Slice of Life - book flaps

Me - "How's your new book series?  The one we got over the weekend."

B - "It's great!"

Me - "What makes it great?"

B - "It's fantasy."

Silence. (I'm not getting anything more easily, I think.)

Me - "What makes it fantasy, is there magic, what are the characters doing?"

B - "You know how the book is hardback?"

Me - "Yes, just the first one."

B - "I love when books have the paper cover because then you can use the front flap for a bookmark and then when you get further in the book, you can use the back flap as a bookmark.  It's GREAT for when you can't find a bookmark to use, like me right now."

Interesting.  (I'm thinking, at least she has no plans to dog-ear the pages.)


All day I've been pondering this conversation. I didn't get much of a book conversation going.  I learned she likes the book.  She likes it because it's fantasy.  I saw her reading it yesterday, so she's sticking with it.  We don't buy a lot of hardback books but the book flap as a bookmark is an interesting feature.  It's also interesting because for many years prior to this the book jackets always came/come off of books because she didn't like them.  They got in the way.  Now that she sees a purpose beside the given purpose, book jackets are GREAT!  

Kids are so interesting.  Sometimes we have to set aside our own agendas and let them lead a conversation to discover something unique or special or enjoyable to them.  I can't wait to make the time this fall to find interesting nuggets with my new readers.

Thank you Two Writing Teachers for hosting and fostering this writing community.

#CyberPD - Digital Reading Part 2

I have thoroughly enjoyed reading Chapters 3-5 in Digital Reading by Bill Bass and Franki Sibberson this week.  When you read several books by the same author its like visiting with a friend.  I find their writing together friendly, inviting, and encouraging.  I really hope other participants are feeling the same way as you continue to read about using technology in your literacy work.  Personally, I'm finding this book nudging and pushing me to do more with my students and digital reading.  I've been skimming the surface with technology and I'm feeling some nudges and pushes by reading Bill and Franki's book to find ways to use technology with more authenticity, with intentional decisions in hopes of becoming more connected.  

In making the work in my classroom authentic, I clearly need to share and think carefully about my own digital reading life.  I loved the questions on p30 and thought they might make good mini lesson topics for my second graders.  I also think these might be worth talking to parents.  I wonder if they are digital readers?  I wonder if they share their digital reading with their child?  I usually invite parents to come in and share their reading lives with us and over the years my students have loved to ask if they read on an e-reader.  Maybe my informational letter about reading to families needs to include a digital reading piece.  

I want to model digital reading more in our workshop and have digital reading an option for my students.  I think a Symbaloo board called, Places We Read might be a great project in the near future.  This way students could also access it from home.  In the past, a few students have owned an e-reader but they haven't brought them to school.  I wonder why and might offer that as an option, my district does have a BYOD policy.

Several times throughout these three chapters I read Voices from the Classroom scenarios that connected written digital or video pieces to content areas of learning.  I think this might be a great first step with our primary learners.  I want to spend some time exploring and finding digital text to compliment our science and social studies content, especially. I'm wondering how Franki or others organize the clips they use?  Our school days are being reorganized and we are being asked to do more without any additional time.  Integrating the content areas into our literacy work might be very helpful and vice a versa.  

The connected piece has been missing in my classroom community.  I have not had parents or encouraged parents to leave us comments on our classroom blog.  I have not shared it very publicly for others to learn along with us.  I've created a twitter account and just last spring figured out how to work around district filters to be engaged with it.  We were able to connect with Amy LV at Poetry Farm and what a great experience this was for my students.  I think our twitter focus will be to connect with other classrooms and authors or professionals in our field/area of learning, not a reminder of things for parents.  I hope to Skype with an author this year, participate in Global Read Aloud and World Read Aloud Day, all things I have known about but never participated in.  

As you can tell, I have lots of things swirling through my head.  Thank goodness for summer to regroup and connect with all of you to help me grow.  Thank you to Cathy, Laura, and Michelle for co-hosting and generating some summer #CyberPD love!

