And the Winner is . . .

The winners and honour books for the Newbery and Caldecott Awards were announced last week. The Newbery Medal was first awarded in 1922 and is awarded by the American Library Association for the most distinguished American children's book published in the previous year. The Caldecott Medal is awarded to the artist of the most distinguished American picture book for children.

The 2016 Newbery winner is Last Stop on Market Street by Matt de la Pena, published by G.P. Putnam's Sons Books for Young Readers.  The choice was surprising to some as this is a picture book and the Newbery usually goes to a chapter book! 

The Newbery Honor books include:

The War that Saved my Life. Author Kimberly Brubaker Bradley.

Roller Girl by Victoria Jamieson.

Echo by Pam Munoz Ryan.

Recent Newbery winners include The Crossover by Kwame Alexander (2015), Flora & Ullysses: The Illulminated Adventures by Kate DiCamillo (2013), and The One and Only Ivan by Katherine Applegate.

The Honor Books are also very well-known titles including El Deafo by Cece Bell and Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson in 2015.  If you want a list of recent winners, go to the ALA website here.

The Caldecott Medal was awarded to Sophie Blackall, illustrator of Finding Winnie: The True Story of the World's Most Famous Bear. The author is Lindsay Mattick and the publisher is Little, Brown and Company.

The Honor Books include:

Trombone Shorty.  llustrator Bryan Collier, Author Troy Andrews.

Waiting. Illustrated and written by Kevin Henkes.

Voice of Freedom:  Fannie Lous Maner, Spirit of the Civil Rights Movement. Illustrated by Ekua Holmes. Author Carole Boston Weatherford.

and

Last Stop on Market Street. Illustrator Christian Robinson. Author Matt de la Pena.

Recent winners of the Caldecott include The Adventures of Beekle:  The Unimaginary Friend by Dan Santat (2015), Locomotive by Brian Floca (2014) and This is Not My Hat by Jon Klassen (2013).

The Newbery and Caldecott books are staples for your library collection, whether it be your classroom library or school library.  They appeal to a wide audience of readers, including adults!  I also find that it is not unusual for a book to be honoured in different categories (even though a book does not usually win in both Newbery and Caldecott categories). This year The War That Saved My Life was named the top audio book as well as being an honor book. The Crossover in 2015 earned several awards as well as the Newbery.

Many schools and teachers have a Mock Caldecott and/or Newbery process in their schools. The students nominate books and eventually vote on their own winners.  You can find many samples online to guide you if you would like to try this out.

John Schumacher from The Nerdy Book Club is making an attempt to read ALL the Caldecott and Newbery winners from 1922 to the present (some are difficult to find). Check out the lists and see how many you could already check off your list!

Twitter Buzz

Are you following the Pembina Escarpment Reading Council on Twitter @PercReads? We tweet and retweet lots of interesting information.  Since starting the twitter feed in the fall, we have been retweeted by many Manitoba Reading Association followers and many authors! It is exciting when an author replies or retweets to your tweet!

@mra_mb is hosting its first twitter chat on January 21st with Tanny McGregor. Many of us are becoming good friends with Tanny through the tweets we share and we are looking forward to sharing the Twitter chat with her and then hearing her in person in April in Winnipeg.

If you are not familiar with Twitter, there are many tutorials available to help you learn more.  Just signing up and following a few people is a great way to get started. Follow @percreads and @mra_mb to get a taste for world of Twitter.

What interesting information have I found on Twitter in the last few months?  Check some of these out:

• Jonathan Auxier won the 2015 TD Canadian Children's Literature Award. Author of The Night Gardener, a chilling novel about orphan who become servants in a haunted mansion. MRA invited to be on an author's panel.  Jonathan will be a new father in the spring so is unable to join us.  Check out his middle-grade novel. I also heard him interviewed on CBC by @terrymacleod and ordered the book. Expect a blog post about it in the upcoming months.
• Check out the other nominees for the TD Children's Literature Award. I had also ordered From Vimy to Victory:  Canada's Fight to the Finish in World War I by Hugh Brewster and shared it with a grade 6 class prior to Remembrance Day.  It seemed to be a popular pick.
• The 2014 winner was The Man with the Violin by Kathy Stinson, illustrated by Dusan Petricic. This is a book I shared at the PERC workshop in previous years.  I really appreciate this book and it has caused me to follow up on Dusan Petricic's work. 
• I subscribed to the Canadian Children's Book Centre newsletter and get great information every month. Do you know Family Literacy Day is January 27th? What are you doing to celebrate Family Literacy?
• American Library Association Awards will be announced on Monday, January 11th! Lots of tweets from classrooms on who the winners should be! Stay tuned.

If you are not on Twitter, you probably think it is one more thing that will require your valuable time.  Yes it will take time. Personally, I spend much less time on other social media now and find far more useful info on Twitter.  Try it and send me feedback.

Barb Lepp

PERC Past-chairperson

Faye Brownlie Canceled

Unfortunately, Faye is unable to travel to Manitoba in February as she needs to attend to some family health concerns.  We will stay in touch with her and hope to schedule another time.  Thanks to Darlene Keith for all her hard work organizing this event for parents and teachers.