Adaptation

So I was getting some chores done while Kiernan noshed on his second lunch (today was apparently Hobbit Day) and read his newest Magic School Bus book, The Magic School Bus Gets Ants in Its Pants. Kiernan loves books, and he loves two kinds of books in particular. Magic School Bus books. And new books. Right now, for him, the Venn Diagram of these two things is a single circle.

Me: Please can we read something else? How about Knuffle Bunny? That's my favorite. Please?

Kiernan: Nope.

The Magic School Bus books, for those of you who do not know, are a series of books that focus on a group of kids and their science teacher, Ms. Frizzle. Whenever Ms. Frizzle needs to teach a lesson, she takes the kids on a field trip on the Magic School Bus. The bus--as its name might imply--has amazing powers that enable it to blast the kids off into outer space so they can learn about the Solar System or to shrink down to microscopic size so that the kids can explore blood cells.

The books have basically the same set of characters each time. There is a bit of cast shifting from the older books to the newer books, kind of like MASH did over the years it ran, but basically it's the same group of kids. Kiernan is keenly aware of who is who, and because of the way we read the books each of the kids has a distinctive way of speaking. When we read we must honor this, always. The girls must sound like girls and the boys must sound like boys. Arnold is always nervous sounding. Phoebe has a southern accent. Wanda has a Chinese accent. Carlos has a very hip sounding Mexican accent (Carlos is Kiernan's favorite because Kiernan thinks of him as cool--this reminds me of the boy-crush Kiernan had on his friend Kevin last year).

The pages have a particular format, as you will see below. There is usually a paragraph of text at the top of the page spoken by a random narrator kid, with quotes from some of the characters. Mom or Dad have to read that part. On the margins there are boxes that look like sheets of paper; these are short little reports different kids have written on the subject at hand. We generally only read these bits the first couple of times we read the book. We usually skip these in day-to-day reading because they bog down the story and because Magic School Bus books take awhile to read. And by "awhile" I mean forever.

In the lower half of the page you have the characters interacting, with dialogue bubbles over their heads. Kiernan reads the dialogue bubbles. He is scrupulous in the way he does the voices, too (his Arnold is particularly excellent, but I also love his Phoebe's southern accent and I'm just waiting for a call from a teacher when he tries out his Wanda some time...why I should feel this way is beyond me. We do English accents and southern accents and Scottish accents and Russian accents, why do I get skittish about the idea of working out an Asian accent? But I digress).

Boy I've gotten off course.

At any rate, these Magic School Bus books are all the rage at the Murawski house. He was reading one today.

I came walking into the kitchen, and he was doing what you see in the picture at the top of the page. He was looking down at the book, then adjusting his hands and his face. I looked down at the book, which was open to a page of a group scene which had all the kids and Ms. Frizzle and the class mascot, Liz the lizard. I suddenly realized he was posing himself like the kids in the picture. I grabbed my camera, and he struck the next pose.

Here's a picture of the page he was reading, and adapting:


I was lucky to get a picture of Kiernan's version of each of the kids, including Ms. Frizzle and Liz. Happily once Kiernan realized what I was doing he only wanted to see the pictures as he progressed, and didn't decide to run off and hide. The photoshoot became part of the event (unfortunately, in a way). This, of course, makes me think of how different cameras and pictures are for him than they were for me. Kiernan often requests to see a picture immediately after I take it (if he knows I'm taking it). "Can I see?" he will ask. And why not? All I have to do is flip around the camera and show him the display. So this is how he understands photography. Instant gratification. What a revolutionary shift from just a few years ago, when you had to wait until a whole roll of film was done to develop it. Develop it? What? And while you could get the film in one hour if you wanted to, the reality was that the film sat in a drawer until four others joined it and you made your eventual monthly trip to Costco. On foot. Through five feet of snow. Uphill. Both ways.

Anyway, Kiernan did all the characters on the page. Notice his use of props (book, cup) and costumes (hat). I'm particularly fond of the way he's sticking out his foot in his Liz the lizard pose.

Please note that I did not interfere in his interpretations of these characters in any way. I did not suggest a thing. This was totally him, from the position of his hands to the expression on his face. The only thing I directed was the photography.

Mouse over any picture in the slide show to see a character's name. See if you can match the pose to the character in the picture from the book. Also, cross your fingers that I don't get a "cease and desist" from Scholastic from having this picture posted here.