Webinar Transcript

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Karly O'Brien: as we have questions pop up, I'll be sure to send them to our lovely presenters' way throughout the session, and I'm really excited for tonight's. This is our first Every Book Counts webinar for this new school year, and we're so glad you're here. And this one is called Reading Pictures, Building Visual Literacy Through Picture Books. So, if you've joined us before.

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Karly O'Brien: Welcome back! We had our first Every Educator Counts webinar a few weeks ago, last month in September, and we had lots of engagement and excitement. It was all about how to get students motivated for the school year, so if you haven't seen that webinar, definitely go ahead and check it out. And this one will also be available in your archive as well, so you can revisit

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Karly O'Brien: after this evening or afternoon, and as well as other additional past archives. So, I'll be sure to share that link, later in the session. So, also, some other logistics. Closed captioning is available via Zoom and LinkedIn, and we encourage you to use the chat box and

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Karly O'Brien: Q&A throughout the webinar to share any questions or reflections.

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Karly O'Brien: So today, we are exploring the powerful role that illustrations play in children's literacy development. Picture books are so much more than the words on a page. The illustrations tell stories of their own, invite curiosity, and create opportunities for rich conversations.

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Karly O'Brien: We'll explore how looking closely at visual details can deepen comprehension.

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Karly O'Brien: spark meaningful discussions, and help children make connections between words and pictures. You will also walk away with practical strategies to make reading experiences even more engaging and meaningful for young readers.

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Karly O'Brien: So, for those of you who may be new to RIF, or Reading is Fundamental, we are the nation's largest children's literacy nonprofit. We turned 60 this year, and we have always been dedicated to inspiring the joy of reading and helping every child become a lifelong reader. One of the ways that we bring that mission to life is by connecting educators and families with research-based strategies, practical resources, and opportunities to

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Karly O'Brien: learn from one another and experts in the field. So today's webinar is one example of how we're working to make these experiences accessible for all.

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Karly O'Brien: So I'm really excited to introduce our special guest, Carol Jago. She is a longtime educator, author, and literacy leader who spent 32 years in the classroom. She currently serves as the Associate Director of the California Reading and Literature Project at UCLA.

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Karly O'Brien: and has held several national leadership roles, including president of the National Council of Teachers of English, or NCTE, and chair of the College Board's English Academic Advisory Committee. She also has served on the National Assessment Governing Board, which oversees the nation's report card.

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Karly O'Brien: Carol is the author of numerous books, including the book in question, why and How Reading is in Crisis, and has written extensively about literature and literacy education.

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Karly O'Brien: Her contributions to the field have been recognized with a Lifetime Achievement Award from the California Association of Teachers of English and NCTE's prestigious Squire Award, which honors individuals who have made a lasting impression on the profession.

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Karly O'Brien: So please welcome me in joining Carol. So excited. And I will stop sharing my screen and turn it over to you so you can take over the screen share.

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Karly O'Brien: Oh, great, you did it for me, great.

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Carol Jago: All right, yes.

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Karly O'Brien: Best no perfect.

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Carol Jago: Oh, Grim!

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Karly O'Brien: Hehehe.

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Carol Jago: All right. Welcome, everyone. Thank you for that introduction, Karly. You know, I'd like to start with this quote from Umberto Eco, who talks about how every text is a lazy machine asking the reader to do some of its work.

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Carol Jago: Now, we're familiar with the idea of the work entailed in decoding and comprehending written text, but what about those visual texts? What about the works of art that so many picture books are? And

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Carol Jago: Shouldn't we ask students to do some work, you know, that four-letter word, work with them? And that's what I want to talk about today is the power of this. So I do have to be careful to say what I don't mean.

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Carol Jago: I'm not talking about using pictures as a way to get around reading the words.

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Carol Jago: I also want to be very careful to say, not every picture book you pick up is worth the kind of scrutiny and careful reading that

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Carol Jago: I'm going to talk about. Some simply have illustrations, cartoon characters of the story being told.

