Tag Archives: Baseball Saved Us

Behind the Novel Effect Soundscape: Baseball Saved Us

Novel Effect, a free voice interactive storytelling app, syncs theme music and sound effects to stories as you read them aloud. By now, you may have explored some of the Lee & Low titles available on the app, including Baby Born, The Story I’ll Tell, Sparkle Boy, and Baseball Saved Us (and more on the way!). What you may not know is that Novel Effect works with award-winning composers from film and gaming to custom create each and every soundscape.

Novel Effect

We sat down with composer Ian Silver and Audio Lead Matthew Boerner, two of the talents behind several Novel Effect soundscapes, to ask them about creating the Lee & Low soundscape for Baseball Saved Us.

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Celebrating the 25th Anniversary of Baseball Saved Us by Ken Mochizuki

This month, Lee & Low Books will mark the 25th anniversary of its Baseball Saved Usfirst book release, Baseball Saved Us by Ken Mochizuki and illustrated by Dom Lee. With over half a million copies sold, this groundbreaking picture book about a young boy playing baseball in a Japanese American Internment Camp continues to be one of the company’s most popular and bestselling books.
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What does close reading look like in Third Grade?

Jaclyn DeForge thumbnailJaclyn DeForge, our Resident Literacy Expert, began her career teaching first and second grade in the South Bronx, and went on to become a literacy coach and earn her Masters of Science in Teaching. In her column she offers teaching and literacy tips for educators.

Over the past several weeks, I’ve been modeling how to do a close reading at several different grade levels. Next up: Close Reading in Third Grade using the O level text  Baseball Saved Us by  Ken Mochizuki and illustrated by Dom Lee.

One way to structure close reading questioning is to use the format laid out by the Institute for Learning of the University of Pittsburgh.  Under their framework, students read the text selection four times: first, to get the gist; second, to find significant moments or ideas; third, to interpret the ideas in the text; and finally, to analyze the author’s methods (craft).  Here’s an example of how to plan out your questions for close reading of just the first 8 pages of Baseball Saved Us:

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