Reading With Pictures: Getting Comics into Schools and Getting Schools into Comics
A Comics project in Chicago, IL by Josh Elder ·
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Update #5: "Capt'n Eli and the Mystery of the Goblin Shark" by Jay Piscopo
Posted on March 4, 2010
STORY SUMMARY
Deep off the coast of Tasmania, the distress call is sent: Divers are trapped in a cave by a giant sea monster!
Heeding the call in The Dolphin (his mini-sub) is Capt'n Eli, intrepid sea explorer and inventor. He is joined by his friends, Barney the Sea Dog and
200-year-old parrot Jolly Roger. As Eli arrives on the scene, he sees an empty damaged shark cage and notices hot water vents on the ocean floor.
As he explores further, he discovers the underwater grotto with two wayward divers inside. Eli dons his scuba gear and leaves The Dolphin to help the divers.
Suddenly, it appears! A grotesque, giant shark, prehistoric in appearance. The shark and Eli swim in a cat and mouse chase- Eli realizes that the shark's appearance is distorted by the hot water vents, making him seem much larger. He also realizes that the shark is a Goblin Shark - a living fossil - very rare - and of no danger to humans. One of the divers, emboldened by Eli's arrival, swims from the grotto. The diver recovers his spear-gun and fires at the animal.
Eli deflects the spear, realizing that the shark is far from its habitat, and uses his sonic lure to help the creature back on its course. He then helps the divers to the surface and tells them about the "monster" they thought they encountered, and the living fossils.
The divers realize that a little bit of knowledge can overcome fear, and that in the endless depths, everything is not as it seems!
CREATOR BIO
Jay Piscopo is the author and illustrator of The Undersea Adventures of Capt’n Eli all-ages graphic novel series. Piscopo also co-created The Scrap City Pack Rats, art directed the award-winning Fizz and Martina Math Adventures, and was an animator for ABC TV’s Squigglevision. He resides in his hometown of Portland, Maine.
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This project successfully raised its funding goal on May 23, 2010.
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Project By
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Josh Elder is an award-winning cartoonist, a nationally recognized advocate for the use of comics in the classroom and the founder of the educational nonprofit Reading With Pictures.
As a comics scribe, Josh has contributed to the superheroic sagas of Batman and Superman and the sci-fi phenomenon StarCraft. He is nonetheless best known for co-creating (along with artist Erich Owen) the nationally syndicated comic strip and certified awesome graphic novel series Mail Order Ninja. The series was named one of the 25 Best Graphic Novel Series for Children by School Library Journal and the comic strip was syndicated in over 40 newspapers nationwide including The Boston Globe, The LA Times and The Denver Post.
However these days, Josh spends far more time in the classroom than at the keyboard. In order to promote the use of comics in education, Josh gives cartooning workshops to thousands of students each year at schools, libraries and literary festivals across the country. He has done workshop events with the Chicago Public School System, the New York Public Library, Northwestern University and the Novello Festival of Reading among many others. Josh has also provided professional development services for or on behalf of numerous clients including the Illinois State Library, the Children’s Museum of Indianapolis and DePaul University. He has also given conference presentations on the role of comics in education to organizations such as the International Reading Association, the San Diego Comic Con, TEDx, and the American Library Association.
A graduate of Northwestern University and a National Merit Scholar who took college courses while still in middle school, Josh has always credited comics for his academic successes. He taught himself to read at age four by using comics, and they have been his scholastic “secret weapons” ever since. Now he wants to share that secret with students in every city, every school and every classroom.
In 2009, Josh joined with a group of likeminded individuals to found Reading With Pictures. Josh is honored and privileged to serve as the organization’s Executive Director and President, guiding Reading With Pictures’ efforts to get comics into schools and get schools into comics by developing educational resources, cultivating academic research and publishing high-quality curriculum materials.
Josh makes his home in the small, Midwestern town of Chicago, Illinois.
