Gibberish
Book description
It's Dat's first day of school in a new country! Dat and his Mah made a long journey to get here, and Dat doesn't know the language. To Dat, everything everybody says - from the school bus driver to his new classmates - sounds like gibberish. How is Dat going…
- Coming soon!
Why read it?
2 authors picked Gibberish as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?
Gibberish is one of those brilliant picture books that couldn’t be made any other way.
The combination of words, symbols, and multiple art styles perfectly tells the story of an immigrant child’s acclimation to an English-speaking classroom. At first, the English words are all written in symbols, which read as gibberish, and those speaking them are depicted as old-timey cartoon characters.
As the child begins to understand, the symbols slowly transition to letters, and the characters gradually merge with the style of the rest of the book. It is so clever, so emotional, and so simple for even the youngest…
I love Gibberish for the brilliant way that Voh portrays how it feels to be the new kid at school, in a new country, with a new language. It’s a familiar story arc but told in such a unique way! Voh’s use of speech bubbles and emojis to represent the new language as gibberish is such a powerful tool to convey the confusion of the unfamiliar. I love how easily children relate to the text and the images—and in so doing, connect with the new kid. Masterfully done, I highly recommend this!
From Jyoti's list on children figuring out their place in the world.
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