Snakes in a Shed

I just want to say that I finished reading Jeanne DuPrau's prequel to the Ember series, The Prophet of Yonwood, and was very pleased. (If you've read it, you'll understand "snakes in a shed"...) I hope there will be more books in the series, or in that world setting.

I found a few interesting news articles posted in the latest SCBWI newsletter received in my inbox. Firstly, a Baha'i group in Hungary is promoting literacy for Roma mothers and children via a program in which the mothers get together each week to read a children's book, then take the book home to read to their children and keep it for their own household library. I really had no idea--though I wasn't surprised--that illiteracy is such a problem for people of the Roma ethnicity. Kudos to the Mesed project for tackling this.

There are two odd things about this article about a local library in Leeds which has chosen to start charging late fines for the return of children's books. The first odd thing is that the outraged dad in the article has the same name as a guy I went to high school with (but I'm fairly certain it's not him). Secondly, they weren't charging late fees before??

Here's an interesting article about reading to babies and how reading (age-appropriate materials) aloud to infants can provide them with a crucial jump-start in learning to read. I liked the idea that children who have been read to have heard approximately 32 million more words by the time they reach age 4 than children who haven't been.