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CCBF “Funraiser” is May 1; A Chance to Meet Rosemary Wells!

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A Kids’ Carnival and “Funraiser,” with activities and carnival games for kids, will take place at 586 King Street in Chappaqua on Sunday, May 1 from 1 p.m. – 4pm, with proceeds benefiting the Chappaqua Children’s Book Festival. Families will have a rare chance to meet Rosemary Wells, of Max and Ruby fame, courtesy of Houlihan Lawrence, and there will be lots of carnival fun including Kiwi Country Day Camp’s gaga pit, blow-ups, carnival games, plus raffles and refreshments.

A special appearance by Rosemary Wells at is planned at the May 1 funraiser.
A special appearance by Rosemary Wells at is planned at the May 1 funraiser.

“The Chappaqua Children’s Book Festival has grown to become one of the most anticipated family events in Westchester,” said CCBF Executive Director Dawn Greenberg. “In order to continue championing our cause to promote children’s literacy, we need the support of our community. It’s through fundraisers such as the Kids’ Carnival, as well as through our thoughtful sponsors, that we are able to raise funds to keep our Book Festival as vibrant as previous years.”

COST:
Admission is $20 per family.

REGISTER:
To register visit, EVENT BRITE.
(https://www.eventbrite.com/myevent?eid=24333125032)

WHEN:
Sunday, May 1, from 1 to 4pm

WHERE:
586 King Street, Chappaqua, NY

WHO:
The Chappaqua Children’s Book Festival is the only children’s book festival in Westchester County. From princesses to pups, to angst-filled tweens, and every crazy character in between, you’ll find them all at the fourth annual CCBF, on September 24, 2016. More than 85 popular authors, who bring your favorite characters to life, are expected to participate. Most will be signing their books and reading excerpts. It will be a family event with tons of fun, food, kid-friendly activities, entertainment and, of course, books! For more information, visit www.ccbfestival.org or follow the CCBF at www.facebook.com/chappaquachildrensbookfestival.

New Kids on the CCBF Block

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By Sarah Jane Weill

It’s no surprise that the Chappaqua Children’s Book Festival (CCBF), a growing phenomenon, has attracted a whole cast of new authors for this year’s upcoming event on October 3rd. Highly praised by the media as well as in the literary community, the CCBF gets numerous requests from authors and illustrators to join the festival. The 20 newcomers this year bring more variety to the event in terms of genre, content, and appeal. In hosting a range of authors, the CCBF can cater to the needs of almost every young reader, which will draw a larger turnout to the festival.

Two genres that were particularly sought after are nonfiction and Young Adult (YA.)  Nonfiction has a big appeal for children, so they were pleased to add authors like Jennifer Berne and Susan Stockdale.

These writers focus on concepts that engage readers in their own world. “I like to write about our amazing universe and the people who explore its mysteries and discover its secrets,” Berne says in reference to her books like On a Beam of Light about Albert Einstein. “I try to write books that are as compelling, interesting and inspiring for the adults who read them as for the children they’re reading them to.” In discussing her books like Stripes of all Types, Susan Stockdale says, “I enjoy conveying scientific themes such as how animals benefit from their stripes and spots.”

Since the breadth of the YA readership is so wide, organizers of the CCBF wanted to expand the representation of this genre in order to appeal to even more readers. As a result, the new YA authors vary in terms of their content.

Bianca Turetsky, author of The Time-Travelling Fashionista series about Louise Lambert, a 12-year-old girl from Connecticut, describes her style. “It’s historical fiction through a fashion lens. Louise tries on a vintage dress and gets magically transported back to the last time the dress was worn,” And Turetsky adds, “she gets to meet some of the greatest fashionistas in history.”

Virgina Euwer Wolff writes more realistic fiction. “I’m particularly interested in young people who are trying to understand the transitions that are happening to them…as they go through the twisty route to maturity,” she says in describing her novels such as True Believer.

Henry Neff who, along with author Matt Myklush, adds more contemporary fantasy and adventure fiction to the festival this year. “Both The Tapestry and my upcoming Impyrium series blend elements of fantasy, mythology, science fiction and history in ways I haven’t encountered too often,” Neff says in describing his work. “While [the two series] have many elements of epic fantasy, the stories and many characters have roots in actual historical eras, events and folklore. It’s a lot of fun to blend my love of history with products of my imagination.”

