The Book!

Holland Road Elementary Book Project During the fall of 2007, our children had the opportunity to participate in a wonderful and challenging project initiated by the school's Fine Arts volunteer committee. Three hundred and twenty students in grades primary to six collaborated in writing and illustrating a children’s book entitled “A Kids Guide to Making and Being a Friend”.

Local author Jane Baskwill coordinated writing workshops for each of the fourteen classes, to help facilitate students in the development of their written portion. Instead of creating one continuous story line, she had each class write a short piece or poem that fit within the theme of multiculturalism, acceptance, and friendship.

Students worked together as a class to decide what ideas they were going to represent and what information or message was most important to get across, while Mrs. Baskwill helped them edit their grammar and keep their thoughts comprehensive and connected with the rest of the book.

Local craft artisan Tara Grude led the art workshops. The challenge was to find a way to bridge the stylistic differences between the younger and older students so that the book would have a cohesive look. Ms Grude’s solution was a fantastic opportunity to explore the artwork of Eric Carle, creator of renowned children’s books including, ‘The Very Hungry Caterpillar’ and ‘Brown Bear, Brown Bear What do you See?’. Carle creates his illustrations by collage, using brightly colored papers that he has painted himself. The art portion was a huge undertaking, but so much fun. Students met one grade at a time in the gym, to first watch a video of Eric Carle creating his papers. Volunteers then divided the students up into five groups, each group exploring a different painting technique to use when creating their paper.

One group used large brush strokes, another used pieces of sponge and carpet to stamp textures, another scratched into wet paint with plastic forks and other tools, another painted washes over crayon rubbings, and the last flicked paint splatters onto their painted page.

Each grade was responsible for one or two colors. In the end, there was a great stack of visually stunning papers in a variety of textures and colors that every class would use to create their artwork.
Students discussed their ideas on how they would like to illustrate their written portion. These ideas were combined into one image which Ms Grude loosely mapped onto a large piece of mural paper. Ms Grude and the students then met together, one class at a time, to create the murals. First, students watched another portion of the video ‘Eric Carle, Picture Writer’, showing Carle creating one of his amazing collaged images. The children then emulated his technique of cutting out individual elements from the colorful papers and gluing each onto the white background in layers, building the picture story.



It was thrilling to see the student's excitement as the image developed before their eyes, and their pride when they saw the finished result! The 14 murals were then photographed by local photographer Trevor Allen, and parent volunteer Michael-Andreas Kuttner generously committed many hours to creating the digital layout of the book for print.

On April 18th, 2008, Holland Road School hosted a book launch celebration for the students at Holland Road to commemorate their fantastic achievement. It was a great experience for everyone!
Holland Road Book Launch April 18, 2008 The book launch was a huge success! Local MLA Percy Paris was present to congratulate the students, and stated that he thought the book was the most diverse and inclusive he’s ever seen. Councilor Krista Snow, along with Mayor Peter Kelly, showed great support and presented the school with a beautiful framed certificate and letter that showcased the book's cover. There were also two local papers covering the story, along with ATV’s Live at 5. The story has been featured 3 times since on television! We had a PowerPoint presentation of pictures taken during the project, outlining the whole process, and then the students held a collective reading of the book, which really brought the whole things to life. The students were all so thrilled to finally get their own copies of the book, and were eagerly anticipating sharing them with their families. There was much applause and general excitement.
'Word on the Street' September 2008 On Sunday, September 28, 2008, Tara Grude and Peggy Chisholm took 'A Kid's Guide to Making and Being a Friend' to the Word on the Street Festival in Halifax. Many copies of the book sold, and orders for copies were placed by both individuals and bookstores! Copies of the book were also exchanged with other local authors for copies of their books, enabling us to introduce four new, autographed books to our school library! Everyone who saw the book thought it was wonderful and said, "The children must be so proud!". Below are a few pictures taken at the festival. A big thanks goes out to Tara and Peggy for all their hard work!



'Word on the Street' September 27, 2009 Volunteers Tara Grude, Peggy Chisholm, and Val Turner represented Holland Road and our book, ‘A Kid’s Guide to Making and Being a Friend’, at the local literary event, Word on the Street, again this year. Once again, the book received great reviews and attracted lots of interest, and some of our students participated in a stage reading of excerpts from the book! Through a connection made at the event, the book was even featured in an on-line magazine, called East Coast Eco Parent. Check it out here! The C100 fm Breakfast Club also mentioned the book on their radio show!




Purchase Your Copy! The book is available for $10 each through the school office or you may contact Tara Grude at tara.kg@live.ca. If you would like to donate a cash contribution, the school will gladly present the equal value in books to a local children’s organization, school or library. Please help us to circulate our message of friendship and acceptance among a larger community.