14th February Valentines Day, Library Lovers Day, International Book Giving Day, Clifford's Birthday

Yes, it's Valentines Day, but more importantly it is International Book Giving Day and Library Lovers Day. 

I have written about these days at length before and activities that we have done at school to celebrate. See here; here and here.

Two books I haven't used on this day, but could 

This heartwarming picture book is a love letter to libraries and all the moments that make them so special and it is perfect to read and talk about with young children.

This one is more suitable for older readers as it is based on the author's grandparents love story. After the bombing of Pearl Harbor, Tama is sent to live in a War Relocation Centre in the desert and she works in the camp's library. There she meets George.

And if these two days are not enough celebration, it is also Clifford the Big Red Dog's birthday. The students I teach Love the large Clifford toy in the library. He gets plenty of hugs and on the occasions when we do a Clifford display the books, although old are still borrowed. I'll put some out this week.

1st February Wear Red Day

The first of February is Wear Red Day, a day to think about our hearts and the blood that makes them healthy, but to celebrate,  the books I recommend here have nothing to do with hearts and much more to do with the colour RED. School starts this week for the students I teach and the kindergarten teachers this week have been collecting books for their classroom libraries. Each of the classes has a colour, KRed, KYellow etc and each teacher has a small collection of books about that colour to read and talk about. Some colours are easier to find books about than others, but Red was easy. As well as The Red Book, Clifford, Little Red Riding Hood and The Little Red Hen, here's what I put in their box:

15th February Norman Bridwell (1928)

Norman Bridwell needs no introduction. He is the author/illustrator of the ever-so popular Clifford books. Our library has more than forty titles and two plush toys that are fondled and borrowed very frequently.

On the Scholastic website Bridwell sums up Clifford's characteristics matter-of-factly: “He's red and he's warm. Clifford does what you'd like to do but can't. Because Clifford is so big and also because he's a dog, he's able to do the most unbelievable and imaginative things. But not too unbelievable or imaginative. You won't see Clifford traveling in outer space, for example." Bridwell is firm about his decision that Clifford won't do anything that a real dog wouldn't do!