Title: “Thank You, Mr. Falker”
Author & Illustrator: Patricia Polacco
Publisher and Year: Philomel Books 1998
Number of Pages: 40
Tags: Disabilities, 2-3, 4-5, 6-8, Non-Fiction, Stephanie Rudi
Genres: Non-Fiction
Analysis: “Thank You, Mr. Falker” is the story of how a young girl named Trisha is struggling with dyslexia without even realizing it, and her teacher helps her work through it. Trisha loves to paint and draw, but words just didn’t make sense to her, and her old teacher didn’t pick up on her disability. As a result, she thought she was stupid. Trisha and her family move across the country, and Trisha still felt dumb and was bullied at school, but then she meets Mr. Falker who helps her to read by having her stay behind every day with him and a reading teacher to help her learn how to read.
This book is a door because the illustrations go off the page and are often presented to us as if we are sitting there with the characters. Even when Trisha is hiding from the other children after being bullied, we are there with her in the darkness. Perceptually, the reader sees these images of a little girl being made fun of, and then meeting with her teacher and learning how to read. From the images alone it is easy to emphasize with the girl because we see children making fun of her and then we see her crying alone. Structurally speaking, Mr. Falker and Trisha are displayed as friends because they are drawn close to each other. This is also the case for Trisha and her grandmother, so to me this makes Mr. Falker seem like a very important person in the illustrator’s mind.
The ideological perspective of this book is basically telling us that we should really look out for our students as educators, and that it just takes one person to notice something to make a huge difference. The picture book codes show that Trisha is usually facing left when she’s more confident in a situation and she faces to the right when she’s more upset or frustrated. The author’s note is interesting because we find out that Mr. Falker is a real person to Patricia Polacco, and that she is really Trisha. This is inspiring to see, because she has come so far from not being able to read to being one of the best children’s book authors/illustrators around.
