readers in order to get the full effect of the poems. In addition, a CD accompanies the book of different narrators reading the poems while the jazz music is played. By sharing this CD and the poems at the same time, children as early as 8 years old will learn and appreciate the genre of jazz music and may have a hard time not breaking out into a dance or song.

2. Classroom/Library Connection:
During Reading:
Because of the bold and colorful font used to describe the sound and rhythm of the music and the poem, each poem can be shared using two or more voices. Pairs or groups of students can take turns reading the regular font of the poem versus the colorful lines of them poem. To take it a step further, the poems could be paired with small instruments like conga drums or tambourines and students can play along and create their own rhythms to match the beat and the sounds they hear when they read the poems aloud.

3. Review Excerpts/Awards Won:

Books of the Year, 2006.
Coretta Scott King Book Award, 2007 Honor Book Illustrator United States
Cybil Award, 2006 Finalist Poetry United States
Golden Kite Award, 2007 Award Book Picture Book Text United States
Lee Bennett Hopkins Poetry Award, 2007 Winner United States
Lion and the Unicorn Award for Excellence in North American Poetry, 2006 Honor Book United States
NAACP Image Award, 2007 Nominee Outstanding Literary Work-Poetry United States
Odyssey Award, 2008 Winner United States

Kirkus (Kirkus Reviews, September 1, 2006 (Vol. 74, No. 17))
A cycle of 15 poems and vivid, expressive paintings celebrate that most American genre of music: jazz. Myers presents readers with poems that sing like their subject, the drumming of African rhythms leading into a celebration of Louis Armstrong, an evocation of stride piano, a recreation of a New Orleans jazz funeral and a three-part improvisation among bass, piano and horn. A script-like display type appears sparingly, guiding readers to the sound of jazz embedded in the poems' syncopated rhythms. Myers uses bold colors and lines straight from the muralists of the '30s to create his illustrations, dramatic foreshortening and exaggerated angles a visual complement to the pulsing sounds being celebrated. It's a very different look and treatment from that given to their earlier blues journey (2003), although equally successful at giving readers a visceral sense of its musical subject. A lengthy introduction, glossary and timeline give background to the whole. This offering stands as a welcome addition to the literature of jazz: In a genre all too often done poorly for children, it stands out as one of the few excellent treatments.