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(Continued)
Jojo as a model of perfection
Ginette Anfousse danced ballet for many years. She has danced on stage and knows what it's like to be a performer. Little Jojo seems to like playing at being a star.
When she says, "Me, well, I'm going to be perfect," look at how the picture shows her. She is standing very straight and her arm is raised high above her hat. Her eyes look upwards. She has a little smile on her lips, and she looks sure of herself.
Ginette Anfousse does not show her as shy, looking small in a corner. No. She puts Jojo smack dab in the middle of the page. You could say she is queen of the page! The iiiii's above her head could be dancing. And maybe they're even laughing! Besides floating on air, these iiiii's look a little funny. They look like little hanging candles, like when you're dizzy and you see stars! Is Jojo dizzy?
The words that Ginette makes her character say are clear. "Me, well, I'm going to be perfect. I'll raise my hand and say: 'My name is Jojo, Pichou is waiting at home for me, I know how to count, one, two, three, up to ten, sometimes up to one hundred. I know my address and my phone number BY HEART.'"
The picture gives Jojo a lot of space on the page. And the words say that Jojo will be "perfect". It's a little as if the picture and the words say the same thing. What is surprising is that they are talking about something that hasn't even happened yet. When you are getting ready to do something FOR THE FIRST TIME, you don't really know how it's going to turn out. So you imagine it. There must be lots of "first times" you could talk about… The first time you lost a tooth, the first time you managed to tie your shoelaces… In your life, maybe there was a first house, a first room and, definitely, A FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL!
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