The opportunity to relate a story is truly cherished by grandparents and their grandchild alike. In today’s world, parents are constantly under time pressure. Grandparents often have the quality time to invest, and willingly do so because it warms their hearts to see their grandchildren prospering, emotionally, spiritually and intellectually.
The primary motivation for me to write The Monster on Top of the Bed was to have a way to pass on my most cherished values to my yet to be conceived grandchildren. As my hair turned from brown to gray, and finally to silver I began to realize that I was mortal. I wanted to make certain that any future grandchildren would understand three lessons: (1) Following the golden rule makes it easy to feel good about yourself and to make friends; (2) Friendship trumps fear; and (3) Believing in yourself makes even the most difficult tasks possible.
As an experienced author, I knew that I couldn’t just say those things in a book. “Boring!” would be the response. The messages had to emerge from the story. Children had to be able to discover them. I also knew that the story had to have a problem, a relatively way for a child to take action to resolve that problem, and be entertaining. Finally, I knew that I wanted to make as many children happy with the story as possible, not a simple task since what makes one child sad can make another child happy.
I considering writing a book an opportunity to relate, not tell a story. I choose to relate the story in different ways, ways that make it particularly attractive for telling by grandparents. Hop on over to http://www.Monbed.com, and view the video of the book—it’s free. Watch for these elements:
• A story that is easy to almost memorize – you can look at the Italian ice-cream parlor artwork by Maneula Pentangelo and recall most of the story without reading. This is on purpose, because one of my goals is to motivate children to write their own story. That’s why we have an edition of the book that includes the major artwork only, without the words. I pictured myself, sitting down reading and re-reading the story with my grandchildren, and then challenging them to write their own version of the story. I pictured the child excitedly writing their version of the story, and then putting their name on the front cover of the book as co-author. Can you picture yourself doing this for your grandchildren?
• “Do unto others as you would want others to do unto you,” is the desired behavior that is modeled by the characters. The Golden Rule is never mentioned. Children don’t like to be taught, they love to discover. They get it. Want proof? Watch the story with your grandchildren, and then ask them something like, “What did Suzy do to make it easy for Karrit to be her friend?”
• Captivating artwork that appeals equally to both boys and girls. The artist and I spent two years tweaking everything from the colors used in the characters to the Kung-Fu ponytail that makes Karrit very appealing to boys, as well as girls.
• Discussion Questions – They’re built right into the book, at the end. This feature makes it easy to spend quality time discussing the key lessons of the book with children.
• A CD (or free .mp3 file download) of the book in different languages, so that children are exposed to different languages and cultures. Children will listen to the same page in different languages, many times. Grandparents enjoy having fun discussions with their grandchildren after asking a question like, “which reader did you like best?” or “what did you think of the story in Spanish? Was it as much fun as English?”
You don’t need high-technology to enjoy a book, but for grandparents who are tech-savvy there are many formats that children enjoy, such as being able to listen to the book on an iPod while shopping, or the ability to download a multi-media version that works on a computer. As you turn the pages, the book reads the story, and you can even ask your grandchildren to draw their own illustrations, take a digital picture of them and upload their pictures into the e-book. The book will read the story while their pictures are displayed. They can even e-mail the e-book to friends, family and classmates. That’s a story for another day, or perhaps you’d like to hear an interview with Glenn Hahn, on a radio show. It’s an interesting 25 minutes. Listen to Alan being interviewed by on The WIFI Tech Show.
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Alan Jordan is the author of The Monster on Top of the Bed, as well as six business books. Order from http://www.MonBed.com/order. If time is short, you can download an e-book version immediately, and receive the printed version later. It makes a great holiday gift. When you’re in the mood for some writing for people over the age of 16, , visit Alan’s new blog Celebrity Magic: Celebrities, Their Causes and the Magic they Weave at http://www.CelebrityMagic.ORG.
