Book Study

      

While our school is transitioning to distance learning I find myself with time to read. Of course I am still reading for pleasure (I just finished The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane and The Candymakers: The Great Chocolate Chase both of which were wonderful and I can't wait to recommend them to students), but this is a good time to enhance myself as an educator. I will have time to read all three of these books, but the decision I must make is: which one first?

I loved The Book Whisperer and have another blog post on that book. Reading in the Wild is supposed to be more practical tips for putting in place everything that Donalyn Miller stands for. I want to make my students wild readers.

A Novel Approach is going to help me structure class time around novels and self-selected reading. I want to learn a better way to approach this for next year so that I can incorporate the novels that I have picked out (Refugee, Restart, A Long Walk to Water, Love That Dog).

The Essential 55 is not reading specific, but just educator and student specific. This one will help with teaching students skills they need in order to get along in the world.

Whatever I decide, I'll come here to share my thoughts.

Emotional

I love books that make me emotional. Books that get me angry or make me cry or really just having me gasping because of the suspense are my favorites. This past year I have read so many books that have evoked emotions in me.

Last year I read Esperanza Rising and I got so angry during that book. I literally wanted to punch a character. I cried a few times while reading and had to put it down multiple times so I could continue teaching. My students saw me get emotional and it led them to want to read the book as well.

This summer I read Drums, Girls, and Dangerous Pie and that book gave me all the emotions. It was very funny, but also such an emotional read because of the topic of childhood cancer. It made me angry at the way that the main character handled everything, but it also helped me understand the emotions of a family member that is having to deal with a sibling with cancer.

Last week I read Crossover and while I could see the foreshadowing in the text I still wasn't prepared when it happened. I had to put the book away because I was about to start crying in front of my students. They wanted to read the book that made their teacher cry.

I had a student tell her reading partner that she needed to "read it like Mrs. Seibel reads." We both looked at her and asked her what that meant. She went on to do her impersonation of me. I understood. I told her partner that she wanted her to use intonation and emotion in her reading. She asked me how you do that. I told her it's a skill that she needs to practice.

My students struggle with reading comprehension because they don't hear the conversational flow of the text. They don't use the punctuation to develop emotions. They don't hear the change in volume and emotion during the paragraphs. I need to help them feel what they are reading so they can experience the joy in reading. So many think that reading is boring because they read in a monotone voice without pausing or stopping for punctuation. They don't lift their voices at a question. They don't raise their voices at an exclamation. They don't let a comma pause the flow of the text to let it linger in their minds.

I want my students to have emotional reactions to their books.

Year 10

I have started my 10th year of teaching and I am so excited.

New things I'm trying:

• Composition books set up with The Book Whisperer sections I mentioned in the last post. I'm still working with the students on the best way to fill out their lists during class time. Maybe they need to take their composition books with them? I'm not sure.
• Easy standards based grading - I'm not going all in with it because I don't have the resources and the rest of the school is doing traditional grading. However, I have started focusing on the standards that I'm teaching and breaking down assignments into standards so students know what the grade actually means. I have had more students interested in the grades now that they know "I'm doing great in main idea 100% and I need some work on figurative language 35%". 
• Notice and Note strategies are starting off my year. I am doing one sign post each week and delving into it with picture books, short stories, and videos. I really hope these strategies will empower my students to try harder to understand what they are reading and interact with their books. A lot of kids think that reading is passive. It is completely the opposite of passive!

This year is going to be amazing and I'm thankful that I get to share my passion with over 100 new students! What excites you about this new school year?

Teaching

As a teacher, I have never been one to stick to what the text book says, or to continuously do the same thing over and over. I am nearing the end of my 9th year teaching and I'm in my third content area and third grade level.

Each year I tend to reinvent. It is a positive and negative aspect of my life as a teacher. The positive is that I'm always looking for different ways to get the information across to the students and always looking for the best ways in which to reach the students. I am constantly wanting to try out new things. The negative comes in that I need to stick to things for longer than I do. Once I see that something is working I need to write it down so that I can do it again next year. My organizational skills need some work.

I am in the midst of planning out my next year and how I want to do things differently. Instead of a binder I want to use a composition book with my students. I want to implement it the way that The Book Whisperer does: a To-Be-Read list, a Currently Reading list, and a Reading Response section. I am trying to find the way to incorporate those things that will work best for my students.

I also want to use storyboardthat with my students. I had them do comic strips this year over The Hero and the Minotaur. They did awesome on the comic strips, but I think some of my more artistically challenged students would have preferred to have the artistry done for them by a website.

I also know that I need to do more work with vocabulary next year and, I hate to say it, more test taking strategies. The sad fact is that these kids have to know how to read a test and answer questions.

One of the best things about always wanting to reinvent my teaching is that I am far from teacher burnout. I love what I do. I love going into work. How do you reinvent your teaching?

Must Reads

Some books should be read because they teach amazing lessons. Some books should be read because they are immensely enjoyable (for me that means that they make me FEEL something). Some books should be read because they give you a new view of a topic that you couldn't otherwise have. Some books should be read because others think they should be banned. The two books I'm talking about fit all of those categories.

The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas will stay with me for a while. I wanted to cry through much of it, but it was light-hearted enough that it didn't send me into a depression. I loved that there was a white kid in the book that was a part of the life of one of the main characters, but still kind of clueless as to what she was going through. It shows that no matter how hard we try, we cannot know what goes on in the lives and minds of others. I love that it was realistic in regards to the friendships and everything else that happened.

There are parts of it that I can see people not wanting high-schoolers to read:the relationship parts (but honestly, it's what high-schoolers are dealing with),the drug references and gangs (however those aren't things that are unfamiliar to high-schoolers either), and the language.

The content of the book and what the characters go through are things that high-schoolers need to read, whether because they experience it as well, or that it is foreign to them. Just because a book has things that may be objectionable to some doesn't mean it doesn't have worth. As a white woman I needed to read this book and the book I'm about to discuss. I don't see things the way some people do and I needed to have their lens in front of my eyes at least for a little while. I have some of the fears that were expressed in the books, however not to the extent that was described in the books. I am thankful for the life that I lead, and thankful that I got to experience someone else's view of the world through the safety of a book. I am blessed.

All American Boys by Jason Reynolds and Brendan Kiely is similar to The Hate U Give, but incredibly different at the same time. This book is so good. There is a lot of cursing which fits with the characters, but I still find to be too much. However, the content of the book is what makes it a worthy read. I would love to know what happens next, but the last line of the book was perfect and I wouldn't want anything to mess that up.

This is another book that high-schoolers should read. I am not sure that middle-schoolers are the right age group for this text, although I did recommend these two books to my students for when they get older.

I love that it goes back and forth between Rashad, the kid beaten by the police, and Quinn, the white kid who witnessed it. Seeing how this event impacted their lives and the lives of their families and friends gets you thinking. The tough questions that are asked, that are uncomfortable, that is why I think it should be read by students. 

I am able to look through things with a different lens after reading these two books and I am forever grateful that they were put into my hands.