Wow… What a FUN job I have before me!

With over 130 votes coming in from our Elementary Students this week, I have my work cut out for me adding up who voted for what. I actually don’t need to do any of this… I really just need to wait until tomorrow night to see who the ALA chooses for the Newbery and Caldecott Medal books, then see which of our students chose the same, and go from there. BUT, it is so interesting seeing who the kids voted for, remembering the lesson that their teacher or I read them that book, the discussions we had, and realizing that the book resonated with them.

I started a tally on a small piece of paper for the Caldecott’s, and soon realized I needed a bigger piece of paper to write down all of the different titles. It really is a great year for picture books, and I am thrilled that so many of our students have been exposed to the LATEST and GREATEST the industry has to offer.

Caldecott Book Tally as voted by the K,1,2,3rd grade students; the number in brackets AFTER the book title, is how many votes it earned from the 4th and 5th graders.

1 vote went to Bunnies on Ice, If you want to see a whale, the Matchbox Diary, A Splash of Red, I’m the Scariest Thing in the Jungle, and Water in the Park (love this one). Of course, the cool thing is, ANY of these books could be the actual Caldecott Medal or Honor Winner.

2 votes went to On a Beam of Light, The Snatchabook(4), Nelson Mandela, The Tortoise and the Hare, and Odd Duck.

3 votes went to Papa’s Mechanical Fish, The Day the Crayons Quit(6), Steam Train Dream Train and also to Journey(3), so of course I think one of those voters must be onto something, with Aaron Becker’s Journey being such a favorite this year around the blogosphere.

4 votes went to Mr Wuffles (1)

6 votes went to Night Light (1), the children really loved guessing what will be on the next page and Mr Tiger Goes Wild, (4) another popular favorite this year.

9 votes went to Tap the Magic Tree, Building our House, Unicorn Thinks he’s Pretty Great (3), Secret Pizza Party (2), Bluebird (6) and Flora the Flamingo proving that you don’t need words to produce a brilliant story kids love.

Doug Unplugged (3) has been really popular with the second and third graders and scored high with them when it came time to vote with 15 votes.

However, it was the teaming of Lemony Snickett and Jon Klassen with The Dark (12) that scored the highest with the K-3rd graders who gave it 21 votes, proving it to be the most popular of the picture books they’ve been introduced to these past three weeks. I certainly hope it gets an honor at least, the silence and air of suspense as I read it, time and time again, was palpable.

So, points of interest between the Caldecott books the lower ES voted for compared to the upper ES…

*Patricia Polacco’s Bully didn’t get a nod from the younger ones, but 3 upper ES voted for it.
*Locomotive got 1 vote from the older kids
*All of the books listed above that only got one vote from the younger kids, were overlooked by the older ones.
*Dark was the clear favourite overall, with 33 votes…
Right…. now on to the Newbery AND Caldecott Votes from the 4th and 5th graders… It will be interesting to see how they chose their picture books compared to the younger students. To win the ‘grand prize’ kiss from me, they need to get the Newbery AND Caldecott winner correct…. tough call.