Summer Reading Resources for Kids and Teachers

It is that time of year that we are all thinking ahead to summer. Part of that is thinking ahead to our students' summer reading. This week's issue of THE BIG FRESH from Choice Literacy is on that exact theme. Lots of free resources are included in the newsletter (others are for members.) NCTE also has a link to Summer Activities as part of Read-Write-Think. This is a site and the Summer Activities link is a great one to share with parents too.

New Baby Shower Favorite

In a Blue Room
by Jim Averbeck
illustrated by Tricia Tusa
Harcourt Children's Books, 2008
review copy compliments of the publisher



I've never had the joy nor the frustration of coaxing a child into sleep. Never raised one from the ground up, as it were. I have chosen to work with 9 and 10 year olds during the daylight hours of their 4th grade year of school. I leave all the rest of the hours of every day to their parents and the rest of the years of their school lives to teachers with more patience for tots and/or teens than I have been dealt.

That said, I do love to give books at baby showers that I hope are destined to become sleep time favorites -- usually Mem Fox's Time For Bed, or the old standard, Good Night Moon.

In a Blue Moon is my new baby shower favorite. Slowly and gently, page by page, Mama settles Alice until it's time for the light to be shut off and the room to turn blue in the pale light of the moon. The book begins with Alice jumping on her bed and ends at a whisper with only a few words on each page. The book is what it needs to do -- soothing, quieting, calming. I daresay Mama is feeling much better by the end as well.


*****
Author interview at Tales From the Rushmore Kid
Reviews at ShelfElf, and 7-Imp.

NCTE

I just got back from Washington D.C. As part of the Executive Committee, I have 4 meetings a year. This trip included meetings as well as participating in NCTE's Advocacy Day. It was a great few days. I thought you'd all be interested in the updates and info from NCTE.

This is my 2nd year participating in Advocacy Day. This year, I was able to meet with a few people in my senator's offices. We had great conversations about some of the issues we are facing in literacy education. NCTE has declared April as Advocacy Month. Their website is full of lots of things that we, as teachers, can do to support what we know is right for kids. One page that I find especially helpful is this one on NCTE's position statements on certain things that Congress is dealing with.

If you keep up with the NCTE Inbox Blog, there is a great post about why it is important that as teachers, we write to Congress.

On another note, NCTE recently released a thoughtful statement on 21st Century Literacy--Toward a Definition of 21st-Century Literacies. Lots of people in the literacy and tech worlds have responded to the thinking, including this post by Karl Fisch. This is a focus for NCTE this year and is evident in the 2008 Conference theme: Because Shift Happens: Teaching in the Twenty-First Century as well as other events. NCTE will be sponsoring a summer institute on the topic in Indianapolis. The speakers and program look great so far!

Nonfiction Monday -- Sisters & Brothers

Sisters & Brothers: Sibling Relationships in the Animal World
by Steve Jenkins & Robin Page
Houghton Mifflin, 2008
review copy compliments of the publisher



We've been paying close attention to the ways nonfiction texts are organized. Some present the information by comparing similarities, while others contrast differences. Some use a time line to lay out the facts in chronological order. Most use some form of topic (usually the title or subject matter of the book) -- subtopic (often page-by-page) -- and detail (more and more the details are found in the back of the book) structure.

"Sibling relationships in the animal world" is the topic of Jenkins and Page's newest collaborative venture. The illustrations are classic Jenkins -- gorgeous and captivating cut- and torn-paper collages. Each page or spread has a sort of tab of torn paper, either at the top or bottom, on which can be found the subtopic for that page. In addition, each page has a statement, phrase, or question in large font near the illustration that summarizes the details or draws the reader into the paragraph of details about that animal's sibling relationships. For example, on the page with the New Mexico whiptail lizards, the tab is "Sisters," and the large font phrase reads, "Girls rule!" The reader is hooked into learning about an animal species that is entirely female. Only girls are born in New Mexico whiptail families, and the species reproduces without males.

In the back of the book is a paragraph of general information about each animal featured in the book: its size, what it eats, and where it lives.

