It seems to me that if Raina Telgemeier, Art Spiegelman, Roz Chast, Stephan Pastis, Mo Willems, Dave Roman, and other cartoonists who double as children’s book creators can have the chutzpah to participate in this video where they speak out against gun violence, the least we can do is to post it.  Frequently.  And everywhere.

Thanks to Boing Boing for the link.

In a switch of gears, here are happy authors talking about happy Newbery calls and what it means to be “chosen”.  So to speak.  Sort of works double duty as bragging rights from Random House on how many Newbery Award and Honor winners they have too.  Certainly they’ve had a good run in recent years.  Would love to see other houses doing something similar.

Thanks to Mr. Schu for the link.

Okay.  Now let’s watch the world’s most adorable children.  Teacher Arturo Avina contacted me recently about his Kindergarten class.

“My students and I recently took this classic story and adapted it for the small screen. What started off as a class project on school and community became an epic production that blended technology, music, and dramatic arts, and at the same time, developed reading comprehension, vocabulary, and oral language skills. The students were encouraged to be creative and work collaboratively, and the results have been rewarding to say the least. The reaction to our movie has been enthusiastically positive by all who have watched it so far. At this point, several parents and teachers have contacted me to let me know that their kids absolutely LOVE it!”

The result is Miss Nelson is Missing by Harry Allard.

Thanks to Arturo Avina for the link.

By the way, I’m sure I don’t have to tell YOU that for the first time in history a Judy Blume novel is coming to the silver screen.  What you may not have known was that it’s Tiger Eyes.  Yep.  Surprised me too.  Here’s the trailer:

Speaking of classics hitting the screen, three words: Phantom. Tollbooth. Documentary.

Check out the full website here.  Thanks to Marjorie Ingall for the link.

And it’s just not a Video Sunday without a good book trailer.  And brother?  This one is good.  It even has its own theme song.

A fun Kickstarter page also brought itself to my attention this week.  Done in conjunction with 826LA (a group I particularly like) “students wrote short stories about their imaginary friend that I had professional artists illustrate to.”  The group partnered with illustrators from Pixar, Disney, Nickelodeon, and DC Comics to bring the stories to life and they’re donating at least 25% of proceeds from the book sales to 826LA.  Further info is found here: http://www.grworks.com/pentopaper/

The kickstarter closes on May 5th, so there you go.

And as per usual, my off-topic video could probably be considered on-topic… but it’s just too weird.

Thanks to Ben for the link.