If you are anything like the fictional children’s book character Amelia Bedelia, common phrases such as “a needle in a haystack” or “a fork in the road” may really confuse you.
“I once tried to find a needle in a haystack,” says Amelia Bedelia in Good Driving, Amelia Bedelia, by Herman Parish. “But I never did find it.”
Many children reading these beginner books may not understand these phrases either, but they will by the end of the books.
Author Herman Parish read this book, his first in the series that was started by his aunt Peggy Parish when he was only 4, and spoke about the writing process at West New York’s Public School No. 2’s pre-kindergarten through fourth grade students on March 9.
Explaining his writing process
“My first book didn’t look like this right away,” said Parish to the group of first graders in the auditorium of Public School No. 2. “It looked kind of ugly.”
Herman Parish’s first Amelia Bedelia adventure came to him while riding a bus into work one morning. Without a pad and pencil, Parish wrote his notes on the side of a newspaper.
While writing Amelia Bedelia books was new to him then, the character had been introduced to Parish by his aunt.
Peggy Parish was the original author of the books. The first book in the series Amelia Bedelia was written in 1963. In the books, Amelia Bedelia is an adult housekeeper who is very literal-minded.
Peggy Parish wrote 12 books in the series. She passed away in 1988.
After turning down the numerous offers from other authors to continue the series, Parish decided to try himself. “Before anyone else writes these books,” said Parish, who wrote his first book about seven years after Peggy Parish’s death. “I would like to try.”
After getting the idea to write Good Driving, Amelia Bedelia, Parish spent at least an hour sitting in his car.
“Driving is so automatic,” said Parish. “No one ever thinks about it.”
Automatic, get it?
However, if Parish wanted to continue the play on words that filled the pages of the past 12 Amelia Bedelia books, Parish needed to find something about driving that could be misunderstood.
“I have to look at things differently,” said Parish to the children. “I have to look at things the way that Amelia Bedelia would look at them.”
After releasing this book, Parish received a letter from a child addressed to his aunt that said that Good Driving, Amelia Bedelia was the best book she had ever written.
“That is a huge compliment,” said Parish.
Parish has written three Amelia Bedelia books so far and expects to release his fourth book soon.
His next book will follow Amelia Bedelia’s adventures helping out in a doctor’s office.
“If you’re a kid, you only go to the doctor for two reasons,” said Parish. “Either ’cause you are sick, which is terrible, or because you are going to get a shot, which is equally terrible.”
Reading is fun
Herman Parish’s visit to the school was part of the district’s Whole School Reform initiative that promotes programs to expand the learning experience of students.
Parish is one of a series of authors whom the school will host this year. These visits were paid for by the state’s Comprehensive School Reform Demonstration grant. Through this grant, Public School No. 2 and other schools in the district were given $50,000 a year for the next three years to be used to improve student achievement. “We thought the children would benefit from authors,” said Building Facilitator Anastasia Olivero, who also came dressed as the housekeeper, Amelia Bedelia. “Hopefully this will spur parents to take their children to libraries.”
While the Amelia Bedelia books are for younger children, the seventh and eighth graders also enjoyed them. “They really get the joke,” said Olivero about reading the books to the seventh and eighth grade classes. “They love it.”
Parish hopes that these books will help spur children to read.
“The books, through the Amelia Bedelia character, help children appreciate the principle that guided my aunt: reading is fun,” said Parish.
Each student in pre-kindergarten through fourth grade received an autographed copy of Herman Parish’s first book, Good Driving, Amelia Bedelia.
“When the entire staff feels that strongly about something, the students will benefit,” said Olivero.
The historical fiction writer James Collier will be reading to the school’s seventh and eighth grade students in April.