Bookmaking With Kids

Another book I often share with teachers in my workshops is Antoinette Portis’s Not a Box, a magical book about imaginative play.* It features an inventive bunny, a box and an unseen, somewhat clueless adult who asks questions. When Why are you sitting in a box? appears on one page, the bunny appears on the next, sitting in the box-as-race-car and replying indignantly, It’s not a box!

To me, it’s a wonderful reminder of the creative byways kids will wander down, given a chance, some time and a springboard—whether it’s a cardboard box or fixings for a handmade book.

Imagine my pleasure, during a bout of domestic divestiture, on discovering Ten Dots Can Be, a book made by my older daughter. Same principle as Not a Box and its successor Not a Stick, but pretend-published years and years before Portis came on the scene. My thanks to the creative teacher who provided her students with the black dots and the opportunity to transform them.

*Another book I like by by this author is A Penguin Story.

Click the link to see more pages from the Dot book.