I have been working with students in the library on choosing good books. Many students who quit books before they finish, don't always spend much time previewing before they decide on a book. They get excited about one thing they read or see and then jump in, only to find that the book isn't what they had expected. I am working with them to take more time to preview. There are so many great new ways to preview with the tools available today. Kids can listen to podcasts, can learn about the writing of a book from the author, watch book trailers, and more. I want my students to know all that is out there around a great book.
I created the above sheet of QR Codes to go along with Barbara O'Connor's new book The Fantastic Secret of Owen Jester. Each QR Code takes readers to a different place--the video book trailer, Barbara O'Connor's website, the publisher page for the book, and a blog review. I think the sheet of QR Codes will allow students to have quick access to sites around books that I may share or book talk. Rather than searching for reviews or typing in URL codes, students can get right to the sites with QR codes. This will give them experience finding lots of information on a book, visiting sites they might want to go back to. In time, they can begin to create QR codes of their own book reviews as well as sites around books.
QR Codes are a little trickier at the elementary level because most of our students do not carry smart phones with them. But we do have access to a few iPods with cameras and I am looking for a desktop QR Reader that works well with Mac. I want my students to have their eyes open to these QR Codes in the world.
Franki interviewed Stacey about the new book, their blog and writing.
Franki: Tell us a little bit about how you got your idea for Day by Day.
Stacey: Day by Day is an outgrowth of our blog. When Ruth and I were approached about writing a book for Stenhouse we envisioned a book that focused on reflective practice, within the context of the writing workshop. We thought a text like this would be useful to teachers who were trying to get in the habit of being more intentional about their teaching.
Franki: What do you hope teachers get out of the book?
Stacey: There are a few things I hope teachers get out of this book. First, I hope teachers who’ve been teaching writing workshop without reflecting on their practice daily will begin to make time for reflective practice. As someone who initially scoffed at the idea of reflecting on my teaching (when I was obtaining my first master’s degree), I’ve come to realize that setting aside time for reflection is what can make one’s teaching much more responsive. Each of the 180 discussions in the book include a challenge for teachers, as well as two or more reflective practice questions. Therefore, we’ve made it easy for teachers to get started with their reflective practice journey.
Additionally, we share our triumphs and our shortcomings throughout the text. I hope our candidness will help teachers develop an awareness that not every minilesson or conference will be perfect, but that they can learn and grow from their successes and challenges by reflecting on them daily.
Finally, for those teachers who teach writing workshop in isolation, I hope they find this book to be like a compassionate colleague they can turn to at the end of a day. No one should ever feel as though they’re teaching alone.
Franki: Your blog Two Writing Teachers follows your belief about the importance of daily reflection in teaching. Can you talk about how your blog has changed your teaching?
Stacey: Ruth and I started Two Writing Teachers when I was transitioning to teaching a new grade (from fifth to fourth) in a new state (from New York to Rhode Island). Blogging about my teaching -- the good, the bad, and the ugly – on a daily basis helped me to become more thoughtful about how I approached the teaching of writing. Additionally, receiving comments from other bloggers pushed my thinking and allowed me to consider new perspectives and approaches to use with my students.
Franki: What are the things that you love most about writing workshop?
Stacey: I love watching the way writing workshop helps children find and develop their voice. Writing workshop shows students that they have poignant stories to tell and important messages to share with others. In addition, I enjoy witnessing the transformation of non-writers into confident communicators within the context of a writing workshop.
Franki: What are your biggest challenges in writing workshop?
Stacey: The greatest challenge I’ve had teaching writing, in a workshop setting, has been around conferring. I never felt as though I was getting to enough kids. Even when I’d make it to five students during independent writing time, I always questioned if it was enough… if I met with the right kids on a given day… if I met with someone too frequently… Reflecting on my teaching helped me to work through those internal struggles; I became more confident about my decisions (i.e., who I conferred with on a given day or in a given week) once I thought about them, after-hours, more deeply.
Franki: Which resources do you go to as you reflect on your practice in writing workshop?
Stacey: There are a few books I turn to again and again when I need to be inspired about the teaching of writing. I find myself turning back to Assessing Writers and How’s It Going, both by Carl Anderson, when I want to think more deeply about my conferring. When I taught full-time, I always found myself paging through Georgia Heard’s The Revision Toolbox, when I wanted to present my students with new revision techniques. Finally, Choice Words by Peter H. Johnston always reminds me to be mindful of the language I use when I work with
Stick a fork in in -- the schedule is DONE! Stay tuned for the HTML code for your sidebar. Thanks, Everyone!! Looking forward to a great year of Poetry Fridays!!
