Word of the Week/Sparkle and Spin: A Book About Words

It's time for our Word of the Week feature here at LitLad. Here's how it works: Every Sunday the boys and I read a book from which they pick their favorite-sounding unfamiliar word. They each write the word that night and we try to use it in conversation as much as we can throughout the week. According to The Read-Aloud Handbook by Jim Trelease, "the only words children learn having heard them only once are the words you wish you had never said in front of them."

This week's word is lurk, a verb meaning "to lie in wait or to sneak, as though to frighten, annoy or attack," as Tintin is now doing just to hear his brother scream.

And we're reading Sparkle and Spin: A Book About Words, in which it says, "...while lurk and murk or moan and groan are just as dark as night."

Sparkle and Spin: A Book About Words
Author/illustrator: Ann Rand/Paul Rand
Publisher: Chronicle Books (August 2006)
Source: Half Price Books


Originally published in 1957 by Harcourt, Brace & World, Sparkle and Spin is a book about small words and big words and what they are, do and say. It tells us how words "teach us how to talk to one another." With retro graphics (modern in 1957) by the graphic designer who created the logos for ABC, IBM, UPS and others, Sparkle and Spin is an eye-popping display of words.

Tintin's note: I liked the big huge words like tintinnabulate. The back looks glittery.

Johnny Boo's note: It was great. I was impressed by sparkles.

Find it: Amazon, IndieBound