The Children's Department of the Irvington
Public Library hosted, as one of its Black History Month events,
a special "Meet the Author Day" on Saturday, February
12th, 2011. The event featured different African-American
children’s authors from the local community.
The Wiz Kids got to the library early so while
the audience was waiting for the event to begin, Wiz Kid Qua-Fiki
did some rope tricks and a rope escape for the children. He is
working on a new book called "Escapes For Teens," but
it won't be published until later this year.
The first author presented spoke about Autism. Rasheeda Saleem-Muhammad, author of Pedro's Visit to the Aquarium read from
her book about the problems that children with disabilities face.
She answered questions about autism and asked the children of the
audience to imagine what it must be like, and how they should
treat other children who have such disabilities, with dignity and
respect.
T. S. Bradshaw, author and illustrator of “The Goodees” , a series of books that
teach children different world languages, gave information about
African American history as it relates to children's literature.
Students were given opportunities to show their skills speaking
different languages as she gave them a chance to take turns
counting to four in Mandarin Chinese and other language
challenges.
Wiz Kid Jim Gerrish, a director of The Wiz Kids
Inc. of East Orange, NJ, presented donations of children's magic
books to the librarian because during an earlier visit to the
library, he had noticed there were very few magic books available
in the children's section.
Before Author Wiz
Kid Qua-Fiki showed his book, he performed a few magic Go
Fish Card Tricks from the book. The book that he
presented to the librarian requires that she do some magic of her
own, otherwise the pages are blank and only contain the rules of
magic. But any young reader who can memorize the three rules of
magic and prove to the librarian that they are ready to see the
magic tricks contained in the book can have her wave their magic
library card over the blank book and it will be filled with color
photos, drawings, diagrams and secrets of how to do the tricks
that Qua-Fiki showed them this day. To see additional photos of
Wiz Kid Qua-Fiki's magic show, click HERE.
The last author of the event was Antoinette
Gelin, educator from East Orange and author of “Dream
Princess.” She was working on a new book and she described
how she wrote and illustrated her books, taking the children
through the steps from storyboard to publishing. The children
paid rapt attention, no doubt dreaming of the possibilities in
becoming an author or illustrator some day.
