A Ball for Daisy

The last couple of weeks the students at my school have been working on March Madness projects.  In conjunction with two exciting weeks of basketball games, we have poured over statistics for winning teams, probabilities of upsets, and more.  Each student filled out a bracket and had to explain how and why they chose their teams.  Of course, as a math teacher I would love for this all to work out and show them how math is is the best predictor of wins. However, Lehigh and Norfolk led to a discussion on why the tournament is referred to as "madness" and, as my co-worker John says, "You can't measure heart." As we count down to the Final Four and last few days of games, here is a book that won big this year in the tournament of chilren's books.  A Ball for Daisy by Chris Raschka won the Caldecott Medal for the most distinguished picture book.

Raschka is no stranger to the Caldecott.  In 1994 he received a Caldecott Honor for his book Yo! Yes? and in 2006 was awarded the Caldecott Medal for his illustrations in Hello, Goodbye Window.  A slight departure from his other books, A Ball for Daisy is Raschka's first wordless book.  The story tells of Daisy, a happy go-lucky white dog, and her beloved red ball.  As Daisy plays with her ball it is caught by another dog who mistakenly deflates the ball.  Daisy, despondent over her lost ball, goes home.  However, all is not lost.  The end of the book promises a happy ending for Daisy.

Daisy loves that red ball!

Raschka's illustrations demonstrate one of my favorite things about children's books: the ability to tell a good story in only 32 pages.  Daisy is a pretty simple looking dog yet through Raschka's paintings we see every emotion, from the joy she finds with her ball to the pain she feels when she realizes it has been broken.  Readers can easily connect with the feeling of loss without the aid of words.  My favorite page is the one of Daisy with the little girl who owns her. Daisy is miserable and the girl is right there with her.  Just like the little girl, we all want Daisy to feel better and make it through this.

Raschka captures every moment of Daisy's despair

My favorite illustration

In the end, this simple wordless book is a pleasure to "read" over and over again.  Whether as a companion to March Madness, a lesson about overcoming loss, a reminder of your favorite dog, or just a new book to add to your "favorites", everyone can enjoy A Ball for Daisy.