Wake Up, Little Children: A Novel

by Jim Aylesworth, Walter Lyon Krudop (Illustrator)

The beauty of a brand-new day, the warmth of sunlight, and the movements of fluffy clouds floating in a blue sky are captured in a collaboration between gentle, rhyming verse and warm paintings.

32 pages, Hardcover

First published May 1, 1996

About the author

Jim Aylesworth was born in Jacksonville, Florida but as an infant moved from the state. He lived in many places during his childhood: Alabama, Indiana, Georgia, Tennessee, Texas... but by the time Aylesworth was 15 his family had settled in Hinsdale, Illinois and that is where he graduated from high school in 1961.

In 1965, he graduated from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio with a B.A. in English. He returned to Hinsdale and began a career as a stockbroker. By 1970, however, Aylesworth was thinking about what he really wanted to do. After a series of assignments as a substitute teacher, Aylesworth ended up in a primary classroom. He began teaching first grade students in Oak Park, Illinois in 1971 and entered Concordia College in River Forest, Illinois, to earn a graduate degree in elementary education -- a goal he reached in 1978.

But it was his work with children that brought him the most reward. It was Aylesworth's experiences as a teacher that eventually led him to writing children's books.

Reviews

[Rll52014_barb_zachwieja · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an above-average poetry/picture book written by Jim Aylesworth about what two little children do during their day in the summertime. It's a nostalgic look into what children might do in a simpler, gentler, rural setting. They look at fields of flowers, they watch passing clouds, they roll down grassy hills, they walk barefoot in the meadow, they play in a babbling brook, climb trees in an inviting woods, etc. This may be the experience of someone who grew up in a bucolic, rural setting, but I don't think many urban/suburban kids can relate. Also, the children look to be about 6 or 7 years old, (they are little white children--one boy and one girl), would their parents really allow them to roam the countryside from dawn until dusk? Probably not. So, this book is good for people who think poetry can paint a picture of an idealized world, not necessarily the one we're living in now. --Barb