This is only a sample of the great new authors who will complement the many returning authors that should make it a very exciting year for the CCBF. The full list of new authors in attendance this year is as follows:
Nina Crews, Susan Stockdale, Jennifer Berne, Jane Sutcliffe, Sarah Cross, Virginia Euwer Wolff, Henry Neff, Matt Myklush, Susan Kuklin, Emmy Laybourne, Wendy Mass, Bianca Turetsky, Natasha Sinel, Sergio Ruzzier, Caldecott Medalists David Ezra Stein and Ed Young, Anya Wallach, and father and daughter co-authors Jeff and Erynn Altabel.

Avid reader Sarah Jane Weill, HGHS Class of ’14, is entering her sophomore year at Bowdin College.

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Dr. Lyn McKay Shares her Love for Reading

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By Dawn Greenberg

It’s both a comfort and a joy that Dr. Lyn McKay, despite the unrelenting demands of her job as the Superintendent of the Chappaqua Central School District, remains an avid book lover–and even finds time to read, both for professional development
and pleasure.

In fact, Dr. McKay has a Ph.D. in Reading in addition to her Supervision and Administration Cognate. Growing up in New Jersey, reading was always an important part of her family life from her earliest years. Early favorites included the Nancy Drew and Clara Barton, Nurse, series.

She notes that her family read the newspaper twice daily–the early morning delivery of the main paper and the evening independent paper. She was also an avid reader of comics, including Little Lulu.

“As I got older, I became a Dickens fan and then when my children were young and I was studying children’s literature at Columbia, I would read children’s classics to my own children. We loved Make Way for Ducklings, all the Angus books, and Play with Me.” Lyn’s favorite book was everybody’s favorite: The Secret Garden. “I periodically pick it up and read it even now. I just think it’s the best.”

Dr. McKay has three children and eight grandchildren with whom she happily shares her love of reading. She has two favorites she reads with the grandchildren who range from one and a half to 16-years-old.

For the little ones, Hurricane by David Weisner is one that is read very often. For those who are elementary and middle, they read A Christmas Carol together during the holidays when Dr. McKay sets up her Christmas Carol village.

To my delight, Dr. McKay and I had a chance to chat about her own as well as the District’s philosophy as it pertains to reading and her impression of the Chappaqua Children’s Book Festival. Here’s our conversation:

DG: Thinking about reading in our schools, I think obviously our teachers do a fabulous job with it. And in letting the kids drive what interests them I think that’s so important. What do you think our strengths are and what is your overarching philosophy?

Dr. McKay: My overarching philosophy is that students need to read a lot and have a lot of choice in selecting books.  We want children of all ages to love reading.

DG: Everyday?

Dr. McKay: Everyday.

DG: Even in the summer?

Dr. McKay: Especially in the summer.Students should be reading what they enjoy and talking to their parents and friends about their favorite books. During the school year, as well, students should be reading during and after school each day. In our elementary school reading workshop, for example, teachers provide time for silent reading and small group book discussions. They also ensure that students select books that are on their instructional and independent levels. In other words, students are reading books that are neither too difficult nor too easy, which allows them to continually master reading skills. Teachers teach students how to select books that are on their reading levels so students do not struggle unnecessarily.

DG: Absolutely, I mean it’s hard to keep my third-grader from Harry Potter and he is not there yet.

Dr. McKay: Choice is important, too. We provide a variety of genres in our classroom libraries. We want to ensure that children are reading nonfiction as well as fiction. My own 12-year-old granddaughter loves biography. She is not in one of Chappaqua’s schools, but she probably has read more biographies at her age than I have.

DG: I love biographies. I am very much a non-fictional person.

Dr. McKay: The reader’s and writer’s workshops are critically important to us because they include vast classroom libraries that provide students with a variety of choices and ranges of reading levels to choose from. We now have more classroom libraries and choice reading at our middle schools and even at our high school than we did even five years ago.

DG: So you don’t say, “You have to read…,” you say, “You can choose to read…?”