This is a great book for any classroom or collection serving animal lovers, and an excellent mentor text for a study on the organization of nonfiction text, both for readers and for writers.



The Nonfiction Monday round up is at Picture Book of the Day.

A Side Note

I love going to professional conferences. One of my hobbies. I like the learning, the people, the books. But, I have also found that I love the jewelry! It seems that teacher conferences are a great place to find jewelry. I am not talking about teacher jewelry. I am talking about really nice jewelry by great artists. In Connecticut, I met the woman who owns Purple Umbrella. This company sells jewelry by women artists from around the world. I loved so many pieces. I bought this necklace designed by Ayala Bar(which just happened to match the jacket I was wearing at the time!).

But my FAVORITE jewelry designer is Karen Spector of Karen Spector Designs. We are SOOO lucky to have her right here in Dublin. I became addicted to her jewelry years ago and have built up a nice, fun collection. Karen Spector was at our Dublin Literacy Conference, selling her jewelry. Karen, our other friend named Karen, picked a 50% off ticket out of the basket and as you can see here, she is VERY excited about her sale item! (I am sure I will soon find out whether this Karen actually reads my blog by her reaction to this lovely photo!) That is Karen Spector, the brilliant designer, in the background.

Lucky for all of us that are local, Karen Spector is having an open house this week! I love these open houses. I always find a piece that I love--especially when I am not shopping for anything in particular. I think I am in the mood for earrings...

So, jewelry shopping at a teacher conference is great, but shopping just to shop is also quite fun! So, if you are local, and you have never experienced the fun jewelry of Karen Spector, you might want to put this Thursday, April 24 on your calendar and join in the fun! Seriously, if you do live local and want to see all of Karen Spector's amazing designs, think about going. If you need directions, call 766-5848. Look forward to a post about my new purchases later this week or this coming weekend!

Just Who Will You Be? by Maria Shriver

So, I seem to get some type of self-help book at this time of year quite often. This week, while I was in the D.C. airport waiting for my flight home, I saw Maria Shriver's new book JUST WHO WILL YOU BE. After I read the first page, I had to have it:

Not long ago, I was whining to my teenage daughter, "I don't know what I want to be when I grow up!" She took me by the shoulders, looked me dead in the eye, and said, "I hate to break it to you, Mom, but this is it for you. You are all grown up! You're cooked!" I jumped out of my chair. "Not so!" I shot back. "You may think I'm over but I'm not done yet! I'm still a work in progress and I'm writing my next act now." ....When she left, I wondered, "Is she right? Is this really it? Am I cooked? Am I over?"

I bought the book and read it over dinner in the airport. It is a small book--a gift size book, so a very quick read. I always like these little books--the ones that come out of graduation speeches. Sometimes I am in the mood for an inspirational graduation speech--but don't have any graduations to attend. These speeches don't quite say anything new, but they remind me of things I know and often help to reground me. And the fact that Maria Shriver is a mom with brutally honest teenagers is comforting as well.

Maria Shriver, it seems, has always worked to live up to others' expectations of her--something I have been thinking about myself lately. When do we stop building our resume and start making decisions based on what others want from us. Maria hits this as well as many other little things that lots of us, as working 40+moms work through on a daily basis. And it is nice to know that we are not alone in this struggle. It is nice for someone else to remind us what it is that is important and real in life. A nice, quick read from a writer I always enjoy.

If you can't think of anything nice to say...

...your mother and/or your conscience would tell you not to say anything at all. Then again, you might try one of these pithy (snarky?) quotes in your next difficult review:

I have read your book and much like it.

Thank you for sending me a copy of your book. I'll waste no time reading it.

This book fills a much-needed gap.

These quotes are all by Moses Hadas. They and others can be found at The Quotations Page.

Poetry Friday -- Acrostics That Say Something

One of my pet peeves: people who write a word or name vertically, write the first word that comes to mind that starts with each letter of the vertical word, AND THEN CALL IT A POEM!! (Even pricklier pet peeve: teachers who TEACH that such a form is a poem!!)

