Wait, How Do You Write a Children's Book?

            Today marks the beginning of the senior projects! I am so excited to start this process and begin working on writing my children’s book. At around ten o’clock this morning, I went to the DeKalb County Public Library to look at different types of children’s books. Before starting this process, I never realized that there was such a wide genre of children’s books! There were picture books, picture storybooks, fairy tales, historical fiction books, poetry books, and many other types. I want my story to be a nonfiction book about Siempre Verde; so, I checked out some of the few nonfiction picture books that I could find. I really liked Sit-In: How Four Friends Stood Up by Sitting Down by Andrea Davis Pinkney. The book talked about the complex issues behind Woolworth’s lunch counter sit-in from the 1960s. I especially liked how the language was incredibly simple to understand (which made the racial issues easier to understand for a younger audience). While at the library, I also looked at some of my old favorite books to remind myself what I liked about them.

            After looking at books at the library and taking a quick trip to Barnes and Noble, I started my online research where I checked out various children’s book author blogs. One blog (KidLit) delved into the issues of rhyming in children’s literature today. Unfortunately, many authors feel like it is not important to establish an overall rhythm of the poem when using rhyming couplets. The blogger highly suggests not using this strategy, offering advice to prospective writers to make sure that syllables are consistent across a couplet. I was not really considering doing a rhyming book before; however, this blog post made me interested to try it out and see how rhyming might make my story more compelling to a younger audience. Also, I learned through my research the importance of selecting an appropriate age audience for your book. I want for my book to be read in the Lower School at Lovett; so, I will probably choose an age group of around the third grade to reach the most students. Overall, today I got a lot accomplished and cannot wait to start writing my book!