An Engaging Evening with Jack Gantos

Every year TAS hosts a visiting author for a week. During the week s/he gives presentations to all of the elementary, middle, and high school students along with a family night. Last night was family night for Mr. Jack Gantos. I was a little reluctant to go because he has a bit of a shady past and some of his novels have controversial topics. However, he was phenomenol! He was truly inspiring, giving tips for parents to help their children's writing, and he also surfaced Len's and my burried desire to work on getting our own stories written and published. Here are some things he said that made me go "aha!"
Most of us read at a level far above our writing level.
To be a good writer you must be a good reader.
To be a good writer you must write! He recommends writing for 10 minutes a day.
To help children get started writing, have them draw a picture first.
He encouraged us to have our children actually make books of their stories and illustrations including covers, a dedication page, and their photo with an "about the author" caption. He even said we could include some blank pages for people who read their books to leave comments. After all he said, when you write a book, you want it published, sitting on a library shelf, and you want someone to check it out!
My favorite thing that he said was that you should choose your literature like you choose dessert, it should be delicious!
At the end of the presentation he signed books and t-shirts. We got all 3 kids a Rotten Ralph story and the kids were so excited to get his signature.
Rotten Ralph Feels Rotten- Kaleb
Best in Show for Rotten Ralph- Noe
Practice Makes Perfect for Rotten Ralph- Gavin.



*Flashback to last year's visiting author Donna Jo Napoli. She gave an enjoyable presentation as well, and she signed books for all 5 of us.
Leonard- Song of the Magdalene
Jennifer- Bound
Kaleb- Bobby the Bold
Noe- Pink Magic
Gavin- Albert
Wouldn't it be great to get a book published some day and get to go to book signings and sign YOUR name for others?

**Sub-post= 5 Taxi Rides
Our little Gavin must have a reflux condition because whenever he coughs hard he vomits. Unfortunately, last night Leonard was his target again and it happened right in the middle of Mr. Gantos' presentation. Kaleb and Noe were sitting on the floor at the front, so I followed Len and Gavin to the bathroom to help them get cleaned up. I didn't come as prepared this time as I did last Friday. Len decided he would just take Gavin home in a taxi and I would stay with Kaleb and Noe. So the 2 of them left with Gavin barechested and Len wearing only his garment top (yes, he was mortified and he held Gavin really close as his shield). About 25 minutes later, they both came strolling back. In our effort to be discreet, we forgot that the house keys were in the diaper bag with me. So they took taxi ride #2 back to the school to get the keys and then taxi ride #3 to go back home. After the presentation and the book signings I gathered up a very tired Kaleb and Noe to head out to the parking garage down the street. I didn't get far when I realized I didn't have the garage card to get our van out, it was in Len's pants pocket. Taxi #4 took Kaleb, Noe, and me home. After we got the 3 kids in bed, Len took taxi #5 back to the parking garage. We finally got it right with keys, cards, and money so Len was able to bring our van back home. This morning when Kaleb woke up the first thing he said was, "Is our van home?" Yes we assured him, it was safe and sound in our little parking spot in our own basement parking garage. Whew!