Thank You, Mr. Falker

Kathy Dorr, a college professor of mine, first introduced this book to me. She always read us the best children's books. I actually cried when I heard this story. It is an autobiographical tale of Patricia Polacco, the author and illustrator. Patricia is dyslexic, disnumeric, and disgraphic...all huge barriers to learning how to read. In the beginning of the book Trisha sits with her grandfather. Keeping with tradition, he puts a little bit of honey on a book and says to Patricia, "Honey is sweet, and so is knowledge, but knowledge is like the bee that made that sweet honey, you have to chase it through the pages of a book." She has waited for this moment her whole 5 years of life...the promise to read.
Trisha knows her family loves stories and books. So she is excited when she begins school and has the opportunity to start chasing knowledge through books. However, the words on the page don't look right and she can't make sense of it all. She continues to struggle to read and the students in the class start to make fun of her. One boy bullies her frequently and Mr. Falker, Trisha's teacher, takes notice. One day, he finds Trisha cornered by the bully and comes to her rescue. He has also realized she cannot read so he decides to help her.
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"Honey is sweet, and so is knowledge..." |
In real life, Patricia didn't learn to read until she was almost 14 years old. Instead, she turned to drawing as a way of expressing herself. These days, statistics tell us that a student not reading by 3rd grade has a tough future ahead of them. However, Patricia Polacco grew up to become the author and illustrator of over 50 children's books. What I love most about her books is that they are based on real stories. Many of them are from her own life and her own family history. They remind me of the family stories we used to tell around the dinner table. If you haven't read one, definitely go find one as soon as you can. I guarantee you will love the sweet taste of the words as you read them.
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