Reading to the crowd inside the subway car

This past weekend I presented Redwoods at the New York Transit Museum.  The Transit Museum’s main attraction is their collection of old subway cars (which are really cool) and I got to read the book to a crowd of parents and children in one of them.

Drawing dinosaur-land!

After the reading, we did an art project.  In Redwoods, the main character’s world changes outside the subway car window as he reads the book.  For our art project the children suggested ideas for things that they might see outside a subway car window (imaginary, of course) and I drew their ideas to a piece of paper taped over the subway window.  On our trip, we went to dinosaur-land.  There were volcanoes, a stegasaurus, palm trees, the requisite T-Rex and a time-traveling robot.  Thanks to the Transit Museum and everyone who attended–I had a great time!

You can see more pictures of the event on the Transit Museum’s Flickr Album.

In Jason Chin’s Redwoods, a straightforward and informative text about coastal redwoods captions pictures that tell not exactly a different story, but one whose metafictional cheek will draw readers in — just as the book’s hero is drawn, by his imagination, high into the redwood canopy. Science and story are seamlessly pulled together in neatly crafted paintings. (6–9 years)

See the full list on the Horn Book website.