Recently, I helped my cousin organize her new third-grade classroom . She presented me with boxes of books that I was to organize into fiction, nonfiction and miscellaneous subcategories for her classroom library.
Sifting through well-worn covers of Judy Blume, Beverly Cleary and Charlotte’s Web, I felt myself slowly rediscovering my third-grade self. Growing up anticipating each “new” Blume or Cleary work at the local bookstore or school library, I was what you could call a fiction girl.
As I sorted the Clancy School for the Arts nonfiction category, I confirmed that that elementary-school sensibility remained. I simply didn’t experience that same warm-and-fuzzy feeling when faced with texts chronicling topics such as whales, amazing discoveries from World War II and the 10 greatest baseball stories of all time.
