# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
First Grade Authors as Mentors Based on IF/THEN Book in the UNITS OF STUDY Big Ideas for This Study: How do authors find ideas? How do authors help readers feel in different ways? How can we be like our favorite authors? How can we revise to write like authors we love?

# data[].attributes.body
8 short video clips of Mo Willems telling about his career.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Biography

Mo Willems, the son of Dutch immigrants, grew up in New Orleans. He spent much of his youth telling stories and drawing. Willems especially loved reading "Peanuts" comics and then sketching Snoopy and Charlie Brown himself. "I even wrote a letter to Charles Schulz," Willems recalls, "saying that I wanted his job when he died." During high school, Willems acted in plays and started doing standup routines at comedy clubs.

After high school, Willems traveled abroad and performed standup comedy in London. He later moved to New York, where he studied film and then switched to animation. Willems spent the first part of his career writing and animating for children's television. For nine years, he worked on Sesame Street, where he won six Emmy Awards and developed characters such as Suzy Kabloozie. Willems later created Sheep in the Big City for the Cartoon Network and The Off-Beats for Nickelodeon.

For five years, Willems tried to write and illustrate children's books. After a number of rejections, Willems' simple doodle of a pigeon attracted the eye of an editor. This pigeon would become the star of his first book, Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus!, which won a Caldecott Honor in 2004. The following year, Knuffle Bunny won another Caldecott Honor, which further solidified Willems' new career as a children's book author and illustrator.

Mo Willems writes and illustrates from his home in Brooklyn, New York, where he lives with his wife and daughter.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
A video interview with Mo Willems | Reading Rockets

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Caldecott-winner Mo Willems grew up in New Orleans. He spent much of his youth telling stories and drawing. Willems especially loved reading "Peanuts" comics and then sketching Snoopy and Charlie Brown himself. "I even wrote a letter to Charles Schulz," Willems recalls, "saying that I wanted his job when he died."

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Mo Willems: The Joy of Creation | A Kennedy Center Digital Stage Original

"Everything that I do comes from a place of wanting to do something ridiculous."-Mo Willems

We Are All Connected | Kennedy Center Public Art Installation

A Large-Scale Public Art 2-Dimensional Playscape on the REACH Plaza

Okay, this is cool!

Have you checked out Mo's

2023 Text and Art © Mo Willems. ELEPHANT & PIGGIE is a trademark of The Mo Willems Studio, Inc.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Mo Willems is an author, illustrator, animator, and playwright. He was the inaugural Kennedy Center Education Artist-in-Residence (2019-2022), and he continues to collaborate in creating fun new stuff involving classical music, opera, comedy concerts, dance, painting and digital works with the National Symphony Orchestra, Washington National Opera, Ben Folds, Yo-Yo Ma, and others.

# data[].attributes.body
Topics - Chooses real life stories like Knuffle Bunny, Makes up characters, Writes about true possible problems, Writes about friendship, writes about wanting things you cannot have

Structure - Problem/Solution

Ways with Words -

Illustrations - Speech bubbles, action marks to show moving, great facial expressions, often has several small pictures on a page or one very large picture on a page

Print and Font -

# data[].attributes.body
Topics -

Structure -

Ways with Words -

Illustrations -

Print and Font -

# data[].attributes.body
Topics - Uses many characters over and over,

Beginnings - Tells background information about the character

Structure -

Ways with Words -

Illustrations -

Print and Font -

# data[].attributes.body
Topics -

Structure -

Ways with Words -

Illustrations -

Print and Font -

# data[].attributes.body
Topics -

Structure -

Ways with Words -

Illustrations -

Print and Font -

# data[].attributes.body
So Many Resources for Author Study Here
Password e2sls

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
TeachingBooks | Author & Book Resources to Support Reading Education

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
TeachingBooks strives to enrich everyone's experience reading children's and young adult books with our original and curated literary resources.