Robert Munsch Munschworks

Munsch's twisted tales are an acquired taste
BETWEEN THE LINES Annie Ho (familypost@scmp.com) Apr 22, 2012
He's subversive, raucous, and unexpected. Canadian children's author Robert Munsch is not for everyone. Although I'm a big fan, I don't recommend him to all my friends because I worry that some may not appreciate the fact that none of the children in his stories make very good role models. A friend once told me that she doesn't let her son watch Elmo's World because Mr Noodle, one of its characters, always does the wrong thing (like putting his legs through a jacket's sleeves), and she doesn't want her son to imitate that. The name "Munsch" does not come up in any conversations with this girlfriend. Ironically, Munsch's best-selling story is a marked departure from the rest of his repertoire of more than 60 loud and funny stories that feature mischievous children who don't necessarily learn any lesson at the end of the story. Love You Forever has sold more than 15 million copies since its publication in 1986, and that doesn't include translated editions. I discovered this book to be a baby shower favourite after I received three copies when my elder daughter was born. It's about a mother's enduring love for her child and that child loving his mother back when she is old and sick. Few can read this story without shedding a tear or two. Smelly Socks and Stephanie's Ponytail were the first two Munsch stories that I shared with my daughter. They both feature little girls who go to great lengths to be different from other children. Tina insists on wearing the same pair of new striped socks day after day in the first story, and the second follows Stephanie's attempts to wear her ponytail in different ways so as not to look like all the other kids. We enjoyed the stories so much that I bought a four-volume collection of Munsch's stories, Munschworks, colourfully illustrated by Michael Martchenko. This collection held pride of place on my bookshelf for two years. But it was untouched while my daughter and I discovered other storybooks. It wasn't until a few weeks ago that my daughter and I started to read the collection. Munsch's stories are perfect for reading aloud because they speak so well to his audience. They contain onomatopoeic words, and plenty of exclamation marks and upper-cased words, perfectly imitating the voice of a wide-eyed, excited child. It's no surprise to learn that Munsch is a gifted and busy storyteller, and many of his tales started out as oral stories that evolved into their illustrated print versions. My daughter loves firefighters and was mesmerised by the two children who play in a real fire engine even after being told that it was strictly off-limits in The Fire Station. My own favourite is The Paper Bag Princess, in which it's the prince who is captured by a dragon and saved by his princess who uses her brains to outwit the dragon. When the ungrateful prince comments on how dirty the princess has become from her ordeal to rescue him, she decides she doesn't want to marry him and skips happily off into the sunset by herself. While there is a growing number of "modern princess" stories in children's literature today, this ending was a minor revolution for when The Paper Bag Princess was first published more than 30 years ago. Two years ago, Munsch went public about his mental health and addiction problems, sharing that he had been diagnosed as obsessive-compulsive and manic-depressive. It's sad that his output had been fuelled by substance abuse. Let's hope that he can be clean and still continue to create wonderful stories. Annie Ho is a board governor of Bring Me A Book Hong Kong, a non-profit organisation devoted to improving children's literacy

Rediscovering the Joy of Reading Aloud: Mem Fox, Mo Willems, Cat at Night, Guji Guji

