About the Author
South Jersey native Darryl Robbins spent 45 years as a private practice pediatrician in Central Ohio, primarily in Gahanna, before retiring from practice four years ago.
He graduated from the Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine in 1971, then interned at Doctors Hospital in Columbus, followed by a pediatric residency at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital before returning to Columbus to begin his practice.
In addition to his clinical practice, Robbins enjoyed teaching, especially annually attending on one of the in-patient pediatric
infectious disease wards at Nationwide Children’s Hospital during the first half of his career. His career morphed over into several leadership responsibilities, primarily at Nationwide, including as medical staff president in 1996.
Other leadership opportunities include being made the president of Columbus Practicing Pediatricians in 2001, a position he would remain in for the next 15 years, that was made to support the private practice pediatricians in central Ohio.
Robbins and his wife, Harriette, have three grown, married daughters who each work with children: one as a pediatric occupational therapist, one as a private practice pediatrician and one as a pediatric endocrinologist. They have five grandchildren (see above).
Robbins states that he never felt that pediatrics was a job for him, and he always felt that he was “the lucky person in the room” to be able to serve in this capacity.
And, as you will see, he has always enjoyed reading.
The Uncertain Book Club
When I retired in mid-2020 following 45 years of general pediatric practice, my wife strongly urged me to have a plan for my retirement so that I would not drive her crazy at home.
My plan involved developing and implementing a children’s book club, although I had never participated in any book club. Thus, the Uncertain Book Club was born, with initial participants including my grandchildren and the grandchildren of good friends. Social infrastructure for this endeavor was enhanced by home schooling during the early pandemic as well as the popularization of Zoom.
Preparation
To pull this book club off, I needed assistance to discover excellent children’s literature appropriate for 8 to 14-year-olds. I turned to two experts: Karen Sherman, a retired gifted-student teacher in the Columbus public school system; and Lexi Walters Wright, owner of High Five Books, a children’s bookstore in Florence, Massachusetts.
The process
Starting with a clean slate, I developed and refined a method to create a one-hour Zoom experience, employing 20 to 30 questions for discussion, avoiding a “right or wrong” answer approach, and utilizing some content questions but mostly questions focused on values.
During each Zoom experience, I had the children rotate who would respond first, and then the other children added input when they were called upon. Parents and grandparents have been welcome to sit in on the entire session and to actively participate in the last five to 10 minutes. The maximum number of children on our Zoom call has been six.
While I selected the books for the earliest sessions, a point came when the children declared they wanted to select the books themselves. We arrived at a compromise: They would each take a turn selecting three books from which I would choose one for the group to review. This has been working well and is still the mechanism used for book selection.
Goals
My goals evolved through the early sessions:
- Promote age-appropriate, enjoyable and sometimes challenging reading experiences as part of lifelong learning.
- Discover the values of each of the key characters in each book (both positive and negative) through their reading experience.
- Learn what each of the children appreciated from each book, as well as each child’s critique of what they read.
- Enhance learning of useful vocabulary. Recent example from The Giver by Lois Lowry: ambiguous; euphemism; dystopia; corporal punishment.
The Q&A approach
I worked on the questions as I read through each book and invited the participants and their parents to submit questions. Content questions were used to see how well the children comprehended what they were reading and to maintain focus on the content. Value questions created discussion for reflecting upon how different characters thought and behaved in certain situations. One of my key ongoing value questions was to provide a list of attributes and have each child respond to what fits a given character.
My last several questions for each book would be to have each participant rate the book from one to 10 (highest), share why they chose that number, and whether they would read another book by the same author.
What have I learned?
- The joy of working with children has extended for me from being an overnight camp counselor to having a career in pediatrics to running a children’s book club.
- There are many terrific children’s books, comparable to excellent adult literature.
- Getting assistance from content experts was key.
- Each book should be an enjoyable and yet challenging read.
- Not to expect children, whose brains are in the process of developing to necessarily pattern themselves on the positive values that were repeatedly inculcated within our one-hour Zoom meeting.
Why uncertain?
I initially picked this title because I had no idea where this experience would lead. It has recently gone in several unexpected directions.
First, last year I read The Secret River, written by Pulitzer Prize Winner Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings and illustrated by two-time Caldecott Medalists Leo and Diane Dillon, to my then 8-year-old and 5-year-old grandchildren. The 8-year-old was a seasoned member of the book club. When we completed reading and reviewing the book, I told the 5-year-old she was now a member of the Uncertain Book Club. You would have thought she had just won a Grammy!
In another recent detour, one of my granddaughters wrote and illustrated a graphic novel for an eighth-grade English class project. I really enjoyed reading it and found it pertinent for ethical discussion. Entitled Best Friends, or Not? it became the book club’s 18th reviewed book – an unpublished hit and our first participating author.
Where are we now?
To date, we have read and discussed 20 books, almost half during the early part of the pandemic. Not one of the books was a disappointment to any of the participants. One member, through age and maturity, is likely to graduate out; and one, much younger, is matriculating in.
Scheduling has become a greater challenge as the pandemic has subsided; the children are all back in school and involved in various extracurricular activities. Although our future is uncertain, I am pleased that all the children would like it to continue.
Dr. Darryl A. Robbins is a retired pediatrician with 45 years of experience in the field.
