Reading Rumpus: Eraser by Anna Kang with illustrations by Christopher Weyant

Publisher's Synopsis: "Eraser is always cleaning up everyone else’s mistakes. Except for Ruler and Pencil Sharpener, none of the other school supplies seem to appreciate her. They all love how sharp Pencil is and how Tape and Glue help everyone stick together. Eraser wants to create so that she can shine like the others. She decides to give it a try, but it’s not until the rubber meets the road that Eraser begins to understand a whole lot about herself."

My Two Cents: Honestly, those little pink erasers have always been a forgotten tool in my classroom; the idea of a little under-appreciated eraser is quite on point!
Time for school supplies = colorful pens, shiny new crayons, sharp pencils, full glue sticks, and white stacks of crisp paper. Eraser is a very creative idea, executed wonderfully with fun puns and engaging illustrations. It's a great opportunity to teach that mistakes are not only acceptable, but expected - teachers give you a special tool for them after all!

Definitely one to add to the growing list of anthropomorphized school supplies (The Day the Crayons Quit and The Legend of Rock Paper Scissors) and has a place in elementary school libraries and Pk-2 classroom shelves.

There is a great activity kit with a writing lesson on drafting & editing, as well as a doodling page and character cut outs. You can snag it HERE.

Cute book trailer adds to the telling for classroom reader aloud. Might use it as a pre-reading/prediction strategy.......

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Genre: Picture Book
Age: 3-7
Themes: Aside from the cooperation theme, I really like the opportunity to build on growth mindsets here. First grade students can especially become frustrated (given their cognitive expectations and developmental age). I can see this as a strong tool for teachers with self-critical students.
Character Development: Eraser is the star, but the other school supplies are rendered as one would imagine each to actually behave in both words and physical characteristics.
Plot Engagement: Standard plot arc... Eraser gets mad, Eraser runs away, Eraser comes back having learned. This tale could have been less if not for an endearing main character, great word choice and exactingly drawn illustrations.
Originality: Made this old educator consider that little pink eraser I had been ignoring for most of my teaching career and reimagine it as the tool that it really is!
Believability: Illustrations really add to the ability to relate to anthropomorphized school supplies.
Thank You to Amazon Prime for my free Kindle copy!
Date: September 2018
ISBN: 978-1503902589

You can buy Eraser HERE

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