The Story of How Two Eggs Please Came to be a Book

When my youngest son, Natty was in Kindergarten at PS 87 in Manhattan, he had a wonderfully gifted teacher named Pat Martinez. One day, while visiting the class I saw her do an extraordinary thing. Ms. Martinez had the children sit in a circle on the rug. Then she took two eggs, one white and one brown, placed them in a bowl and passed it around. The children were asked to describe the eggs. Their comments focused on the differences – in color, in size, in shape, in the texture of the shells. Ms. Martinez then cracked the eggs into the bowl and passed that around. Again the children were asked to comment on what they saw. This time they talked about the fact that although the eggs were different on the outside, they were the same on the inside. It was such a simple and effective way of teaching an important social concept to young children that I just knew it had to be a picture book.

-SW