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Carol Jago: I'm talking about a different kind of text, though. Close… texts that are worthy of close reading. So again, think about, how we've applied this

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Carol Jago: to written text. And now how we can apply the same principles to

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Carol Jago: Works of art inside a picture book. So the moves that one makes as a reader is, first of all, just what does it say? What do I see on the page?

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Carol Jago: And then, just the way we think about writer's craft, to think about how how the author, the illustrator, says it. How what what are the the the what is the artist's craft that's being used here?

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Carol Jago: And finally, what it means or suggests. So this particular book, Something Somedays, is actually a poem. You probably remember Amanda Gorman was President Obama's inaugural poet.

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Carol Jago: And some years later, she wrote this poem.

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Carol Jago: That is about…

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Carol Jago: What happens when you see a problem in the world, you see something, and you think needs to be changed? But everybody's telling you, no, no, no, you know, you can't do it. And how actually individuals have agency to make change in the world.

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Carol Jago: That poem… Makes no reference whatsoever to a child.

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Carol Jago: Cleaning up in in his neighborhood. That's that story.

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Carol Jago: is entirely conveyed through Christian Robinson's brilliant illustrations. You're told that this is not a problem.

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Carol Jago: But you're sure there's something wrong. And so.

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Carol Jago: What is fascinating to me is how Christian Robinson imagined a visual story to accompany Amanda Gorman's words, which were more like an argument.

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Carol Jago: It's a just a fascinating example. Sometimes you feel like you're all alone.

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Carol Jago: But someday, somewhere, you find a friend.

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Carol Jago: Someone who'll help you, who will…

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Carol Jago: will hope with you, who believes in your dream, someone who will fight with you.

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Carol Jago: So, the protocol for… the classroom protocol for this kind of close reading of a visual text is to ask students to look at the illustration for

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Carol Jago: 2 minutes. Now, this will seem an eternity. The average person at an art museum

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Carol Jago: artists, art curators record this, looks at a painting for 7 seconds.

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Carol Jago: So we're asking someone to look, look closely.

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Carol Jago: And then… I ask… have students list 10 things you notice. Now, that number is totally arbitrary.

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Carol Jago: All I want them to do is keep going back to the picture, to the illustrations. Hmm, doesn't it look like that guy's just throwing that bottle off right on the street sign? Who's watching? What's going on?

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Carol Jago: And then to talk about what you see. It's really that simple. This isn't a complicated lesson.

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Carol Jago: But it's a powerful one because again and again, Children, one.

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Carol Jago: realize when they… in those 2 minutes that they've seen a lot of things that, on a cursory glance, if you're doing a read-aloud or just moving quickly through a text.

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Carol Jago: They might not have noticed.

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Carol Jago: And then, as you begin to talk with him about.

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Carol Jago: How did that what made you notice that?

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Carol Jago: Suddenly, It's as though the meaning emerges, almost like a flower opening for students.

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Carol Jago: Again and again, I've noticed that students are more willing to take interpretive risks with visual images than with written images. The other thing they're willing to notice, willing to do, is they're willing to believe me when I said.

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Carol Jago: I don't know.

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Carol Jago: I'm with you here. I'm doing the best I can. But I cannot tell you how many times when, let's say I'm reading.

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Carol Jago: a review of an art exhibition, and some art historian is talking about a particular painting.

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Carol Jago: The number of times, like, my mouth drops open.

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Carol Jago: I didn't know that. I didn't notice that. I didn't see that part of the picture. That's what we're trying to get at with with this, this protocol.

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Carol Jago: Another aspect that I'd like us to think about.

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Carol Jago: is how…

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Carol Jago: Visual images can also be metaphors. We're used to thinking of metaphors, comparisons as something that only happens with in words.

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Carol Jago: But.

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Carol Jago: We can start asking, what idea has the illustrator made visible?

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Carol Jago: That cannot actually be seen. Now, often an image is both

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Carol Jago: representative of itself, as in the Caldecott winning book, Fireworks. The fireworks represent fireworks.

