TUESDAY
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Publisher and copyright information |
The project examining Wordless Picturebooks,
which is presented on this page, was designed by students at Salisbury
University on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. The primary audience for the
materials on this page is elementary school teachers. We have included
book
talks (which is designed to entice students into reading the book),
author
and illustrator studies (which can benefit student interaction with
text in so many ways, not least of which the realization that individuals
like them actually write books -- they do not just magically appear in
bookstores), suggestions for activities
(an excellent
asset for any teacher), a list of related books,
and finally a list of websites related to the author
and the novel.
These books were chosen by the members of our group, Jennifer, Crissy,
Heather, and Shane, because of the unique graphics and visual representations
by the author and illustrator, David Wiesner.
In
this book, the pictures depict a normal everyday neighborhood. It
focuses on the frogs that inhabit the neighborhood. Slowly, the frogs
begin to do weird things such as fly, until they seem to take over the
entire neighborhood. If you would like to know if the neighborhood
turns back to normal the next day or if any other weird things happen,
then you have to read Tuesday by David Wiesner.
FREE FALL
In the silence of a dream, a young boy takes off on
a dazzling night flight. In this dream, the young boy is whisked
away to a magical kingdom where he is seen as the hero of all the land.
In this kingdom the boy is faced with trying to fight mystical dragons,
roam through abandoned castles, and charter unexplored lands that seem
vaguely familiar to him. If you would like to know if the young boy
is able to slay the dragon and chart these familiar lands and still make
it home in time to wake up, then we suggest reading David Wiesner's Free
Fall.
On the day of the school field trip, the weather just
does not seem to be cooperating for the young students. It is very
foggy when the students reach the top of the Empire State Building in New
York and none of the students are able to see anything. Except for
one young boy, who becomes very quick friends with a small cloud.
The cloud takes the young boy to Sector 7 where all the clouds are made
for the New York area. They have asked the young boy to design new
cloud patterns for the skies above. If you would like to know what
happens to the young boy and his inventive cloud designs, then we suggest
reading David Wiesner's Sector 7. David Wiesner (Weez-ner) was born on February 5, 1956 in Bridgewater,
N.J. An experienced author and illustrator, Wiesner has also had
his paintings displayed at many prestigious galleries such as, Metropolitan
Museum of Art, New York City, and Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia.
Wiesner says of his interest in creating books, “I create books I think
I would have liked to have seen when I was a kid.” (Something About
the Author). He prides himself on getting lost in his paintings and the
extraordinary details of his books. Growing up Wiesner was encouraged
to explore his love for drawing because his parents were also artistic.
Wiesner said that he has been drawing for as long as he can remember.
Both his oldest sister and brother were talented at drawing and painting.
But Wiesner says his style of drawing was influenced by the Renaissance
and Surrealism, which he discovered in junior high. Wiesner’s high
school art teacher was also a great influence. “I finally found someone
I could talk to about art.” (Something About the Author). This was
a person who simply enjoyed Wiesner’s work and someone with whom Wiesner
could share his work to without feeling judged or criticized. Wiesner
obtained his B.F.A. at the Rhode Island School of Design where he also
made short films and short stories for adults. Wiesner works primarily
with watercolors and many of his books are dream-like or like a fairy tale.
The reader is often thrusted into a busy world of imagination and color.
For
this activity, we had about five children show up to our library presentation.Together,
we all looked at the books and talked about what would be happening next
in the story.After we looked at
a few different books, the activity that we did was to have the students
draw a continuation of one of the books we covered that day.Most
of the pictures that we got were from Sector 7 and from Tuesday.We
would like to thank all of those who came to our presentation and we hope
that all of you learned a little more about wordless picturebooks!!!
Free
Fall
by David Wiesner, 1988
Sector
7
by David Wiesner, 1999
Anno's
U.S.A.
by Mitsumasa Anno, 1983
The
Snowman
by Raymond Briggs, 1978
Zoom
by Istvan Banyai, 1995
Pancakes
for Breakfast
by Tomie De Paola, 1990
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