There are lots of doubles in this month's mosaic. There are two Epcot balls, two friends riding into a possible Jetson-like future, two big stuffed Disney characters, two tropical flowers, two shots of a rainbow, and two kinds of popcorn. Two flowers were blooming in our house at the same time: the hibiscus had one last fling while the Christmas cactus was ramping up. There are two yummy dishes -- grilled cheese and red beans and rice -- from Skillet, our new favorite restaurant (thank you, Meredith!), and there were two crab cakes and two spears of asparagus on my plate at a dinner "Off Property" (ie: NOT Disney) at NCTE. The two people are Julie Johnson, who received the Donald Graves Excellence in Teaching of Writing Award and Steph Harvey, who was thrilled with her flight of Margaritas at Maya Grill. (There was an advertisement for the Maya Grill in the elevator of Coronado Springs Casita 2 proclaiming that if you ate there, you would be "besieged by enchantment." If that isn't a Disney mission statement, I don't know what is.)
Clever Jack Takes The Cake
by Candace Fleming
illustrated by G. Brian Karas
Random House (Schwartz & Wade), 2010
Review copy provided by the publisher
I'm guilty and I'll freely admit it: I judged this book by the cover when it arrived. "Another folk tale. Meh." And I set it aside for later.
Then, at NCTE, as I browsed the books in the Random House booth, I noticed all the stars adorning it. Hmm. Maybe I better take another look.
Was I ever wrong about this book! It does lean on all the other "clever Jack" tales for the basic "succeed by using your wits, even if everything possible goes wrong" story line, but it is fresh and original and...I'm sorry...clever! There's no way around it, it DOES...take the cake!
Jack is invited to the princess's 10th birthday, but he has nothing to take for a present. Read to find out how he manages to bake her a cake and how he manages to show up at the throne with nothing but the story of making and losing the cake. Read to find out what the princess thinks of her gift. (Study the end papers to see what happens before and after the story in the text.) Read to be delighted. Reread to take a closer look at the illustrations. Clever Jack, Clever Candace, Clever Brian. Lucky us.
A funny thing happened at school this week. One of my kids saw me in the hallway and yelled "Mrs. Sibberson, when I come to library today, will you have any of those empty books?" Empty books? What could she have possibly meant? "You know, the books with no words?" So I decided to read CHALK by Bill Thomson aloud this week, since she had asked so cleverly for wordless books.
CHALK is a great new wordless book--one that I would love to see win the Caldecott Award. Mary Lee reviewed it a few months ago but it wasn't a book that I took the time to fall in love with right away. You see, I am a text girl and I have very little patience for taking the time to enjoy a wordless book on my own. I do not always take the time to really take in the visuals. But this week, I discovered what a treat sharing CHALK with children is! I love watching the kids' faces each time I turned the page. The amazement, excitement, surprise, fear, and discovery were all so clear on their faces. Their conversations around the book have been amazing and this is definitely a book I could read a million times.
So, today, I am adding CHALK to my list of BOOKS I COULD READ A MILLION TIMES. I think this is the first wordless picture book to make the list but it is definitely one that deserves to be there.
Foodspotting was made for me: social networking around the pictures you take of food. What could be better? Meredith shared this iPhone app with me on the way home from NCTE. She also told me about a new (to me) restaurant. The day after I got home, I was eating at that restaurant and taking pictures of my food for Foodspotting.
It's hard to believe that a week ago I was in Orlando attending NCTE's Annual Convention. It seems like yesterday, and it seems like it's been months, all rolled into one.
There was time Wednesday evening after we got in for my one Disney Experience. I chose Epcot. We rode a few rides, took a brief walking tour of the world, hugged Winnie the Pooh and Tigger, too, and saw the amazing fireworks.
Thursday was my Vacation in Florida Experience. I swam laps in an outdoor pool, made some vitamin D the old fashioned way, and caught my breath from the whirlwind week of teaching, grading, and sub plans.
Thursday evening at the Elementary Section Get-Together, Stenhouse Editorial Director Philippa Stratton received the NCTE Outstanding Educator in the Language Arts Award, and our blogging pal from Hilliard, Julie Johnson, received the Donald Graves Award for Excellence in the Teaching of Writing. At dinner, I sat next to Louise Borden and across from/next to Stephanie Harvey and Anne Goudvis. (mandatory name-dropping)
Friday morning, I was due at the Yacht Club for a 7am Children's Literature Assembly board meeting. Disney Magic got me there on time with a magic carpet ride my very own van ride as the sun rose. After the board meeting, and upon my return to Coronado Springs, I snuck into the end of the Poets and Bloggers session, did some hard thinking in a session about how to teach 21st Century Literacies in spite of the "reforms" that would make sure our students can pass a test but not ensure that they would grow up THINKING, and got another dose of poetry at the Poetry for Children Notables session. Friday evening was all about the communities of writers I am privileged and honored and proud to belong to: the Stenhouse reception was followed by the Choice Literacy dinner. (Too many names to drop without forgetting some, but I would be remiss if I didn't thank Stenhouse for continuing to include me as one of their own, and Brenda Power for her incredible generosity, creative vision, and passion for teaching and leading.)