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Carol Jago: But… Along with being fireworks.

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Carol Jago: Think about the feelings or ideas.

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Carol Jago: that these fireworks are showing, are illuminating, are inviting students to think about. There's something else I want to show you that I think is interesting. So right after that page in the book.

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Carol Jago: is this double-page spread of two beautiful children looking up in the sky, and I don't know how… it's hard to show this, but it's important.

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Carol Jago: I can do it.

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Carol Jago: The book… that page opens up like this.

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Carol Jago: And so then to ask students, why do you think the publisher, the writer, wanted that page in the book to open up like that?

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Carol Jago: And of course, he'll say, well, of course, because when you were looking at fireworks, you look up. And so they wanted that sense of.

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Carol Jago: above, because

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Carol Jago: This book is, yes, about literal fireworks. It's two little, a brother and sister. It's the 4th of July in Chinatown in New York City, and the fireworks are going off.

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Carol Jago: And every one of us knows that moment in a fireworks display when you think it's over. And that's what that page suggests. Are we done? And then whoosh, you get a massive…

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Carol Jago: image And so Those fireworks represent All the wonder, All the waiting?

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Carol Jago: The feeling of excitement because so much of this book is about the anticipation for, for it.

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Carol Jago: Let me give you another example, one that I'll bet is on every single one of your classroom library shelves. Peter Reynolds, the dot.

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Carol Jago: Because, of course, this little girl who…

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Carol Jago: That dot represents so much more. The tiny mark that Vashti initially believes is insignificant.

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Carol Jago: It becomes a visual metaphor for possibility, agency.

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Carol Jago: in the beginning of creative confidence. It's increasing prominence.

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Carol Jago: Parallels her changing conception of herself, which then, as I'm sure you all know this book, that in the end she shares with another child.

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Carol Jago: Oh.

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Carol Jago: I think introducing ideas like metaphor and how something can be real, it can be a dot, it can be a firework, and at the same time, it can represent

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Carol Jago: Other things, feelings, emotions, things that you can't draw a picture of.

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Carol Jago: but that are implied by it. So let's…

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Carol Jago: Let's take a try this for ourselves.

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Carol Jago: So, This is another amazing book, The Outermost Mouse. And.

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Carol Jago: Everywhere I go, teachers tell me, oh, my gosh, kids, they can't concentrate anymore. They don't have the stamina. They don't say, stay with anything.

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Carol Jago: There is a power to patience.

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Carol Jago: So one of the things this protocol does is it offers students the permission and structure to slow down. Slow down and look, look closely.

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Carol Jago: Because complex texts hold details, relationships, structures that are going to take time to perceive. Just because you've looked doesn't mean you've seen it.

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Carol Jago: And again, I just want to come… keep coming back to the idea that it's not… not every picture book is worthy of this kind of scrutiny, but the ones that are

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Carol Jago: Change children's lives, change our lives. It also… this work.

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Carol Jago: Helps students value critical attention. Patient investigation, and skepticism toward immediate surface appearances. These are all good things. Good things that have become.

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Carol Jago: Even more important in this age of.

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Carol Jago: smartphones, this age where everything goes fast, fast, fast, this age of AI. We need to help students develop their own powers of patience.

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Carol Jago: So this book, this picture book, The Outermost Mouth by Lorne Walk.

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Carol Jago: is a story about, essentially, climate change. It's about a cabin, that's… where it's built is eroding from the sea.

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Carol Jago: And it's told from the point of view.

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Carol Jago: Of a mouse.

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Carol Jago: She loves a mouse who loves her life at the tip of the beach. And she loves this house where she lives and nests. So I'm going to show you a double page spread from the book, and I want you just to look at it.

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Carol Jago: What do you see?

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Carol Jago: Why do you see it?

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Carol Jago: What do you think it means?

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Carol Jago: Now, I want to suggest

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Carol Jago: Another move, another instructional move with an image, a rich, beautiful visual image like this one.

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Carol Jago: Which is to ask students.

