Here we go!

It’s a pleasure for me to enter the world of blogging for Reading Rockets. Like my colleague and sister Reading Rockets blogger, Joanne Meier (Sound It Out), I find this a bit daunting.

I thought that Reading Rockets readers might want to know a bit about my background. I’ve been involved with children’s literature and literacy for nearly my entire working life in several capacities: as a children’s librarian, as the head of children’s services in large library systems, as a teacher of children’s literature for graduate students, and as a mother to a now teenaged son who continues to find time to read.

After all these many years, I still find children’s literature exciting. Children’s books are dynamic with the power to touch children and the adults in their lives and connect readers — young and old — in sometimes surprising ways.

In this blog, I hope to share some of my interests and ideas about children’s books and ways that they can link, inspire and inform readers both young and mature. And maybe, just maybe, you’ll share some of your ideas!