Today I am celebrating another successful #MockCaldecott experience with my class! There is much joy in watching children become so excited about books!

This year we had 12 contenders. In the 2 weeks leading up to the holiday break, we read a book each day, sometimes two. We appreciated the story for the story’s sake. These are fantastic stories! But we also paid attention to everything about the illustrations. We talked book jackets, surprises under the covers, end pages, spotlight pages, use of colour, mood, details, style, etc. We talked about preferences. We wondered why illustrators chose the colours that they did. We talked about wow pages that made us gasp. Lots of reading. Lots of talking. Lots of looking closely.

Voting was a careful process. We picture walked each book again and answered 3 questions on a 5 point scale.

This book is a book kids will really like. 1  2  3  4  5

The illustrations in this book are excellent. 1  2  3  4  5

The illustrations are a great fit for the story.  1  2  3  4  5

After the holidays, we revisited our ratings over a morning of looking carefully through the books again. Some ratings were adjusted. Other students held fast to their initial decisions. At this point students were asked to choose their 2 favourites. Not easy!

These boys revisited the illustrations in Emmanuel’s Dream

Looking at tiny details in The Whisper

Rereading Wolfie the Bunny together

Recreating a favourite illustration from The Skunk

Choosing favourites and adding detailed comments.

I tabulated all of the scores and determined final winners. Top pick choices from each student were also a part of the final tabulations.

Our winners were:

Our #MockCaldecott medal went to

The Bear Ate Your Sandwich by Julia Sarcone-Roach 

Honor titles:

Last Stop on Market Street by Matt de la Peña and illustrated by Christian Robinson

Wolfie the Bunnie written by Ame Dyckman and illustrated by Zachariah Ohora

Lenny and Lucy written by Philip C. Stead and illustrated by Erin E. Stead

We were pretty excited to hear the winners announced!

Although some students were pretty sure other titles should have been honoured.

Special Delivery was one of the first titles we read and it remained a favourite all the way through for this student!

It is wonderful when the authors and illustrators respond!

@CarrieGelson That’s super sweet! Please give this cute kiddo my greatest thanks and a hearty CHUGGA CHUGGA CHUGGA! 🙂 🙂

— Matthew Cordell (@cordellmatthew) January 8, 2016

THOSE SMILES, @CarrieGelson! ❤️! THANKS for the WOLFIE #MockCaldecott cheer! SO PROUD of @ZachariahOHora, and love these other books, too! — Ame Dyckman (@AmeDyckman) January 8, 2016

This is wonderful! What a great line up! Thank you! https://t.co/09vHzRmWxa

— Julia Sarcone-Roach (@HousecatManor) January 8, 2016

Some comments from my students:

About The Bear Ate Your Sandwich:

“Kids like finding the bear in all of the different spots on some of the pages.”

“There is lots to watch about ears.”

About Lenny & Lucy

“I liked that some pages were not busy and others were. Sometimes it was just small colours. The forest was grey and each page grows more colours.”

“I loved when a little boy made a guard. He wasn’t good enough so he made two.”

 

About Last Stop on Market Street:

“The pictures show the taking care of people who have no homes and I realize that’s caring. I like the page with the sun and the birds. It is so big and beautiful.”

“Kids will love these pictures because you know . . . the tattoo man!”

About Special Delivery:

“The artist paints outside the lines, all squiggly. I liked that.”

About The Night World:

“It has stars on the end pages.”

“The stars look snowy.”

“I like all of that dark!”

Growing readers. Honouring books. Sharing in our community. This is certainly something to celebrate!

Thank you to Ruth Ayres and the #celebratelu community!

Being part of a community that regularly shares gratitude and celebrations truly transforms my weeks.