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Carol Jago: You know, see that little mouse?

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Carol Jago: How would this… Picture, how would this story be different?

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Carol Jago: If there was an elephant on the beach there.

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Carol Jago: Or if it were a tiger, or if that's if the sky was dark and ominous. Sometimes you can get at, invite conversations with students.

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Carol Jago: about what is by asking them to think about how would it be different? You know, like, understanding the choices, the choices that the illustrator is making, whether it's to have that extended, open page for fireworks.

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Carol Jago: Or like this, to tell the story from the point of view of this mouse.

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Carol Jago: It's…

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Carol Jago: It's a story that actually Lauren Wolf talks about that was inspired by her own experience with a cabin on the shore like this that eventually was washed away by a storm.

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Carol Jago: Another, You know, talking about the power of patience.

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Carol Jago: I love that this is a new picture book called We Go Slow.

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Carol Jago: And it's a simple story about a little girl who goes through… goes on a walk with her grandfather, but invites so much, visual inquiry, if you will, of

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Carol Jago: What do they see because they're going slow?

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Carol Jago: And, for me, this is really important, because

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Carol Jago: So often, well, okay, I'm sitting here in my office, on a street that, is where kids walk to school, two blocks down in front of me. So I love watching the parade of kids, Kitty Winkles going to school in the morning.

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Carol Jago: And the number of parents walking with them.

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Carol Jago: who… Have their phone.

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Carol Jago: in their face. And it is really

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Carol Jago: These are precious moments that we have with children to be present for them.

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Carol Jago: And it seems to me that we're really in danger of losing so much. Last week I read a book by Sherry Turkle called Artificial Intimacy.

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Carol Jago: who we become when we talk to machines. She's somebody, she's a professor at MIT who researches the human effects of technology.

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Carol Jago: the effect on human beings of the development of technology. She's written Alone Together, in the early days of cell phone… when cell phones came out, then Reclaiming Conversation.

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Carol Jago: And this latest book, which, by the way, it's an Ezra Klein podcast right now, an interview with her.

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Carol Jago: And what she worries.

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Carol Jago: is that the more we talk to bots.

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Carol Jago: instead of talking to one another, we're losing the skills of communicating human being to human being. And our children, who

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Carol Jago: Communicating is difficult. Anybody, I have a five-year-old grandson. Listening can tell a story and it takes forever. We need to have patience.

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Carol Jago: And we need to help children develop those skills.

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Carol Jago: Human to human communication conversation is messy. It's fraught. It's you can be misunderstood, all kinds of things.

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Carol Jago: But… It is real. Whereas a conversation with a bot.

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Carol Jago: A bot, a chatbot who will always be sycophantic, who will always tell you how, oh, that was so smart. That isn't real.

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Carol Jago: We know that.

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Carol Jago: But do children? I read a statistic that one in five teenagers.

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Carol Jago: have relationships with bots.

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Carol Jago: It's very, very worrisome. So what can we do?

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Carol Jago: What can we do?

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Carol Jago: I'll bet you've all heard of the Suzuki method for teaching small children often to play the violin.

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Carol Jago: And Suzuki was himself something of a philosopher saying, you know, I want to make good citizens if a child hears fine music.

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Carol Jago: Reads beautiful artistic picture books from the day of his birth and learns to play it himself.

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Carol Jago: Learns to write his or her own stories.

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Carol Jago: He develops sensitivity, discipline, endurance. He gets a beautiful heart. And isn't that what we want for our children? So what is the Suzuki method? Talks about immersion.

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Carol Jago: Immersion in wonderful books.

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Carol Jago: Encouragement. Encouragement of children to take interpretive risks. Why do you think the artist did that? Why is it a mouse and not an elephant?

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Carol Jago: But to take small steps.

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Carol Jago: You know, we… teachers sometimes, like, leap to the main idea, or leap what's the theme, or to…

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Carol Jago: Step by step. Let's make sure we see what's on the page before we leap to what it says about the world.

