Deb Pilutti, maker of such fine books as these . . .

. . . visited our school last week. It was a great day. Let’s take a look.

We try to begin the hospitality outside the building.

Author visit suggestion: make some bootleg coloring pages for kids featuring characters from the author’s books (you’ll probably want to check with the visiting book creator first to see if coloring pages already exist). After reading all Deb Pilutti’s books with students (see way above), kids were excited to break out the crayons and customize the characters.

Student coloring pages for our Deb Pilutti visit pic.twitter.com/pAbIQJCjVL

— Travis Jonker (@100scopenotes) April 29, 2018

To make these I did the classic trace from the book, go over top with sharpie, and enlarge with the photocopier. We put these things up everywhere.

What would an author visit be without muffins? Our student council organized some morning snacks in honor of our author visit.

Time to get down to business! Deb presented in our library. It was a bit of a tight fit, but you know the deal:

slightly cramped library > a huge echo-y gym

Deb showed our younger students how to draw Ruby from The Secrets of Ninja School. Pro tip: add a horn and it’s a unicorn ninja.

With older students, Deb tried something really cool based on the book Idea Jar (written by Adam Lehrhaupt). Students wrote an idea on a piece of paper, and Deb drew four of them to create a story on the spot. Students had a good time with this.

Thank you, Deb Pilutti, for stopping by our school!