Acknowledgements
This book and my writing practice wouldn’t exist without the seminal volume, Kids Have All The Write Stuff: Inspiring Your Children to Put Pencil to Paper, by Sharon A. Edwards and Robert W. Maloy. Edwards and Maloy encouraged me to put pen to paper and share my work with teachers and librarians. I take off my writer’s cap and my editor’s hat to salute these two educators, both of whom continue to make a difference with their research, writing, and publishing.
Thank you to the faculty of the Pratt Institute School of Information and Library Science for the rigorous, meaningful, theoretical, and practical education that continues to inform my work as librarian to this day.
A heartfelt thank you to Ellen Loughran, who believed in the replicability of Writing Boxes and, as she called it, the ease of this “Instant Program,” and who supported the program’s early days in the trial branches of the Brooklyn Public Library. She is the model of the very modern mentor, and I aspire to be that to the next generation of youth services librarians.
Thank you to the Bank Street College of Education graduate faculty, the School for Children teachers, and the parents and children who taught me about literacy, pedagogy, child development, collaboration, diversity, critical thinking, reflection, and curriculum development. Above all, “play is the work of the child.”
Thank you to the University of Minnesota Libraries Publishing Services Team. This book was shepherded by Emma Molls, Publishing Services Librarian. Thank you, Emma, for your vision. Thank you, Susan Everson, for your exquisite design skills, copy editing, and above all attention to detail.
To the creators of the children’s and young adult books that inspire all of us to read and write, create and reflect within our communities and beyond, thank you.
To the team at Children’s Literature Research Collections of University of Minnesota and the Kerlan Friends, thank you for being willing first readers and guinea pigs for writing prompts, and for saying yes every time I wanted to program writing at library events on campus and in our community. Yes, Mary Schultz and JoAnn Jonas, I mean you.
And thank you to Paul Von Drasek, writer-in-residence, who understands and supports my passion for this work.