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Carol Jago: Imitate examples, I'm going to show you

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Carol Jago: A model for that in a second.

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Carol Jago: Which allows students to internalize the principles, internalize the principles of close reading.

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Carol Jago: of looking carefully, of taking time, and then ultimately to contribute novel ideas.

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Carol Jago: So here's a book that I think Offers a classroom, lesson that…

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Carol Jago: helps… that is exactly modeled and could be modeled for the Suzuki method. So it's a… the poems are written by the poet Joyce Sidman, and the illustrations are by the wonderful Melissa Sweet, who's the Caldecott winner for Balloons Over Broadway.

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Carol Jago: So let me, and what it is, is a series of poems that are letters from Between friends.

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Carol Jago: But they're not necessarily the human friends you might think about. So the first one is a letter from the oak tree to the acorn.

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Carol Jago: Dear Acorn.

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Carol Jago: I feel you there. A tickle at my twig tips. A plump promise against my rough bark. Your whole life ahead of you and weeks till you fall. Take a good look around.

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Carol Jago: Acorn, drink in the view.

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Carol Jago: The next stop is Earth. Then years upon years until you see this sky this high again.

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Carol Jago: And of course, on the next page, it's Acorn riding back to the oak tree. I live in Oak Park, so this has particular meaning for me, is right now, the sidewalks are full of acorns, and the squirrels are going crazy. But look at… look at this illustration.

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Carol Jago: Again, inviting students to practice.

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Carol Jago: Examine, to think about, to talk with a partner about what does the image, how does the image.

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Carol Jago: How is it in conversation with this letter? And then what you can do.

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Carol Jago: is

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Carol Jago: have students write their own letter poems, you know, to choose a subject in the world around you. It could be, you know, from peanut butter to jelly. Think about why it's important. Write a poem addressed to your subject.

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Carol Jago: And I love… by the way, I didn't make this up, this is inside the book, in the end pages. Start with a compliment or two. Do you notice how, the oak tree's letter to the…

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Carol Jago: to the acorn starts out with compliments. Then ask a question or two.

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Carol Jago: End with a wish or two, and then illustrate the poem.

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Carol Jago: And then you can take it back and forth. It's a lovely class project, and again, one of the things I worry about so much is that we're going to lose writing, and we know how critical students' writing is to their development as readers. It's just really critical. So I want to talk about a couple other books that I think have real

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Carol Jago: real potential for This kind of work and, and that are the kind of picture books.

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Carol Jago: with illustrations that reward this kind of close reading, that are worthy of your time and your students' time.

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Carol Jago: This isn't a new book, but Candace Fleming and her husband, Eric Roman, are artists.

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Carol Jago: He is an extraordinary artist. And this book, Honeybee, as you can see, won many, many awards because along with being beautifully written about the lifestyle of a bee.

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Carol Jago: All the illustrations are biologically Perfect. Correct. Scientifically correct.

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Carol Jago: I think we need to bring more books like this, books about real things, into our curriculum and in our classroom. And there are a whole lot of children who would really rather read about… learn about real things, and…

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Carol Jago: I know some of us love fantasy, but we need to have opportunities for all kinds of readers, but these images will teach students a lot about science.

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Carol Jago: And this is a beautiful new book. It. So it was Flora and the Jazzers. And it's a story, kind of a Cinderella story. And the. The artist, Astrid Jekyll's.

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Carol Jago: has been…

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Carol Jago: drawing pictures of anthropomorphized animals her whole life, apparently. And Flora's a maid, and what I wanted to show you is

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Carol Jago: This double page spread because it's a it's an unusual or it's a different way of where text is combined with the story being told.

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Carol Jago: And so much detail that if you only read the words, you would be missing a huge part of this of this story.

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Carol Jago: It's as a Cinderella story, she gets taken up that the musicians are coming to play at this fancy hotel where she.

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Carol Jago: works in the kitchen, they hear her humming, invite her to be part of the band, and she ends up being a star. It's a lovely story, among other things. But I think that

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Carol Jago: There are many different ways to think about reading the close reading of illustrations. Another book that I think.

