11. Hey You! C'mere

#11 Hey You! C’mere (A poetry slam)

Author: Elizabeth Swados

Illustrator: Joe Cepeda

Publisher: Arthur A. Levine Books (Scholastic Press) 2002

47 Pages

“Mr. Befuddled- ah- well- yes- no, Ask him a question, oh dear, ah ho,

Mr. Befuddled can’t say yes or no, hm, gee, oh my gosh, I don’t know, gosh I don’t know”

Poetry Book

I chose this book because while I was in the library looking through the poetry books I saw the title on this book and it reminded me of my students and how their dialect is sometimes in the classroom. The book is filled with several different poems, but they all tell a story. The first poem is about a bully who is picking on the kids and then the kids all stand up to him. The poems then continue going through summer, visiting family, storms, the bully returning and playing a mean joke, and then wrapping up with the bully apologizing and the kids forgiving the bully. Each poem is tied together with the children speaking a line or two to introduce the next topic for the poem.

            The illustrations in this book are very lively. The medium used is oil paint, which helps brings the pictures to life. All throughout the book the illustration use bright and vibrant colors in all of the illustrations that are upbeat and lively and for the storm poem the colors get dark using a mixture of black, gray, purple, and orange. The shadowing done on all of the pictures helps to create an understanding for the emotions on the characters faces and brings them to life. There are no bold lines used, but very fine thin lines.

            This book is appropriate for grade first through sixth. The rhythm and rhyme in the poem can be used in a language arts lesson to introduce poetry and give the students an understanding of the many types of poems and the beat the words can create. Hey You! C’mere can be used for a character development lesson to teach students how to treat others and also to not hold grudges and forgive others. There are no awards given to this book, but the book is a fun book to read and to add personality when reading takes a little bit of effort.