It's time, it's time ... did she just say it's time?

There's a great stanza in a Veggie Tales song called "Promised Land" that goes like this:

It's time, it's time, did he just say it's time? (boom, boom, boom, boom)
We didn't have a lot of fun in the desert.
We didn't have a lot of fun in the sand.
But saddle up your cow and fall behind us now,
Because we're goin' to the Promised Land.

Whenever it's time for me to get cooking on something, I think of those lyrics.  Yep, it's time. And we're going to the Promised Land ... the land of Lit. Review.

The time has come at last for me to write a THE paper that synthesizes all I've learned about using picture books in high school classrooms. I have a fat, white binder that is bursting with my notes from 27 sources, notes that are contained on my brand new iMac, my old-but-reliable Sony laptap, and a couple of flash drives (that I hope I can put my hands on in the next few minutes).  I have sections of it written in various places, but pieces I have yet to draft.  All told, I believe the paper will exceed 30 pages, and it might be a heck of a lot closer to 50.

Here are the sections the review will include (but not be limited to and not necessarily in this order):

• Introduction explaining how I got involved in this project
• Definition of picture book; this will actually be a fairly lengthy section, as the components of a picture book are many and complex.
• Discussion on the importance of calling picture books "picture books" (I've run across some pretty silly alternatives, my favorite of which is "everybody books" -- uh, no.)
• How to choose quality picture books
• DOs and DON'Ts for using them in high school classrooms
• Theories about why they work; this section will include a description of efferent and aesthetic reading events, as well as read-alouds and visual learning.  Oh, and also situated perspective (yes, I'm perusing my fat, white binder right now). OH!  And also the stages of reading!
• Cross-curricular lesson applications (This will also be a pretty chunky section.)
• Teacher anecdotes (May or may not use -- have not decided on this yet; if so I'll spread them throughout; they'd certainly add interest to the paper, but they lack science.)

This is the basic idea. Lots to write. And I think it will be a whole heap of fun. I'm saddling up my cow ...