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Carol Jago: does something really important and marvelous is Adrian Simcox does not have a horse.

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Carol Jago: So this is a story of a little girl who, every one of you has had a student like this, is a know-it-all. And just, I can't believe that the phone never rings.

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Carol Jago: If…

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Carol Jago: And so she is pissed off by one of her classmates, Adrian Simcox, because he consistently insists that he has a horse. And she says, Adrian Simcox does not have a horse. I know where he lives.

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Carol Jago: But her mother is very wise, and her mother

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Carol Jago: Says, let's go for take the dog for a walk. And they walk past Adrian Simcox's house.

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Carol Jago: And… When she's there, now look at the it's such a simple illustration.

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Carol Jago: And look at the emotions that you can read on these children's face. She's just ready.

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Carol Jago: To have to tell Adrian Simcox, you do not have a horse.

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Carol Jago: But… She doesn't.

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Carol Jago: And instead, She says, Adrian, you have the best imagination in the world.

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Carol Jago: I… for me, This ability to convey Emotions.

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Carol Jago: in simple, simple drawings is something that, again, can very easily be overcome, or you just pass by, and again.

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Carol Jago: are…

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Carol Jago: Our insistence on, we've got material to cover. We've got so much we have to study. Sometimes we need to slow down.

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Carol Jago: And look again.

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Carol Jago: Look more closely.

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Carol Jago: Now, the next book I want to talk about is…

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Carol Jago: I hope you know Sean Tan. He's an Australian illustrator who he wrote The Arrival, which is a wordless picture book, but not really as much for young children as it is for older children.

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Carol Jago: And this book, Hometown, is a little bit similar in the sense that this young woman illustrated on the front page lives in a world.

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Carol Jago: of fabulous creatures, larger-than-life creatures, and it's… you never really understand necessarily how she got there. Maybe from outer space, maybe this is all happening in outer space, because one day.

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Carol Jago: A spaceship arrives.

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Carol Jago: And… A kind of humanoid creature wants to take her back and she

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Carol Jago: Has to make the decision whether to go or stay.

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Carol Jago: The illustrations in this book.

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Carol Jago: demonstrate an imagination that, like, I just don't even know how it's possible for an illustrator to think it. And what strikes me is that

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Carol Jago: Sometimes we forget What how complex a text picture books are, how how worthy they are of close scrutiny.

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Carol Jago: of rereading.

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Carol Jago: Because they see the imagination of our children. I think we're in a place

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Carol Jago: Right now, we're… I hope we're going to become increasingly, adept

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Carol Jago: at teaching students how to read.

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Carol Jago: The next question becomes, To help them want to read.

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Carol Jago: Because… All will be for naught.

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Carol Jago: If we can't help children and put books in front of them.

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Carol Jago: That make them want to look closely, to think about books, to keep coming

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Carol Jago: to these stories and to reach for the next one, to reach for the next and the next and the next. Those are students who…

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Carol Jago: in third or fourth grade become avid readers, they simply know so much more about the world, about history, about culture, and not because they've been keeping notes.

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Carol Jago: They know so much more because they've absorbed it from all of the fabulous books that you've put.

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Carol Jago: In their hands.

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Carol Jago: So, I'd like to take a couple minutes if people have questions or comments.

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Karly O'Brien: Well, yes! Well, first of all, before I take the question that we did get from LinkedIn, I just want to say thank you so much! This was amazing, Carol. We had so many folks in both Zoom and LinkedIn, just…

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Karly O'Brien: smiling ear to ear with, all the messages that you were delivering, so thank you so much for your time, before… just wanted to say that before I dove into the question, so… Okay, but the question we did have, was around, older students and picture books, so…

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Karly O'Brien: my… I thought about what you were saying, so I'm gonna say something first, and then I'm gonna ask the question that.

