7th May Jumper Weather

Sweater Day is on February 4, because in America, people are getting ready to snuggle into their warmest sweaters in the depth of winter. The World Wildlife Fund (W.W.F.) established Sweater Day and advocates it every year. The circle of life means human depletion of natural resources negatively impacts animal wellbeing and their habitats. Consumption of fuel pollutes the environment and water, endangering the lives of animals. Changing our little habits can make a difference.

I'm not sure we have an equivalent, like Jumper Day in Australia, but as I walked this week in Orange with my sister and today, with a friend in Sydney, it most definitely was a jumper or sweater day! A couple of weeks ago we were basking in warm sunshine sans jumper.

Why so many names for what is a  type of knitted garment that is worn over the upper body? Americans call them 'sweaters'. As you might have guessed, sweater comes from sweat—the earliest sweaters were worn by rowers, and were intended "to produce sweating and reduce weight."

Australians and Brits call them 'jumpers'. The word is derived from an old French word, “jupe" which was a type of short coat. At some point in time the word in English became “jump" and then eventually “jumper".

Of course there are other names for various versions of overgarment designed to keep us warm. There is jersey, cardigan, sloppy joe ...

Sadly there is no gazetted Jumper Day. There is however a Christmas Jumper Day in Britain on 8th December, once again in the Northern Hemisphere's winter. It was instigated by the Save the Children Fund in 2012 to raise money.

At school during Autumn it is fun to watch the leaves on the trees outside the library windows change colour. We often do a display of Autumn books and as it gets colder and the trees are bare we begin to think about a display linked to knitting and making things indoors.

There are some good 'jumper' picture books that I have enjoyed reading.

Look for:

• Jack's Jumper by Sara Acton

• The Huey's in the New Jumper by Oliver Jeffers

• Where's My Jumper  by Nicola Slater    

• Sheep to Jumper by Fiona MacDonald

• The Bush Jumper by Jean Chapman and Ali Beck

• The Best Jumper by Lynne Garner

• Little Bear's Big Jumper by David Bedford and Caroline Pedler

• Extra Yarn  by Mac Barnett and Jon Klassen 

• Otto Goes North  by Ulrika Kestere

• Unravelled by Leanne Hatch

• Woolly Jumper: The Story of Wool by Meredith Hooper

• Brrr! Where Did the Dinosaurs Really Go? by Kes Gray and Nick East

• Lester's Dreadful Sweaters  by K.G. Campbell

• Squirrel's Sweater  by Laura Renauld

• Sweater Weather by Matt Phelan

• From Sheep to Sweater  by Robin Nelson

My two favourites to read aloud to preschool classes:

And the newest:

There's a fun activity for this book on Sara's webpage.

And if you want to read about penguins wearing jumpers , not because they're cold but rather affected by an oil spill, read these:

• Flipper and Finnegan : the true story of how tiny jumpers saved little penguins  by Sophie Cunningham and Anil Tortop

• Penguins Don't Wear Sweaters by Marrika Tamura and Daniel Rieley

16th July Cherry Day

Celebrate with cherries! Obviously a Northern hemisphere celebration and a bit hard to do in Australia without paying an exorbitant amount as they are a summer fruit and we eat them around Christmas. We will just need to be settle for reading about them and dreaming. 

Read:

Cherries  by Carrie Gallasch and Sara Acton. It will remind you of summer and cherries in Australia.

Now explain to a child what it means when people say 'Life is a bowl full of cherries!'

Cherry Blossom Day on 27th March is probably easier to celebrate with books as so many books about Japan have cherry blossom as a feature.

3rd April Find a Rainbow Day

How appropriate that there is a day such as this when we are in the middle of a crisis.

Rainbows are symbols of many things, peace, hope, prosperity, new beginnings and good luck, so no wonder  the Irish believe there is a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.

The rainbow is a comprised of seven different colours.  Each of these colours is vibrant and beautiful, and each one is different than the next. This conveys a beautiful message of inclusiveness and cohesion. It demonstrates how beautiful diversity can be, but these colours work together to make a new beautiful whole so it can also be about working together.

Rainbows are often seen after a storm when the sun breaks through the clouds. This provides us with a very powerful message. Good and beautiful things often follow the darkest storms. We need to remember this right now!

I walked up my street (exercise) and counted how many rainbow paintings were affixed in windows. I counted eight in my neighbourhood. These children have done these paintings to thank all the health workers who are at work saving lives . In fact it was this that sent me looking for rainbow stories for a virtual display. It has to just be a pinterest page  because I'm not at school in my library for a while.

While looking I learned that it was Find a Rainbow Day!  this week, which gave me another reason to put together the list of books.

Thinking of rainbow stories, the first one I thought of was Annie's Rainbow by Ron Brooks. It is old and long out of print, but a real favourite when I first started teaching. Annie loves rainbows and whenever she sees one she tries to catch it. She just wants one of her own. What a wonderful thing to think you could do! What else is there?

I remember reading Esther's Rainbow by Kim Kane and Sara Acton to a preschool class last year and they really enjoyed it. It is a joyous story about a girl who also sees colours everywhere and goes looking for them.

A parent came to the library last week when we were still open wanting The Rainbow Plate a story by doctor Preeya Alexander, which she wrote to encourage children to eat fruit and vegetables of a variety of colours. There are other books too about eating the rainbow.

I like the concept and the fun of How the Crayons Saved the Rainbow by Monica Sweeney. Just like the children around here, the crayons draw rainbows all over the place. There are so many versions of this on Youtube!

And then for older students there is the colorful picture book biography Newton's Rainbow by Kathryn Lasky that celebrates Newton's discoveries that illuminated the mysteries of gravity, motion, and even rainbows, discoveries that gave mankind a new understanding of the natural world, discoveries that changed science forever. 

So lots of avenues to explore while you're looking for rainbows and hoping for an end to the isolation of Covid 19.