I was a stickler about this week's poems. No off-the-cuff first drafts were accepted. Before I ever introduced the poetry form for the week, we listed a bunch of qualities we admire in people, then they picked one and did some kind of brainstorming about that quality (a web or list of words and/or phrases). Then I shared some examples from Spring: An Alphabet Acrostic by Stephen Schnur, and we studied how he makes his poems say something or show us something about the key word without ever using that word in the poem.

As I said, I was a stickler this week. I sent poems back for revision, for removal of repetitious language, for being a list of words or unconnected phrases. But I think it was worth it. Here are a few of the best:

Someone I know
Truly has heart.
Remembers to respect
Each other in her path.
Not angry, just says what she means.
Gathering everybody
To teach, and to
Help all the others.

Fake farts are really hilarious. He
Uses rubber chickens. He makes
Nice jokes,
Not mean jokes.
You laugh when you're near him.

Readers are almost always reading
Everywhere, at
Any time. Some readers oddly read the
Dictionary, and even the
Encyclopedia. Others usually just
Read chapter books.

Kind of person that
Is respectful,
Never will they
Do something that is
Not respectful.
Exactly the
Serious friend
Somebody needs.



Round up this week is at The Well-Read Child.

Really?

You Are a Question Mark

You seek knowledge and insight in every form possible. You love learning. And while you know a lot, you don't act like a know it all. You're open to learning you're wrong. You ask a lot of questions, collect a lot of data, and always dig deep to find out more. You're naturally curious and inquisitive. You jump to ask a question when the opportunity arises. Your friends see you as interesting, insightful, and thought provoking. (But they're not always up for the intense inquisitions that you love!) You excel in: Higher education You get along best with: The Comma

What Punctuation Mark Are You?

Here's a comma, a colon, an exclamation point, another colon, and another question mark. I wonder what it takes to be a period? Or maybe I don't want to know.

The Right Book at the Right Time

Rabbit & Squirrel: A Tale of War & Peas
by Kara LaReau
illustrated by Scott Magoon
Harcourt, Inc., 2008
review copy compliments of the author and illustrator


If your children are behaving perfectly at this time of the year you don't need this book. (And I don't want to talk to you.)

If your politicians are behaving perfectly in your part of the world you don't need this book. (And again, I don't want to talk to you.)

If, by chance, your children (or politicians) are jumping to conclusions, making assumptions, or seeking revenge before they ask for information, they you (and they) need this book.

Rabbit and Squirrel live on opposite sides of the garden and yet they never speak to each other or share vegetables. One morning when Rabbit awakes to find her finest lettuce and carrots picked, she jumps to a conclusion, storms over to Squirrel's house, thumps on his door and accuses him of this crime. The next morning when Squirrel wakes up, he finds that his best tomatoes and peas are gone, he jumps to a conclusion as well, he accuses Rabbit AND he throws a rotten tomato at Rabbit's house. Their war escalates until the Gardner (the one, we assume, who was harvesting lettuce, carrots, tomatoes and peas in the first place -- we can see a large human hand through the window of Rabbit's and Squirrel's houses in the illustrations) stomps into the garden in her big green boots and chases the two pests out of garden and into the deep dark woods where they continue bickering and blaming. The book ends with the hope that they will grow tired of fighting and "learn to grow something new" -- a garden they make together.

I told my students before I read this book to them that the characters remind me of "some people I know." They nodded knowingly (and sometimes guiltily) when the first assumptions and accusations were made.

After I read the book, we looked for moments in the book when, if they could intervene and change the characters' behaviors, the outcome of the story could be changed. They decided that it wasn't so bad that Rabbit had made the first assumption, but if she hadn't "thumped" on the door or shouted at Squirrel -- if she had knocked and asked if he knew what had happened -- the story might have turned out differently.

There's great power in a cautionary tale such as this one. It gives our children a way to distance themselves from their disagreements and think about the problem in terms of Rabbits and Squirrels.

Hopefully the big people who read this book -- the "gardeners" who ultimately "own" the "garden" -- will look for their message as well. Is it really necessary to chase the problems away with a pitchfork, or is there some way we can all share the garden with less war and enough peas for everyone?


*******
Another review with great pics is over at 7-Imp.