10 for 10 Picture Book is Coming!

Dear Cathy,

I have to be honest with you.   I don't have a clue what my #pb10for10 will be about this year.  If you recall last year I was SO ahead of the game and even changed my plan up to focus on a theme.  I don't know if you realized how big this was for me.  I like routine and by just tweaking my list each year a smidge, I've been comfortable with our project together.  However, since I had the list already by this time last year and it had a theme I am sweating just sitting here in my kitchen.  

What will I do?  This year life is a bit calmer because I'm going to be teaching second grade again.  Yahoo!  Maybe I can ponder what kinds of picture books I want to use right away because August 10th is my first teacher work day with students coming on the 12th!  Maybe I can think of a content area I need to collect books for.  Maybe I can make a collection for a writing or reading unit.  But wait, maybe I can collect some poetry books to share with my students.  Oh my, this idea of a theme has endless possibilities and while I'm thinking about all of the content theme areas why not a list of books to enjoy on any day of the school year, just because.  If I don't want to stress out about something new, I could always go back to an old list and think about tweaking that.  

I certainly hope our #pb10for10 friends will join us and stay tuned to my dilemma this year and that my thinking above helps them generate some ideas.  

Participating

We are hoping you will join us.  

1. Contact Us:  Contact us on our blogs, on Twitter (@mandyrobek or @cathymere), or by e-mail to let us know you are joining this event.  This way we can try to be sure we don't miss anyone on the day of the event.  

1. Grab a Badge:  Add the Picture Book 10 for 10 Badge to your blog.  

1. Choose your favorites:  All you need to do is choose ten picture books you cannot live without for whatever reason.  Believe me, that's not as easy as it sounds.  Here are some tips that might help (Choosing Picture Books and More About Choosing Picture Books). 

1. Write Your August 10th Post:  Write a post telling us about the 10 books you cannot live without.  Share your post on August 10th and link it to our Google Plus community, which Cathy will provide more information on and I will update that here.

1. No Blog?  No Problem:  If you don't have a blog this might be the perfect time to start one --- or you can find alternate ways to participate here.  Cathy and I are not huge rule followers so feel free to adjust as needed.  

1. Enjoy August 10th:  It's such a fun day to be in the blogging/twitter world!  We feel fortunate to have so many friends new and old join us and share some book love.  This is our 6th year and each year we aren't the only ones reserving lots of library books and/or increasing our personal book budgets!

Pass the news along to all your crazy picture book friends.  Educators, media specialists, parents, book enthusiasts are all welcome!  The more the merrier! 

#CyberPD - Digital Reading Part 1

I have to begin with a confession.  I own all of Franki Sibberson's books.  I am a huge fan of Franki's writing and when I read her next book was titled Digital Reading, I jumped with joy and was ready to click preorder!  Then I read the byline, What's Essential in Grade 3 - 8 and my heart sank a little bit.  I teach 2nd grade!  I didn't know what to do and I wasn't sure who to ask.  I am blessed to know how to get in touch with Franki and call her my friend, so I did just that. I reached out to my friend who was brilliant in her response.  She told me the first chapter was online and I should read that to see if I wanted to purchase the book.  I followed her suggestion and clicked preorder within minutes.  

I usually follow grade level suggestions but this is what I know about Franki's writing.  It's down to earth.  It's full of good suggestions that make me stop and think.  It confirms what I'm thinking when the world seems to spin a little bit in the opposite direction.  I know digital reading is a way of life.  I know it's important for K - 12 to think about embracing digital reading because our students either are trying to read digitally or will be very soon.  

