Hubbub and Blurt: Far from Shore Chronicles of an Open Ocean Voyage written and illustrated by Sophie Webb

Wednesday, May 6, 2015

Far from Shore Chronicles of an Open Ocean Voyage written and illustrated by Sophie Webb

591.77 WEB

The Eastern Tropical Pacific Ocean is a 7.7 million-square-mile area — larger than Africa! — teeming with wildlife who are terribly tricky to study due to their vast home and its distance from land. Sophie Webb, a naturalist specializing in birds, and author of several fabulous science books for children, made a four-month research trip into this tantalizing, far-flung world, and wrote this book to tell us all about it!

Webb writes this book, like her others, in a journal format, which gives even its scientific information a friendly, personal feel. She also illustrates it with colorful, watercolor paintings, detailing interesting bits about life aboard ship, as well as the curious birds, fish, and mammals she encounters at sea.

There’s a great deal of information packed in these pages. We learn about several

species of dolphins, and the efforts to restore their populations after the toll tuna-fishing has taken on them. Webb tells us what we know, as well as what we still are wondering about; facts, as well as puzzling questions; both of which are helpful for developing understanding. We also check in with thousands of seabirds, numerous, assorted whales, shimmering bursts of flying fish, yellowfin tuna, squid, and a bunch of tiny creatures who end up being food for these bigger fellows!

We learn about the effects of pollution and fisheries on various sea creatures, stop at several tropical ports of call, gaze at the spangled sky far from any human lighting, and hunker down in the cabin during some wildly windy, rainy days. What a delightful way to learn so much, and develop a thirst to know more.

The journal entries are prolifically illustrated, sometimes with full page, richly colored, glimpses of sea life; sometimes with small cameos of the scientists at work. Intriguing graphs, helpful diagrams, close-up views, imagined deep-sea realms, all complement the information extremely well. For upper-elementary and up, perhaps a bit younger if you read aloud a bit at a time, this is a fabulous way to learn, and to lure kids into a life of observing, caring, protecting, exploring the natural world around them.

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Reading and Me

When I read, I experience in poet Jane Hirshfield’s words, “a clarification and magnification of being”. Hirshfield is speaking specifically of poetry here, “its word-woven and musical invocation”. The treasure - the ability and freedom to read – and its result – knowledge, insight, wisdom, understanding, empathy, compassion - is lifeblood of human civilizations. The exploration of words (those squiggly shape pictures on the pages) – broken down into those letters in a row then a space then some more letters in a row, each having a sound and a way – knowable! – to become the sentence, the paragraph, the verse, the poem, the story, the novel, the treatise, the manifesto, the sacred statement, the myth – this exploration of words, how to read them and what they mean – this is reading. If you cannot read, the list of loss goes on forever. The works of these authors: Aardema. Alcott. Avi. Babbitt. Bemelmans. Carle. Cooney. Coville. Dahl. Dorros, DePaola. Ehlert. Galdone. Hamilton. Henkes. Keats. Kimmel. Lester. Lobel. Lowry. MacLachlan. McKissack. O’Dell. Peck. Peet. Pinkney. Polacco. Rylant. Seuss. Silverstein. Spinelli. Travers. Ungar. Van Allsburg. Wells. Wilder. Young. Zieffert. Language is a living thing – these stories are mirrors of our lives and doors into other families and cultures.

I worked for many years at the Reference Desk in the Children’s Room of the Public Library. The first key to that room is an adult who will bring a child and choose books to look at and read aloud. The second key to that room is consistent regular persistent introduction to the wealth lined up on each shelf. The third key is the habit of use – a willingness, a commitment, to go weekly, to bring a big rolling box, to read and reread and reread the books at home. Ask the librarian questions, look for answers in the books. The questions may not be “homework related” –- the questions may be “What’s a good book about taking a bath? Try The Tub People by Pam Conrad. “My child thinks she will never be able to figure some things out.” How about Leo the Late Bloomer by Robert Krauss? “We are planting a garden.” How about Allison’s Zinnia by Anita Lobel?

During my year with Minnesota Reading Corps I helped children with reading skills. I held open the door. I held open the passages. I focused on the vowels and helped turn squiggly picture shapes into words made of letters. Mystery to meaning. We walked through these doors. This is blending, this is segmenting. In blending students connect sounds together, in segmenting they separate words into sounds. The reading path begins with awareness of the page content. Reading is decoding. The words are made of sounds! The sentences are made of words! There are syllables and segments! There are rhymes! We can blend, we can combine separate sounds into meaningful words! We can take this words apart and make different words! This is segmenting, this is blending, this is reading! This has meaning. We work to achieve comprehension by constructing meaning from the written text. This word means something you can know. This vocabulary makes meaning. This story is for YOU. You make this story mean something. This is the world that reading opens and enriches. There are fierce thunderstorms here and nannies who arrive by umbrella. There are Enormous Crocodiles, Muffins for Moose, Snowy Days, Giant Peaches and Millions of Cats. There is a Bear Hunt and An Old Lady Who Swallows a Fly. There is a Velveteen Rabbit and a Garden of Verses. There is a place where there are Wild Things. This is the world that is lost to a child who cannot read.

Today in the USA most children learn to read at school. Few bring homemade lunches anymore and most bring complications that arise from our culture’s technological fixations and media fascinations. Nevertheless, schools and teachers are diligently striving to teach these children to read. Some take to it, others do not. Some have help from home, many do not. Some speak languages other than English and cannot read in either language. Some will learn to read. Some will not. Others will require a faithful consistent daily reading tutor. Be that person another student, an Associate Educator, a teacher, a parent, an encourager – we all had helpers. Here at Loring Library we have books. And I am here to open doors and read aloud and answer questions and point the way and listen and learn. Welcome to Loring Library.