Link: Read Across America Day

It's Read Across America day, which also commemorates the birthday of one Theodore Geisel, known colloquially as Dr. Seuss. It has always amazed me that Seuss is considered an advocate for childhood literacy; partially because of his famed ambivalence toward children, but mostly because the character of his books relies so heavily on the artwork. Don't get me wrong, I loves me some Seuss. I had Fox in Sox memorized word-for-word growing up, I loved the Lorax until he started shilling for Hot Topic, I've even played Horton in Seussical. Geisel's work is undeniably enjoyable, but lets look at the breakdown: your average Seuss book is 20% linguistic patter, 30% repetition, and 50% stylized artwork. The picture-to-word ratio is strangely reminiscent of comics, but you'd be hard-pressed to find a member of the elementary education community who would accept even the mere suggestion that comics have educational potential.

Anyway, Read Across America is a pretty good program, and "give a kid a book" is a message I can get behind. A word of caution, though:

(confession: I've been waiting for a chance to use that image.)