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Karly O'Brien: that is here, but I feel like you did mention some picture books that did scale a little bit older, and picture books, as we all know, are often more associated with early childhood, but especially after today, we've learned that there's a lot of richness in

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Karly O'Brien: the relationship between words and illustration. So what when it comes to older students, middle school, high school, what do you think that they can gain from engaging with picture books?

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Carol Jago: I think a picture book can be an extraordinary way to introduce a topic that you're then going to study a classic text on. So that's one way to open up the conversation, to introduce big ideas.

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Carol Jago: But you have to be careful, too, because what can happen

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Carol Jago: is that students who don't see themselves as very able teenage readers will feel you're treating them like babies. So, it's just… everything is delicate. Everything requires a teacher to know your students, know the circumstances.

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Carol Jago: And to introduce the book, a book like Shantan's Hometown is saying, you know, this is a really complex text here.

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Carol Jago: It… the format may seem to be for children, but, boy, this… he's…

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Carol Jago: addressing some really high-level ideas. So you need to introduce it like that so as not to make students feel bad about themselves.

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Carol Jago: It can be troubles. It can be trouble.

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Karly O'Brien: No, absolutely. But I think that's spot on. And we did get another follow-up question in the chat from a wonderful guest, and it says, have you faced questions slash skepticism from teachers or parents about wordless picture books and their role in literacy or reading?

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Carol Jago: Oh my gosh, I love some of the why can't I'm not.

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Karly O'Brien: Same.

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Carol Jago: I mean, you know, there's one on chalk. Oh, I why? I'm just blanking on the author's name. I don't know.

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Karly O'Brien: I'll try to find it right now.

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Carol Jago: Okay, but one's a typewriter. Oh, they're great.

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Carol Jago: I think the way to approach any criticism or skepticism is to say this is more complex than a book with words in it, because a student is having to read the images to find the narrative arc for themselves. Again, everything requires common sense.

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Carol Jago: Of course we want kids to read words. Of course I want them to read 800-page books and not be intimidated. But I also want them to see that narrative

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Carol Jago: can be conveyed in other ways, too. Narrative can be conveyed by visual images. So, it's work. It's, again, goes back to every text.

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Carol Jago: Requires the reader to do some of the work.

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Karly O'Brien: Awesome. Thank you.

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Karly O'Brien: The next question I would actually love to take the lead on answering, and then if you have any other… any other recommendations, but someone's asking where do you, recommend teachers to go to identify high-quality picture books? And I am going to say us. Reading is fundamental. We have a, free and open access, website called Literacy Central. When I'm done talking, I'll drop

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Karly O'Brien: the link in the chat. And there we have…

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Karly O'Brien: Tens of thousands of resources aligned to, very popular and hopefully new and expanding your picture book options.

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Karly O'Brien: available on Literacy Central. Many of the books, actually all of the books that Carol talked about tonight are recommended on Literacy Central, and then also some of them have accompanying educational resources as well. And we also have collections that are.

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Karly O'Brien: recommended around topics, themes, holidays, editorial collection months, or celebration months, whatever you need. And our team goes through a very

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Karly O'Brien: selective guidelines that we evaluate our books that we embed into our programs, so I would definitely say everything on our website is probably high… not probably, I know for sure it's an awesome, high-quality picture book, but Carol, besides Riff, are there any wonderful.

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Carol Jago: I pay you.

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Karly O'Brien: volume.

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Carol Jago: I pay very close attention to all the book awards. Kirkus Book Awards.

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Karly O'Brien: Absolutely.

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Carol Jago: Book Awards, and not just the winners, but all of the nominees, you know, all the long lists. The winner gets chosen for all kinds of compromises and the rest.

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Carol Jago: But they're probably all wonderful. I have the very good fortune to live in a community that has a five star library, so I don't have to buy all these books because the library buys them. And I just go into the children's section and I don't want to take them out because I don't want to take them away from kids.

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Karly O'Brien: From then, right.

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Carol Jago: Yeah, I just sit there and read. And then some of them I have to, as you can see, I have to buy. But, that to me is the award nominees. They they never get it wrong.