IMG_6299
Parents and friends provided an authentic audience for students in English 9/10 classes at Greeley. Students showcased a favorite piece of writing repre- senting many genres including literary essays, persuasive pieces, definition essays, personal narratives, reader-response pieces, and poetry. Guests also were asked to give the author feedback by writing a few comments on a notecard.

IMG_6296 Dr. McKay: I would say both. Students should read daily and have some choice about what they read. Frequently, students select from a large variety of texts. At times, teachers require particular books and support students as they read them. At other times
students choose from teacher-selected genre. In addition, students should have opportunities each day to read for pleasure. One question you asked was about how we provide for the student who struggles and the student who is an avid reader. It is through the reader’s workshop structure, which allows teachers to easily differentiate and ensure students are reading at the appropriate levels.

DG:  Right, which I think is a strength in our District.

Dr. McKay: I see it as a strength.

DG: And what would you think is a recipe for success for infecting your kids with a love of reading. If they are reluctant, what can we all do to combat that?

Dr. McKay: My answer is, “Read aloud to your children and enjoy talking with them about their favorite books.”  There is lots of research indicating that reading aloud to students makes a significant difference in their comprehension and infuses a love of reading. As parents, we often think of reading aloud as what we should do with two-year-olds or four-year-olds or five-year olds, but reading aloud to older students is important as well.

I remember when my husband was reading aloud Les Miserables. He read the entire book aloud to our middle school daughter and she loved it.  Children get so much more from read aloud than learning the content of a book. It increases language development, motivation, and curiosity. At the same time, parents and children can build strong relationships through read aloud.

DG: Emotional ties to the reader?

Dr. McKay: Yes. Parents sometimes think, especially with preschoolers, that it’s best to work on phonics and focus on letters and the sounds of the letters, but reading to young children is actually more important and having conversations about reading is important too. I am not talking about asking children questions about a plot, but rather having discussions about what a child predicts will happen next in a story or about what a child is curious about, for those kinds of discussions build critical thinking along with the love of reading.

One evening in June, I was in the iLab at the high school. One of our teachers, Jacqueline Abair, was having a reading and writing celebration with her ninth and tenth grade English classes. She had students write their favorite literary quotes on the walls and display their written works on posterboards.

There were parents and administrators there, and what was very exciting was the way she turned the iLab into an environment that celebrated reading and writing. The students who introduced the work stood up and read poems and then said to the audience, “Now I want you to listen to the poem a second time so you can feel it and know what it’s about.” It was a beautiful event.

Dr. McKay: It was a celebration of reading and writing in an incredible environment with a real audience. It was really so exciting!

DG: What do you think about our little book festival that we’ve started? I noticed you there with your granddaughter this year.

Dr. McKay: What really impressed me was the volume of books, the number of authors, the number of students who were just enthralled with the books…and the llamas. For my granddaughter, I don’t know what she liked more, the many books or the llamas, and I really mean that!

Dr. McKay: She loves reading and animals.

DG: Perfect.

Dr. McKay: So if there is a llama and books, you will have a very happy girl.

DG: Any favorite authors you enjoyed meeting?

Dr. McKay: We didn’t have a favorite; we just walked from one to the next to the next. We had a great time.

DG: It’s amazing, right? Each one was better than the last.

Dr. McKay: I agree. It was a terrific community and family affair. The book festival was a true celebration of literacy. What a lovely event!

DG: Thank you. We think we have even more authors this year and we are trying to bring in diversity, different ages and different genres, and it has been exciting to see some of the authors who have reached out to us– Nina Crews, David Ezra Stein.

Dr. McKay: Really?!

DG: Then you get in the position of having to turn people away or giving them half days but it is a good problem to have.

Dr. McKay: You truly have to be excited about that!

DG: Very excited. I would do it two days if we could but logistically it’s impossible.

DG: So I have to ask: What were your beach reads this summer?

Dr. McKay: Of course I am always reading professional books, which I very much enjoy. Right now, David Rock’s Your Brain at Work is very exciting to me. I like neuroscience. I also enjoyed Just Mercy, which is written by Bryan Stevenson–he is the executive director of Equal Justice Initiative in Montgomery, Alabama. It’s a true story of justice and redemption.

