COLLEGE PARK, MD (November, 2016) – Jeff Kinney’s “Diary of a Wimpy Kid” books have sold 180 million copies in 52 languages worldwide. “Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Double Down,” the 11th book in the series that was released on Nov. 1, has helped keep the series on the New York Times Bestseller List for 400 weeks.
It’s an outcome Kinney, B.A. ’93, would have never imagined for himself, he told an audience of about 200 at an Inspired Learning event hosted by the College of Education on Oct. 27 at University of Maryland’s Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center.
Yet, before “Wimpy Kid” was pitched to Kinney as a children’s series, “I had never for a second—and I can’t even explain why I never thought it—but I never for a second thought I was writing something kids might want to read one day,” he said. “I really became a children’s writer on accident.”
In his discussion of his journey to become the writer and illustrator, he also talked about the books, comics and other publications that inspired him while growing up in Maryland, including books by Judy Blume, Uncle Scrooge and Calvin and Hobbes comics and Circus magazine.
After his talk, Kinney participated in a panel discussion with College of Education professors Jennifer Turner, associate professor, Teaching and Learning, Policy and Leadership; Jade Wexler, assistant professor, Counseling, Higher Education, and Special Education; and Allan Wigfield, professor, Human Development and Quantitative Methodology. The discussion was moderated by COE Dean Donna Wiseman.
The panelists discussed topics like using drawing to encourage writing among students, how to reach reluctant and non-readers and ways to keep students motivated.
“His books, his films, his online games have had an incredible impact in inspiring children to read and motivating them to learn,” UMD President Wallace D. Loh said during his introductory remarks at the event.
Kinney got his start as a cartoonist during his days as a student at the University of Maryland, when his comic strip Igdoof appeared in the campus newspaper, the Diamondback. Igdoof, in fact, was popular enough to the point that one year, the character received the most write-in votes from students in a mock contest run by the Diamondback, said his mother Patricia Kinney, who earned her Ph.D. at Maryland in 1987 and introduced her son at the event.
“Students mainly did a write-in, and Igdoof won for president of the United States,” Patricia Kinney said.
He showed an interest in drawing over the years, and Kinney was often found drawing and writing in a journal during family reunions, Patricia Kinney said.
“That material would later become the first three [Diary of a Wimpy Kid] books,” she said.
In college, drawing Igdoof became an all-consuming passion for Jeff Kinney.
“I started taking cartooning very seriously, in fact, a little too seriously, ’cause every night I would say, ‘Either I can do this one term paper that one person’s going to read or this comic that 20,000 people are going to read,’ and so my grades really started to suffer, but I found my calling.”
At 22, Jeff Kinney’s book of Igdoof comics, “The Igdoof Bathroom Companion,” was published, leading to a profile in the Washington Post.
After graduating from the University of Maryland in 1993, Jeff Kinney stuck around at the Diamondback a little longer, his first full-time job as the production manager of the student newspaper. In 1995, he moved to Massachusetts, where he worked as a graphic artist at a newspaper and later did computer work for a medical journal, among other jobs.
During those years he sent his comics to publishers all over the country, working toward his dream of becoming a nationally syndicated cartoonist. He envisioned his work along the lines of works like “The Wonder Years” or “A Christmas Story” that featured adult protagonists looking back on their childhood experiences.
“I thought I was a good gag writer, but I knew I wasn’t a good artist and I couldn’t get my pen to do the things that those real cartoonists did on the page. And I tried, and I worked on it for a long time but I would just never get to there, which is where I needed to go. I said, ‘So, I’m burning to be a cartoonist but my artistic skills tap out around seventh grade, and so what am I going to do with this?’ he said.
“That’s when a light bulb went on over my head, and I said ‘Maybe I should act like a middle school kid. I should cartoon as a seventh grader,’ and that’s when I had that idea for “Diary of a Wimpy Kid” and so once I had that idea, I was off and running.”
Kinney persisted, only to receive rejection letter after rejection letter. His luck finally changed when he decided to take his work to New York Comic Con in 2006. It was there he connected with the man who would become his editor, Charles Kochman, of publisher Harry N. Abrams, and pitched the Wimpy Kid idea, which was already being published online at funbrain.com. From there, Kinney ended up signing a book deal.
Looking back, Kinney said that by not intentionally writing to children, he prioritized humor over trying to teach a lesson, creating something that was more appealing to young readers.
Over the years, Kinney has heard from parents of reluctant readers, including many on the autism spectrum, that their children are drawn to his books. One reason Kinney thinks so is because his books include illustrations that allow readers to navigate “islands of text,” much in the way he read textbooks in college.
Navigating the “islands of text” can be a helpful strategy for many students, but those like the incarcerated adolescent students Wexler and other colleagues worked with during one study and are the focus of her research, lack the proper instruction needed to get the most out of reading.
“(The students) were inherently motivated to read, but interestingly, these kids saw reading as (having) to decode the words on the page, that was reading,” Wexler said. “They didn’t understand that the purpose of the reading was to learn, and I think a lot of it comes from their backgrounds, not having a model of good reading, not being exposed to good instruction early on.”
Drawing can help students develop stronger reading and writing skills, said Turner, who studies multimodal instruction and culturally-responsive teaching. In a summer reading program, students were given the task of drawing what they wanted to be what they grew up, and teachers found that those drawings served as a springboard for the students to express themselves through writing.
“Writing for them became a way to describe their picture, describe their dreams, describe their hopes,” she said. “I’ve actually begun to think of them as designers, designers of their own career interests, designers of their hopes and goals, and so much of that, I’ve tried to help them see is part of literacy.”
The challenge for teachers is taking the relatability and the relevance young readers have found in the books, and applying that toward effective classroom instruction, said Wigfield, whose research examines the role of motivation in learning.
“How can that feeling be transferred to the books that the kids are experiencing at school?” Wigfield said. “To the extent that some of those things can be built into instruction … to have the kids make those connections more, it doesn’t have to be personally interesting every time, but at least relevant … then they’re going to … at least spend the time to get through it and learn.”
Educators, parents and others all have an important role in encouraging children to read, according to Kinney.
“I think putting a book into a kids hand is a sacred act, and we all are in some way united in that mission,” Kinney said.
Photos from the event available here.
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