In reading Franki and Bill's first and second chapter, I find myself thinking about what I might want digital reading to look like in my classroom.  Figure 2.2. The role of digital texts in the literacy workshop made my mind spin really fast and is some information I need to process more.  I was surprised how many ways digital reading could be incorporated with our reading workshop, as I read through the questions provided.  I was surprised to reflect and decide I'm not modeling digital reading enough in my classroom and maybe this is where I might focus my work while reading this book.  It might be taking this recommended for grades 3-8 book and finding nuggets we can use with more modeling or shared participation for a longer period of time.  However, if I truly think about how my students work, they will be eager and willing to move the pace a bit faster from the I do to we do to you do, meaning they will be engaged with digital reading!  

I also want to share a few thoughts from the book that made me stop and say hmmm

     -"reading on a computer does not make a digital reader"

     -"digitally literate vs technology users"

     -"Figure 1.3"

    -"learning to read digital texts must be embedded in the ways we do our     literacy word on a  day to day basis

    -"authenticity, intentionality, connectedness"

Thank you to Cathy, Laura, and Michelle for co-hosting and generating some summer #CyberPD love!

    

Natures Welcoming {Poetry Friday}

One morning this week I woke up while on vacation to discover my friend Cathy, at Merely Day by Day is at it again!  She is constantly inspiring me and pushing me to do projects with her and projects on my own.  I love how she is using Instagram to share her poetry and photography.  Maybe she will do a blogpost to share if the poem comes first or the photograph.

Cathy wrote a haiku poem about mornings at the ocean beach and I looked out my window at the lake beach and began pondering about my own haiku.  For me, this image came first through observation and I snapped my photograph.  Then while walking my dogs I began my pre-writing process to think about my own haiku.  I started putting together word phrases and counting out syllables.  When I returned from my walk, I went down and sat on the dock to draft my own haiku using the app Phonto because I believe that is what Cathy uses.  

I decided writing a haiku was fun and having the syllable format made me think a bit more intentional about my word choice.  I wrestled with the first line the most and like my final decision.  Haikus are intended to be about nature and I found this poem easier to write than the one I tried later about doughnuts.  Let's just say eating the doughnut was a bit distracting.

                        

Thank you to Donna at Mainly Write 

for hosting Poetry Friday and organizing the Round Up!

Slice of Life - Protocols

Protocol.

Modeled yesterday.
Piece of writing is read first by everyone.
One group member shares responses.
Others listen.
The author responds.
Others still listening.
Next group member shares responses.
Others listen.
The author responds.
Others listen.
Repeat and continue until all group members have shared.
Looks easy enough - we can implement.

Reality.
Piece of writing is read first by everyone.
One group member shares responses.
Might be interrupted.
Others listening, difficult!
Eye expressions happen.
Mouths are covered up.
Hand gestures.
Laughter.
Chocolate break to keep self busy.

Goal met.
Writers pushed.
Protocol tweaked.


I have the honor and pleasure to be working this week and next with the Columbus Area Writing Project on a new little adventure.  I am equally blessed to be working in a small group of local educators that has new friends and old friends for me.  I can't wait to see what this week and next brings our group.

Thank you Two Writing Teachers for hosting and fostering this writing community.

Celebrate This Week - Sitting

Today I am celebrating, sitting.  

We had a double header for softball to start our day.  It was very hot and humid.  I tried to knit but knitting wasn't the most fun as sweat was dripping and rolling everywhere.  So, I sat and cheered and watched a fun group of 12 year olds have fun.  I told myself sitting is okay and I decided if I was a dog my owners would not be happy with how much focus it takes for me to just sit.  

I realize sitting this long is easy for many people.  However, I am usually doing things while I am sitting and the amount of time I sit is very short. 

Then we were invited to a post game pool party and I thought we would be there about an hour, mingling with team parents.  We actually sat and visited, making new friends.  Sharing and listening to stories that create connections for about three hours.  It was fun to watch our youngest play with teammates.  Sitting allowed her to make connections.  

Sitting created connections for us today.

Sitting is important.

Thank you Ruth, for supporting us in finding the positive in our busy lives and using our words to celebrate.