Saturday sessions/thinking: using conferences in writing workshop as a kind of formative assessment; smart ways to use picture books; three hours of talking about books and winnowing our list of Notables (fabulous committee, must drop names: Mary Napoli, April Bedford, Nancy Roser, Donalyn Miller, Yoo Kyung Sung, Tracy Smiles), and then a dinner sponsored by Macmillan. The authors at the dinner were fun, but it was also great to spend a little time with Elaine Magliaro, Trisha Stohr-Hunt, Karen Terlecky, and Barbara O'Connor. (drop, drop)
On Sunday, those who attended the Children's Literature Assembly breakfast were treated to an amazing talk by David Wiesner about his newest book, ART AND MAX. (There was much bantering later on Twitter between certain pairs of friends -- @donalynbooks / @PaulWHankins, and @maryleehahn / @frankisibberson -- about who is Art and who is Max.)
After the breakfast, I presented on reading workshop with Franki, Aimee Buckner and Donalyn Miller, then raced to Coronado Ballroom H and presented about the 2010 Notables (2009 books). After we talked briefly about the 30 books, there were 8-minute roundtable sessions with some of the authors. I got to hear Rebecca Stead (WHEN YOU REACH ME), Alexis Frederick-Frost (ADVENTURES IN CARTOONING), Ching Yeung Russell (TOFU QUILT), and Linda Barrett Osborne (TRAVELING THE FREEDOM ROAD). (drop, drop)
Two of my favorite people to run into in the hallways or in sessions were Amy Ludwig VanDerwater and Heidi Mordhorst. We know each other mostly on our blogs, but it's amazing how well we know each other. Heidi picked right up on my penchant for purple, and I gave her an idea for her next book. Amy and I sat on a bench in the hallway and chatted like sorority sisters.
(This post is getting way too long and I'm 1/2 hour over budget time-wise, but we're almost to the end, so let's just finish it up...)
Monday was the Children's Literature Assembly workshop. Now, I know there are some die-hard ALAN fans out there, but CLA puts on a classy workshop for those of us who work with younger readers. The CLA workshop is not about speed and huge boxes of books. There were 5 author/illustrators and we left with a stack of 7 picture books. We heard Doreen Rappaport talk about her recent series of biographies, especially Martin's Big Words and John's Secret Dreams, which were both illustrated by Bryan Collier. Then we got to hear Bryan Collier. After a break, Andrea Davis Pinkney sang to us, and talked about Sit In. After lunch, David Diaz taught us to draw and told us about his process for Me, Frida.
We ended the day with a trip to the Mississippi Gulf Coast, led by Hester Bass (she ALSO sang to us!), who wrote about the artist Walter Anderson in Orbis Pictus winner, The Secret Life of Walter Anderson. Her slide show gave us a peek into the process that E.B. Lewis used to create the amazing illustrations from extensive research and photographs taken on a site visit with Hester.
Next year when you are planning your NCTE experience, consider staying on Monday for the CLA Workshop! It is a fabulous, intimate day with children's authors and illustrators.
And now it's time for me to get back to my current reality: lesson plans, grading, and an attempt to make my days at NCTE a part of my life in the classroom.
Disclaimer: All blog posts, opinions, grammatical errors, and spelling mistakes are our own.
Franki and Mary Lee are both teachers, and have been for more than 20 years.
Franki is a fifth grade teacher. She is the author of Beyond Leveled Books (Stenhouse), Still Learning to Read (Stenhouse), and Day-to-Day Assessment in the Reading Workshop (Scholastic).
Mary Lee is a fifth grade teacher. She is the author of Reconsidering Read-Aloud (Stenhouse) and has poems in the Poetry Friday Anthology, the Poetry Friday Anthology for Middle School, the Poetry Friday Anthology for Science, the Poetry Friday Anthology for Celebrations (Pomelo Books), Dear Tomato: An International Crop of Food and Agriculture Poems, National Geographic Books of Nature Poems, The Best of Today's Little Ditty (2014-15 and 2016), Amy Ludwig VanDerwater's Poems are Teachers, National Geographic's The Poetry of US, and IMPERFECT: Poems About Mistakes.
