Read aloud / storytime has many purposes beyond entertainment and reading development in my professional opinion.  Among those is to sometimes inspire and stretch the minds of the students.  I chose a book this week that was a bit difficult and required some interpretation on every page, but I wanted the children to appreciate the many facets of this unique picture book.

That Book Woman by Heather Henson honors the Pack-Horse Librarians of Eastern Kentucky in the 1930s.  (If you have never read about this New Deal Era project, please read the links provided at the end!)  While this book doesn’t always flow easily as a read aloud, it is still lyrical and full of the flavor of 1930s Appalachia.  Words like a-twixt, critters, a-wander, britches, greenbacks, and poke of berries.  With K-2 I stopped after every page and we explored the words or concepts I thought they would not know.  With third grade I waited until the end and then went back to discuss pages.

This book is a stretch because of the unfamiliar vocabulary, but as we explore unknown words together I am modeling reading skills.  But this book is worth reading for more than that.  Hopefully it will inspire non readers to embrace reading as Cal, the main character, does by the end of the book.  Cal has no intentions of sitting “stoney-still” with his “nose a-twixt the pages of a book” like his younger sister Lark.  But the tenacity and dedication of the pack horse librarian eventually wins his admiration and peaks his interest.  “…all at once I yearn to know what makes that Book Woman risk catching cold or worse.”

“Teach me what it says” Cal asks his sister Lark.  This is my favorite page out of all David Small’s lovely illustrations.  The pure, steady look on Lark’s face as her older brother holds out a picture book so she can teach him to read is breathtaking.  “…she does not laugh or even tease, but makes a place and quiet-like we start to read.”  Cal learns to read that winter.

When spring comes Cal’s gift to the Book Woman is to “read me something.”  My teachers get teary eyed at this part, for after all, student success is why we do what we do.  It is the greatest gift our students can give us.

How do we make our students into lifetime readers?  I readThat Book Womanhoping to inspire my non-readers.  Cal calls them “dumb old books” at first, but by the last lovely wordless page he is sitting on the porch of that mountain cabin beside his sister, each with their noses a-twixt the pages of books.

Wednesday I’ll share the personal narrative I related to each class after we finished this lovely book.

For information on the Pack Horse Librarians of Eastern Kentucky:

http://www.kdla.ky.gov/resources/KYPackhorseLib.htm

http://newdeal.feri.org/library/j_1k_bg.htm

http://www.kykinfolk.com/knott/bookwomen_easternkentucky.htm