New article in California Reading

Hi everyone,

From time to time I publish an article in California Reading Association’s Reading Journal. With over 3,000 members, CRA is the nation’s largest state affiliate of International Literacy Association, which has more than 300,000 members. Most recently I sent a 3-page article called “Reflections from an Author and Poet, Where Are the Stories?” I’m happy to say that it just came out in the Winter Issue of the Journal. My thanks to the editor, NANCY ROGERS-ZEGARRA, PhD, who is also an educational consultant and past president of California Reading Association. Nancy tells me that the article is receiving numerous positive comments from readers. I’m delighted.

I can’t post the article but can say that it was inspired by my concern that in recent years the publishing industry has leaned more toward children’s books that teach at the expense of stories that inspire. It is a personal observation based on personal experiences so I don’t present my thoughts as though they are based on researched information. Still, I’ve been publishing books for children for more than half a century so I consider my observations to have some merit. One point I make in the article is that over the years I have received fan letters about stories I’ve done, anecdotes about how much this story or that has meant to a reader, how a book has been kept in the family and passed down to the next generation, sand-blasted into a sidewalk, painted onto a bookmobile, tattooed onto a leg… And during all that time, no one, not anyone, has ever written to me to say how much one of my nonfiction books has meant to their family. That became the thesis for the article. Children need stories that make them dream. I worry that we are not providing them with enough stories.