dear world

I love Tokayo Noda's work.  I love dear world.  It's one of my favorite books of poetry.  I use with children often... because within its simplicity lies a tremendous amount of complexity of thought.  

     Using her poetry for inferring makes so much sense to me... the text is short, easy to get in the hands of readers, and filled with just enough of a nudge, both in vocabulary and content, to get readers contemplating.  

     Her poem "dear sun" always makes learners think beyond just the text...  dear world is one of those books that I've come to rely on often, no matter what strategy we are investigating as both readers and writers.  I use it in my own classroom and while doing demonstration teaching in other classrooms.  Simple complexity.  That's how I would categorize this book.  Plus, it's just beautiful... I can imagine children delving into an illustration study of collage after close study of her artwork.

     Her illustrations using cut-paper collages are stunning!  If someone wanted to make me happy, they'd give me an original piece of framed piece of Tokayo Noda's art.  Trust me, I've perused her website often... just to take in the wonder of her creativity.

     If you don't have dear world in your collection, it should be.  Along with Song of the Flowers, you'll have two books by a children's author and illustrator who I hope will continue to add to her repertoire.

  

dear world
please tell me
why and how
you keep our earth
so beautiful