Dr. McKay: I also was with many of my grandchildren so I read a lot of children’s books with them.

DG: I really enjoyed talking to you and please be sure to put October 3rd on your calendar for the Chappaqua Children’s Book Festival.

Dr. McKay: I will. It is a celebration I will be sure to attend. Thank you.

Guest Editor Dawn Greenberg is the founder and director of the Chappaqua Children’s Book Festival, founder of Chappaqua Cares, and executive director of the Chappaqua-Millwood Chamber of Commerce. She lives with her husband Paul and son Ben in Chappaqua.

Lyn McKayMore about our School District Leader
Dr. Lyn McKay is Superintendent of the Chappaqua Central School District. She was Assistant Superintendent for Curriculum and Instruction and then Deputy Superintendent for Chappaqua Schools for eight years prior. Before that she worked in Pinellas County Florida as a Reading and Language Arts Supervisor and Director of Teaching and Learning, K-12, where she established a writing demonstration school and led research, development, and implementation of curriculum and instruction, K-12. Since coming to New York, Dr. McKay has been the president of the Putnam-Northern Westchester BOCES Curriculum Council, a consultant to neighboring districts on leadership practices, an executive coach, and currently co-facilitates the Tri-State Consortium’s Steering Committee. She has chaired and presented at numerous educational institutes throughout the country. Her publications include Flexible Grouping for Literacy in the Elementary Grades, Teachers on the Cutting Edge, and Extended Wait-time and its Effect on Listening Comprehension.

Dr. McKay received her master’s degree from Teachers College, Columbia University and her Ph.D. from the University of South Florida, where she became an adjunct professor.

 

Author Jean Van Leeuwen Inspires Chappaqua’s Youngest Writers

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Photos by Jolie Simpson

One of Chappaqua’s most well known and prolific children’s authors, Jean Van Leeuwen, is part of an adorable and sweet surprise for a certain class of first graders each year.

Douglas Grafflin Elementary School first grade teacher Yvonne Davies tells the story: “Jean has been volunteering with me approximately 15 years: she worked with two other colleagues before me that I know of. The children develop a relationship with her over the year as she works with them one on one, giving ideas and suggestions. They know her as a community volunteer, “Mrs. Gavril” until May, when we do ‘the reveal.’

“By then kids have become better readers and have often fallen in love with the Oliver and Amanda Pig book series, written by Jean van Leeuwen.

One day in May, I let them know that they will get to meet Jean Van Leeuwen and the excitement grows. The priceless looks on their faces when they discover that Mrs. Gavril IS Jean Van Leeuwen, and realize they have been working with a famous author all year is one of the highlights of first grade. While kids always enjoy working with her, after they realize who she is, they can’t get enough.”

Shhh…keep it a secret, parents of rising first graders!

Jean has lived in Chappaqua for 38 years, and have been volunteering at Grafflin for close to 20 years.

jean book coverWhile her Oliver and Amanda Pig series are popular around the world, she has written for both toddlers and middle graders we well.

She notes: “Many of them have been inspired by my own two children, David and Elizabeth. When they were very small, I didn’t have much time for writing. The only free time in my day was when they were taking their naps. So I began to write little stories about what they were doing and saying. These stories grew into a book, Tales of Oliver Pig. Over the years, that first book has grown into a whole series of Easy-to-Read books about Oliver and Amanda Pig. Even though my children are now grown-up, I still write from my memories of the fun we had together when they were young.”

The Chappaqua Children’s Book Festival and Hall of Scoops are thrilled to pay tribute to Oliver and Amanda Pig with a “Purple Pig Tales” flavor at Hall of Scoops during the month of September. Proceeds will benefit the JCY-WCP SMART program (Students and Mature Adults Read Together). A kick-off party on Monday, August 31st from 2-4 p.m. will include crafts, games and a reading by Jean Van Leeuwen.

About the upcoming book festival, Jean says: “I of course am a big fan of the book festival! It provides an opportunity for local children to purchase books directly from the author and illustrator and have them signed then and there. They may learn a little bit about how a book comes to be. And the festival promotes reading, and encourages parents to be involved in reading with their children.”

–Dawn Greenberg