Thinking aloud: rediscover the joy of storytelling
BETWEEN THE LINES Annie Ho (familypost@scmp.com) Apr 15, 2012
"Mama, read this one, then that one, please." My daughter, from age 15 months to three years, would plead for stories throughout the day and at bedtime. Now that she's four years old, we continue to read to her, but more as a matter of habit: on the potty, at meals, before bed.I can't recall the last time she picked up a book and asked us to read it to her. I didn't give much thought to my daughter's recent feelings about books until I spent a weekend with Mem Fox, the celebrated children's author and early childhood literacy expert. After her weekend visit to Hong Kong, I became determined to reignite my daughter's passion for books. I grabbed the funny, colourful, monosyllabic Time to Sleep, Sheep the Sheep by Mo Willems and read aloud with enthusiasm. I used different voices. I tried to engage my daughter, but she would give only one-word replies in a monotone. I wouldn't call my daughter a reluctant reader; she's too co-operative to run from a readaloud session. She just didn't seem to derive any joy from my reading. I rationalised that my daughter's waning enthusiasm for books was due to a combination of reasons: she now had a growing collection of toys, jigsaw puzzles and other playthings to occupy her time, she was spending more hours at school and extra-curricular activities, and mum had since become busy with the baby. I had the privilege of hearing Fox read aloud some of her best-selling children's books at a few of her talks. I had almost resigned myself to the fact that only a great storyteller could hold a child's interest in books. Then I recalled Fox's comment that reading aloud is all about children enjoying a good story. And it suddenly dawned on me that I was the reason my daughter had become so ambivalent about books. You see, six months ago, my daughter entered kindergarten and started to learn her ABCs and 123s. And that's when I began using our mother-daughter read-aloud sessions as an extension of what she was learning in school. Here is the way I had started my reading of Time to Sleep, Sheep the Sheep: "Time to sleep ... [pause and wait for daughter to fill in missing words]. Yes. It's Sheep the Sheep. Let's read the title again, this time I want you to put your finger on each word that you are reading, OK? Time to sleep, Sheep the sheep. And look here on the cover, Cat the Cat has a baboo [my daughter's nickname for her blankie]. What colour is the baboo? Green. Yes, that's very good. It's a green baboo. OK, here we go. Time to Sleep, Sheep the Sheep, by Mo Willems. Mo Willems is the author. He wrote this story and drew all the pictures, too." I considered how I was no longer sharing a good story with my daughter; I was using our story time as yet another lesson where she was quizzed and asked to focus on learning. Of course, for curious children who want to know more about a storybook, it's wonderful to digress and talk about the illustrations or relate real-life similarities. But by reading with my own agenda, I was slowly killing my daughter's interest in story time. Learning to read is a benefit of reading aloud, but it should not be the goal. My need to test my daughter's growing knowledge had clouded my original goal for reading aloud to my daughter, and that was for her to grow up loving reading and books as much as I do. After coming to this realisation, I pulled out a couple of storybooks, The Cat at Night by Dahlov Ipcar and Guji-Guji by Chen Chih-yuan, and read them to my daughter. I didn't pick books with rhyming stanzas, I didn't introduce the titles and I didn't pause for teachable moments. I simply read aloud in my best "Mem Fox the storyteller" impersonation. When I finished, I could feel my daughter beginning to rediscover the joy of a good story.  Fox shared a memorable saying from her own father: "Stop teaching and let the children learn." Annie Ho is a board governor of Bring Me A Book Hong Kong (bringmeabook.org.hk) a non-profit organisation devoted to improving children's literacy

Children's Books about Hong Kong

It's Hong Kong beyond our wildest imagination
BETWEEN THE LINES Annie Ho (familypost@scmp.com) Apr 08, 2012
I'm in day seven of our staycation over the children's two-week school holiday. I'm see-sawing between exhaustion from an overdose of quality time with the kids and boredom from all the extra time on our hands. The kids are having fun with the make-believe games they are playing at home, but I can tolerate only so many consecutive days of pretend tea-time.While I say thank you to my toddler for the 55th imaginary cookie she is force-feeding me, my mind wanders to new writing projects. What about a children's book on Hong Kong? No, thanks, I decide, who has that kind of time? Well, it seems that that a number of Hong Kong parents find the time, because there is a notable collection of children's books on Hong Kong, some of which are sitting on my bookshelf. Cindy Stephens' Hong Kong for Kids: A Parent's Guide has been No1 on the SCMP & Dymocks best-sellers list for months now, so we know that many Hong Kong parents are mining it for ideas on family excursions around town. Prampushers, a guide that folds out like a map, was written by three mothers who wanted to share their favourite Hong Kong baby-friendly restaurants and stroller-friendly walking routes. It's categorised into green walks and urban jungle exploration, such as the elevated walkways of Central and Admiralty. There are also useful maps of various districts in Hong Kong. This is an especially good resource for new parents. Toddlers and kindergarteners will enjoy the beautiful woodblock print illustrations in Joanne O'Callaghan's My Hong Kong. I have handed out a dozen copies to out-of-town visitors and friends moving away from Hong Kong. Ironically, this book has been a staple in my gift closet, and yet my own daughter had not seen it until her grandmother walked by a bookstore recently and bought it for her. My Hong Kong has many familiar scenes, such as pandas at Ocean Park, the vista looking out from the Dragon's Back hiking trail and the costume stalls on Pottinger Street. This picture book, with simple rhymes describing each scene, was a helpful companion for my daughter during the week she was learning about transport at school. Hong Kong's iconic modes of transport are such an integral part of a child's outings in our city. The Star Ferry, The Peak Tram, double-decker buses and taxis are all depicted in My Hong Kong. For primary school children, I highly recommend Karl Woodbury's Hong Kong is Truly a Magical Place. The book follows the adventures of Jenny and Lenny, two kids who fly around Hong Kong in their dream. The book comes with a CD audiobook and includes illustrations and maps of all the places that they visit. I can only imagine how months Woodbury devoted to his tome. It's a truly comprehensive lesson on Hong Kong. It covers the Tanka boat people who arrived on Lantau Island centuries ago and the history of the Tuen Ng dragon boat festival, and more. Woodbury has not left out a single historic, cultural or geographic fact about Hong Kong, and he has astonishingly presented the entire story in the rhyming couplets of four-beat iambic tetrameters, the metre of nursery rhymes. What shines through in all these books is the genuine affection the authors have for Hong Kong. And it's interesting to see how each of them has chosen to present their knowledge. By sharing their affection and knowledge with us, we are better off trying to find time to read rather than write. Annie Ho is a board governor of Bring Me A Book Hong Kong www.bringmeabook.org.hk a non-profit organisation devoted to improving children's literacy.

