bend

Sunday was a glorious spring day and I had a great time hanging out with Jacqueline Woodson, Kwame Alexander, and Bryan Collier at the Studio Museum in Harlem book festival. My presentation wasn’t fantastic, but I’m learning to be more flexible—if you expected to present before a group of kids and instead you have an audience of adults, what do you do? Improvisation isn’t one of my strengths so I need to work on that. I’m heading to California in a few days and will have a chance to speak to a class of 3rd graders while I’m in Berkeley. Last week I presented before two fifth grade classes and they were amazing—lots of energy, lots of questions, and before I even began the principal handed me this letter:

Not every class will have that reaction so I have to learn to feel out the kids and respond accordingly. I don’t work much with young children and watching Jackie and Kwame present to the under-7s made me realize I’ll need an entirely different approach if I move into the elementary market. Right now I’m talking to two editors about some of my picture books. I always thought I’d work with little kids but then moved into the YA market and have been there ever since. Flexibility isn’t easy for Scorpios but I’m going to give it a try…