special report

HIGHLIGHTS HIGH FIVE
“Celebrating Early Childhood”
Ages: 2-6

Mission Statement [from masthead]: “HIGHLIGHTS HIGH FIVE celebrates the early years of childhood – a time of discovery when learning happens at every turn. Our magazine is dedicated to helping parents, educators, and other caregivers nurture young children by:

• encouraging their natural sense of wonder about the world;

•  promoting reasoning, problem solving, and creative self-expression;

• fostering a love of language and a rich vocabulary;

• And inspiring them to be kind, to get along with others, and to grow in self-confidence…for children are the world’s most important people.”

 Like the older sibling magazine, HIGHLIGHTS HIGH FIVE takes the mission statement very seriously, and any submission needs to seriously consider the goals of the magazine. For example, since I know HIGHLIGHTS believes in leading by example, their goal of “inspiring [readers] to be kind” will mean they will not publish a story where children are unkind to one another, even though sometimes small children are. It would be wise to keep these goals in mind as we write.

Note: HIGHLIGHTS HIGH FIVE, like HIGHLIGHTS FOR CHILDREN, buys ALL RIGHTS. The material you sell to these magazines won’t be yours anymore. Be comfortable with that before submission because that’s just the way things are. Also at this time, HIGHLIGHTS HIGH FIVE is only interested in submissions from writers with extensive credits in writing for young children.

From Highlights High Five editor, Kathleen Hayes: “I need to let you and your readers know that the Highlights writers guidelines do not apply to our new magazine Highlights High Five. Our stories are no more than 150 words in length, and at this time we are commissioning most of the stories and poems that appear in the magazine, and most of the features are being written in-house. We do sometimes get stories that have been sent to Highlights, and Marileta Robinson, who has been with Highlights for many, many years is also working on High Five - so folks she knows will often send her stories and poems that they think might work for our new magazine. Of course, we are always happy to see very short stories and poems from established authors who have a proven track record writing for the very young.”

Editorial offices:
Highlights High Five,
Editorial Department,
807 Church Street,
Honesdale, PA 18431

E-mail: eds@highlights-corp.com
Editor in Chief: Christine French Clark
Editor: Kathleen Hayes/ KHayes@Highlights.com
Senior Editor: Marileta Robinson

ANALYSIS OF SPECIFIC ISSUE

HIGHLIGHTS HIGH FIVE
April 2008

COVER: High Five doesn’t feature the “what’s wrong with this picture” puzzle. This front cover has a really cute lively illustration of little birds learning to fly by Scott Brooks. 

INSIDE FRONT COVER: A letter from the editor (Kathleen Hayes) about learning early math concepts.

TABLE OF CONTENTS: Content is broken out into categories: “Let’s Read Together,” “Let’s Puzzle It Out,” and “Let’s Do It.” They also have a pull-out of bug dominoes.

 STAIRS by Marguerite Reiss Kent – poem about escalators being “stairs that come downstairs too.” 

THE ADVENTURES OF SPOT [Marileta Robinson]: Spot, the dog from the Timbertoes (a long running comic in HIGHLIGHTS) gets his own cartoon. Spot meets a new friend. 

BERT, BETH, AND A LOT OF SPLASHING [by Valerie Gorbachev] Cut story of a grandfather and two grandchildren splashing things into the pond – rocks, frogs, and finally rain. Lots of repetition of “splash” and some counting (raindrop splashes).112 words. 

MY FIRST HIDDEN PICTURE [by Mary Sulivan] – Colorful hidden picture with 8 hidden items, based on the nursery rhyme about the old woman tossed up in a basket. 

MAKE YOUR OWN TORTILLAS [by Mary Mulard] – Picture based recipe for tortillas – child does mixing and adding. Child rolls balls of dough and then rolls them out flat with a rolling pin. Adult does the cooking. 

A LOST FRIEND [by Marianne Mitchell] A simple story in English and Spanish about a little boy looking for his lost dog – going back to the three places he went on errands with his Mom. The dog turns out to be a toy. 

PUT THEM TOGETHER Five Simple addition word problems based on picture clues. 

MAKE A COLLAGE [by Istar Schwager] The basics of making a paper collage. 53 words – no subheadings but the two steps (basically tear paper and glue paper) are numbered. 

KNOCK! KNOCK! [by Wendi Silvano] A collection of silly knock knock joke based rhymes that introduce different animals showing up at a little girl’s house. Seven verses ending in the girl deciding not to answer the door anymore. 

LOOK UP (by Marilyn Kratz) A poem about how you can see the child’s kite by following the string up past increasingly taller things (his nose, the fence, the tree, a high wire, etc). 

SPRING GIVING (by Jan Fields) A poem about picking dandelions and giving them away, match to a “maze” where the child follows the correct path (with his finger) to “take” each flower to the proper recipient. 

THAT’S SILLY A cute “find the silly things” picture in a park. 

APRIL SHOWERS (by Lisa Rowetch) A “Tex and Indi” story, maybe a new regular feature? The two children see shapes in the clouds and imagine a kind of story for them – then it rains. 

IN THIS EGG, A fingerplay [by Wendy Perkins] A cute rhyming fingerplay about a hatching baby bird – with sound effects (peep and cheep). 

BACK COVER FOLD – CREEPY CRAWLY DOMINOES – detachable bug dominoes. 

INSIDE BACK COVER – BUILD IT – a regular feature, suggests children use blocks to build a parking garage, then asks questions about what they will build. 

OUTSIDE BACK COVER – LOOK AT THE PARAKEET (a regular feature) A photo of a bird (that looks a lot like a green parrot rather than the common budgie that we tend to think of when we hear “parakeet”). The text discusses the parakeet as a pet and some things a pet owner might need to know. 61 words

This page last updated on 01 July 2008