Happy April Fools Day! (An April Fool's Joke Column)

A foolproof guide to raising intelligent little monsters
BETWEEN THE LINES Annie Ho (familypost@scmp.com) Apr 01, 2012
I have been searching for decades for a comprehensive guide that can provide parents with the tools to raise intelligent little beings. I had pretty much given up any hope of finding one that was well-researched and reputable. Then, I came upon the Yale-Harvard Friendly Co-operation Joint Study of High-functioning Progeny, of which more than a dozen chapters were devoted to early literacy in children. I read the full study, to be published today, and distilled from it the astonishing findings listed below.  1. Dr Seuss is the best way to learn phonics The study cited Dr Seuss as one of the early proponents of phonics and revealed that he had written all his books with phonics in mind. According to Dr Seuss, children who were read a story over and over would be able to recite it from memory rather than learn to spell out each word on the printed page. To prevent this from happening, he said parents must read aloud each story only once and then ask the child to read the text phonetically. In Australia, one of the leading countries for phonics, all grade one pupils use The C-a-t i-n the H-a-t as their first phonics reader. The Australian version of this Dr Seuss story enlarges the size of the text and reduces the size of the illustrations to help schoolchildren focus better on the relevant aspects of the story. Everyone knows that illustrations are useless. 2. Physical restraint improves attention spans The study found that babies who were physically restrained during early read-aloud sessions had 80 per cent greater attention spans by the age of four. Parents are advised to use some form of physical restraint until a child is capable of giving his or her undivided attention throughout a storytelling session. The researchers stressed that such restraint must be gentle and not cause babies excessive discomfort. Car seats and high chairs with baby-proof seat belts are suitable. However, baby carriers should not be used, because they provide too much promise of love and comfort and will distract infants from the serious task at hand. 3. Uninterrupted reading improves logic formation When comparing read-aloud sessions where the parent paused to answer questions raised by his child with those where the parent read a story uninterrupted, the study concluded that children from the latter group solved logic puzzles 80 per cent faster than those children who illogically interrupted. The study used a test group of children who were allowed to set the pace of the storytelling by pausing to revisit previous pages, asking questions before the story was finished or running off mid-story to engage in another activity. The result was that these children were unable to form logical sequences in their brain because they did not have a proper concept of beginning, middle and end. Always let the child know that YOU are the boss. 4. Animation beats illustration The most significant finding of the study is that children remembered a story better in animated form than in printed illustration. For children, particularly those who were three months to six years of age, illustrations from a book became uninteresting when repeated more than 4.7 times. On the other hand, this same group of children could remain fixated on the moving-image version of the same story for many hours. The researchers postulated that the brain stored memories in moving images; therefore the images from an animated film were easier to remember than printed illustrations. According to the study, if electronic devices were more affordable for a larger percentage of a country's population, then governments would no longer advocate reading aloud with printed books. I fully agree  that electronic devices and educational apps were the best investment for our children's future. After reading this study, I feel reassured about my decision to install TV screens in our children's bedroom, bathroom and the family car and to always have at least two iPads situated within their reach. Multi-use restraints that can be attached to a variety of seating are also highly recommended. I urge parents to pick up a copy of the Yale-Harvard Friendly Co-operation Joint Study of High-functioning Progeny in order to glean more tips for raising superior children. PS - Happy April Fool's Day! Annie Ho is a board governor of Bring Me A Book HK (bringmeabook.org.hk a non-profit organisation devoted to improving children's literacy