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Dayton Daily News education reporter Scott Elliott writes about schools, kids, teaching and learning.
Home > Blogs > Get on the Bus > Archives > 2007 > September > 14 > Entry
“Marley” author visits Kettering school
(John Grogan at Kettering’s Oakview Elementary School Friday)
Back at the beginning of the summer, my wife returned from a trip to Books & Co. with a big smile. A friend had turned her onto a great book called “Marley & Me” a sentimental story written by newspaper reporter John Grogan about what he calls “the worst dog in the world.”
While she was at the bookstore to pick it up, she saw on the shelf another book called “Marley: a dog like no other.” The book was the same story, re-written for a younger audience. So my wife bought that book for our eight-year-old daughter and they spent the summer reading them together.
That turned out to be really fun for the both of them. With every chapter, they would discuss what happened. It was great mother-daughter bonding time and it kept my daughter reading during the summer.
Grogan happens to be in town today as part of a book tour. He will be at Books & Co. in the Greene at 6 p.m. for a book signing. But this afternoon, he visited Kettering’s Oakview Elementary School where I caught up with him for a few words.
In his talk with a gym full of elementary school kids, Grogan told stories from the book and read the kids another version of the Marley story — an illustrated, fictionalized Marley story called “Bad Dog Marley!” that’s aimed at kindergarten and pre-school kids. Grogan said he has another Marley book coming out with a Christmas theme.
I asked Grogan about this multiple book strategy. Was it marketing? Was this an industry trend?
No, he said. This all started when Grogan was on his first book tour and he noticed younger children showing up at his signings with the book — kids in grade 5 to 8. This made him uneasy — the original book has a few spots of adult language and content. He wrote it, after all, for adults.
So, Grogan and his publisher talked about this. Teachers also came up to him at events and said how much they’d love to use the book in class, if only they could get approval from their school boards. They considered first an edited version of the adult book before arriving at a simple conlclusion — why not re-tool the book directly for a younger audience?
The move turned out to be genius. Marley is now a worldwide best seller as the books have been translated into 30 languages.
During the assembly at Oakview, Grogan said he was pleased so many kids enjoyed the stories. He asked how many in the audience had a dog of their own. Probably three-fourths of the kids hands went up.
“I guess a lot of kids have bad dogs in their homes, too,” Grogan said with a smile.
Permalink | Comments (6) | Categories: Teaching and Learning
Comments
By Concerned Mom of 3
September 15, 2007 3:13 PM | Link to this
This sounds like a wonderful program. I once had the opportunity to see an author present his book to an assembly of students at St. Rita school. It was a real treat! (I think the parent oranization raised the funds in order to bring the author to speak.) I hope the students had a great experience that they will remember forever. Maybe someone will be inspired to write their own book.By MC
September 15, 2007 9:32 AM | Link to this
Mary, you are absolutely correct. Male teachers are often in short supply in all areas and can offer valuable role modeling so desperately needed for our young males today! Thanks for your point of view!By Mary
September 15, 2007 7:36 AM | Link to this
“null”,dream on.By null
September 14, 2007 11:01 PM | Link to this
Mary - please stop talking and posting. Your knowledge and ideas are limited and unfounded half the time. I’m tired of you running the boards.By sdswith5
September 14, 2007 8:28 PM | Link to this
Such a great story, a great offering that doesn’t take a lot of effort to coordinate and not one of the normal nay-sayers is on here griping about SOMETHING…”why aren’t they in MY district?” “why can’t DPS get this for my kid?” Notice a pattern here? The complainers only like to TALK when there is something to WHINE about - - - want some cheese with that?By Mary
September 14, 2007 7:29 PM | Link to this
It’s nice to hear about some male role models like Grogan in schools for a change. Now, if the middle schools and high schools could make some similar efforts. Few male role models and few male teachers are a topic in the news this week, but I also think the students need to be exposed to a more diverse group than they have in the school setting. Not too many literature and English teachers are male, and boys and girls need to know it is okay for guys to be good at that stuff, too.