Mr. Plumbean lives on a neat street, where all the houses are the same. That is, until a seagull drops a giant can of bright orange paint on the roof of Mr. Plumbean’s house. Will Mr. Plumbean “fix” that splot, returning his house to the ticky-tacky neatness that existed before? Or, will he do something altogether… different, changing his block, and his neighbors, forever?

The second season of Little Voices, Big Ideas, kicks off with a SPLOT. Daniel Manus Pinkwater’s 1977 book, The Big Orange Splot, highlights a key tension encountered by all of us living in a shared democracy: that of individual freedom versus collective responsibility. Where does one end and the other begin?

Host Sarah DeBacher, along with panelists Tom Wartenberg and Freddi Evans, discuss the book’s themes and approaches to discussing them with young people. Highlights from a conversation about The Big Orange Splot between eight-year-old Jude and his mother, Kelly, are also included.

This podcast is a production of Prime Time Family Reading, a project of the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities, and is funded by generous grants from the Community Foundation of Northwest Louisiana and the W.K. Kellogg Foundation.