Resistance and repetition

Dear Aunt Debbie,

I wrote a few months back about Isabel's disinterest in starting to learn to read on her own, as Eleanor becomes an increasingly fluent reader.  Another facet of this resistance is that Isabel refuses to let me read her chapter books: not the early, short-chapter ones that Eleanor began with, like Riverside Kids and Jamie and Angus; not the longer chapter books full of animals that I know she'd love, like Doctor Dolittle or Mr. Popper's Penguins.

I don't mean that I start these books, and they don't hold her attention -- no, Isabel will not allow me to pick them up and try reading them to her in the first place. Never mind that some of her favorite picture books have text as dense as, or denser than, a chapter book might (St. George and the Dragon and The Kitchen Knight are regular fare these days); if it's not a picture book, she's not interested.  I know this is normal: she'll be 4 later this month, and I recognize that being able to read The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe to Eleanor for the first time when she was 3 1/2 was anomalous.  Still, Isabel has a good attention span, and I'd love to be able to enter a larger narrative world with her, as I do so often with Eleanor.

Isabel is a visual kid.  She watches movies with unblinking intensity -- sometimes her eyes actually water -- and recalls images vividly.  Any night that Jeff is home for bedtime, her reading of choice is our giant book of Little Nemo comic strips, which they have now read cover to cover, and to which she returns with specific requests for certain pages.  (The size of the book makes it impossible for me to handle when I'm home alone with three kids -- imagine trying to hold it over the head of a nursing baby!)

So our reading time, in the morning and at night, toggles back and forth between Eleanor's current chapter book and Isabel's desire to read the same small group of picture books repeatedly for days in a row.  It's not uncommon for them to argue over who gets read to first, or to pout when it's the other one's turn.  Isabel tunes out Eleanor's books (or listens to them with half an ear from the other side of the couch); Eleanor is bored by Isabel's desire for repetition.  I've been looking for a book that would keep both of them interested.

Enter Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle.  Reminded and inspired by your recent post about the miracle worker who cures children of all kinds of bad behavior, I requested the first book from the library, and it worked.  Although there are only two pictures per chapter, Isabel was captivated by the stories, and Eleanor found them hysterical.  "The Answer-Backer Cure" proved to be a tremendous favorite, as both girls liked the parrot who repeats rude phrases, loudly out-doing the girl whose rudeness needs to be cured.

So has Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle cured my children of their arguments at reading time?  Not exactly.  We read the first chapter, "Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle, Herself," one evening last week, and everyone went to bed happy.  The next morning, Isabel wanted to hear the chapter again.  Eleanor, of course, wanted to read the next chapter.  And that's how it went for a few days: when it was Eleanor's turn to choose, we'd get one chapter further into the book.  When it was Isabel's turn, we would reread a chapter. By the end of the week, we got to know the book quite well.

Any suggestions for what we might try next?

Love, Annie

Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle

Dear Annie,

Books and a flashlight under the pillow!  Excellent!

 I've just spent a lovely afternoon re-reading Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle.  A little while ago I referred to it as an Ur-text of what Eleanor called a "lesson book."  Betty MacDonald wrote four Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle books between 1947 and 1957, all of which pointed out bad behavior in children and illustrated ways to modify it.

During the years that we read a lot of Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle, I went from finding the books archaic and ponderous, to scathingly satirical, to straightforwardly hilarious.  I still love the books now, although I know they can be an acquired taste.

Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle is a charmingly eccentric (but wise!) little woman who lives in a house that has been built upside down, with chandeliers rising from the floor.   She plays with all the neighborhood kids, who have free run of her house and possessions, and counsels the parents how to stop the children's bad habits, which are legion.  The structure of almost every chapter is the same: we meet a new child, discover his or her intolerable (to the parents) vice: extreme selfishness, aversion to bathing, tattling, dishonesty, etc.  Someone mentions that Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle might have the answer, and the rest of the chapter is devoted to her "cure."  In our household, the first mention of her name was usually shouted out by all listeners.  Wikipedia has a lovely chart of all the cures.  In two of the books all the cures are behavioral; the two others introduce magic.  I'm sticking to the non-magical today.

In "The Selfishness Cure" we meet Dick Thompson, who refuses to share anything.  Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle tells the parents to label everything with Dick's name "DICK'S BOOK -- DON'T TOUCH! DICK'S NOTEBOOK -- DON'T TOUCH!  DICK'S CRAYONS -- DON'T TOUCH!"  This extends to bicycle, baseball bat, lunchbox, and even food, which is labeled with icing: "DICK'S APPLE -- DON'T TOUCH!"  Dick is mercilessly laughed at in school; by the second day someone pins on his back "THIS IS DICK -- DON'T TOUCH!"  Dick can't take the ostracism and within two days he declares that he's willing to share everything he owns.  This story gave us another family literary reference -- every now and then one can be moved to theatrically assert ownership, adding, DON'T TOUCH!

"The Radish Cure" deals with Patsy Waters, who refuses to bathe.  Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle counsels her parents to wait until the dirt on Patsy is deep enough to sprinkle her with radish seeds while she sleeps.

When they had finished and were standing by her bed gazing fondly at their handiwork, Patsy's father said, "Repulsive little thing, isn't she?"

The dads often get to say the little zingers.

Patsy, unphased by dirt, is horrified by green radish sprouts and demands to bathe.  Problem solved.

The names are part of what won me over to MacDonald's nutty sense of humor.  Corinthian Bop, Enterprise Beecham, Jimmy Gopher, Electra Rockstall and my favorite, Paraphernalia Grotto, all have appearances.  The upwardly-climbing Foxgloves name their sons Harvard and Cornell; the daughters are Melody and Emmy: this is the Fifties.  The moms are all full-time moms, baking cookies and talking with the other moms about their children.  Dads are consulted on the phone, want to read the evening paper more than engage with their families, and forget Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle's name ("Call that Mrs. Wriggle-Spiggle.").  But as this theme goes through story after story, I start suspecting MacDonald of being a proto-feminist social critic.

The story that provoked the most glee in our house was "The Fighter-Quarrelers Cure," about the constantly bickering Russell twins, Anne and Joan.  Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle tells the parents to take notes on the girls' fights and then act them out the next day.  So the day starts with the mother screaming to her children that the father has told her there's a spider in her bed (Joan's usual attack on Anne). 

Mr Russell said, "Was she scared?" and jumped out of bed and ran into the bathroom shouting at the top of his voice, "Ha, ha, my first turn for the shower!"
   At that Mrs. Russell came flying in from the twins' room and began pounding on the bathroom door, yelling, "It is not your first turn!  It's mine!  You traded me your first turn yesterday for a new golf ball."
   Mr. Russell laughed rudely and called out "Too bad for you.  I've got the door locked."
   Mrs. Russell kicked at the door and shouted, "Cheater, cheater, cheater!"

The fights go on until the children, having learned their lesson, beg their parents to stop fighting.  All go out for ice cream.

The redeeming element of all these stories is that outrageous behavior -- by kids and adults -- is so much more entertaining than the final lesson (let's-be-good-and-share/bathe/not fight).

 I look forward to seeing what your family will think of Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle.

Love,

Deborah