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Carol Jago: The Orbis Pictus Award is fantastic for nonfiction. National Book Award, just…

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Carol Jago: And I love that the Mock Caldecott, you know, also a school library journal, has a lot of blogs where librarians love to talk about and make all their guesses about who win the Caldecott this year.

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Karly O'Brien: Yeah, we were actually just talking earlier today in a meeting about how January is like a delayed Christmas at Riff because when the awards come out for the books.

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Karly O'Brien: We make sure that we order all of them, we make all instructional resources for them, we divide and conquer, and we read all of them, and it's just a good way to get, like, the rest of the staff involved also, in reading the new books for the year. So, we were… we were just talking about that earlier today, so I…

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Carol Jago: For me, it's like Super Bowl Sunday. Some people look like.

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Karly O'Brien: Yeah, exactly.

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Carol Jago: For me, when they announced the Newbery and the Caldecott winners, that's my Super Bowl.

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Karly O'Brien: Yes, I could not agree more.

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Karly O'Brien: We had another person in the chat just echoing your, sentiment around, like, your librarian, but also adding, like, talking to the school librarian. And I'm gonna put our friend on the spot that shared this, but she's… she or he cannot see the first name, but I'm at a school librarian, excuse me, I am a school librarian, and I read a lot of picture books.

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Karly O'Brien: sifting through many, as you say, to find ones that I want to share with students. If you tell your school librarian what you're looking for with, advance notice, they can keep an eye out for books that might work for you. I think that's a great idea.

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Karly O'Brien: I do too. And a lot of time, it, allows students to make the connection that librarians are our big… one of our biggest literacy teachers, so I… seeing, like, the connection between what they're learning in library and in classroom is also really powerful, so…

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Karly O'Brien: I think that's a great recommendation. And thanks for joining. We love having librarians join our especially our our book recommendation webinars.

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Karly O'Brien: Lovely.

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Karly O'Brien: Well, it looks like those were all of the questions. But feel free to reach out, to either myself or Carol if you have any other questions after this. But before you go, I just wanted to quickly share, I'm gonna switch with you, Carol, really quick.

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Carol Jago: Okay.

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Karly O'Brien: practice.

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Carol Jago: I have to stop sharing.

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Karly O'Brien: You're good. I think I took over. Yep. Okay.

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Carol Jago: Okay.

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Karly O'Brien: So if you, if you enjoyed this webinar, we have at least one, probably two every month for the rest of the school year. So we have another one coming up at the end of October. And that one will be facilitated by Dr. Susan Newman. So we are very.

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Carol Jago: excited.

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Karly O'Brien: And then I know, so feel free to sign up, Carol, and come and join.

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Carol Jago: I will.

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Karly O'Brien: And she's gonna kick off our, six month reading campaign that just launched in October. So we're really excited about that. And then we have two in November, one educator focused webinar talking about, rethinking leveled reading as a concept. And then we also have another webinar similar to this, but talking about the power of the power of oral story storytelling. Oh my gosh, that was a tongue twister.

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Karly O'Brien: Power of oral storytelling.

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Karly O'Brien: And we have lots of authors from August House that we will be partnering with to facilitate that webinar. So we are looking forward to seeing you all joining us again. And thank you again, Carol, for everything.

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Carol Jago: Oh, my pleasure!

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Karly O'Brien: We are so honored, so honored, and be on the lookout, everyone. Carol is also writing a guest blog, and she'll be a guest on our podcast, Reading Inspires, as well. So if you didn't get enough of Carol, I know I didn't after tonight, please check out the other resources as well, so…

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Karly O'Brien: And thank you all for joining wherever you joined in from, and thank you for your time, we really appreciate it.

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Carol Jago: Thanks.

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Karly O'Brien: See you all next time.

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Carol Jago: Sounds great. Thank you. Thank you.

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Karly O'Brien: And yes, for someone in the chat, it will be recorded, so be on the lookout, yes.

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Karly O'Brien: Have a good evening. Bye.

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Carol Jago: Bye-bye.