On your mark... Get set...

Go!

I woke up late so am already an hour and a half behind my starting line. First book to read:
The Dark and Hollow Places by Carrie Ryan.

See ya in about 3 hours.

School's Out... Time to Read!

Time to get my list together for MotherReader's annual 48 Hour Book Challenge. I haven't decided yet when I'll start. I have post-planning this week which hopefully I'll be finished with before Friday. I may use Friday to get my house clean and comfortable and start on Saturday morning. I'm not the biggest fan of blogging during the challenge, but I know that was added to the rules last year. This is my third year participating, and I hope it's the best one yet. Again, for every 100 pages I read, I will donate $2.00 to my charities LiteracyKC and Rose Brooks.

Nook books:

The Dark and Hollow Places by Carrie Ryan

The Ask and the Answer by Patrick Ness

Belladonna by Karen Moline

Audiobooks:

I know I can only count one; however, I'm not sure yet which one it will be. Here's what's in my library cart.

Okay for Now by Gary Schmidt

Paper Towns by John Green

Going Bovine by Libba Bray

Books lying around the house:

Marcelo in the Real World by Francisco Stork

The Boy in the Striped Pajamas by John Boyne

The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate by Jacqueline Kelly

Peony in Love by Lisa See

The Summer of the Swans by Betsy Byars

The Door in the Wall by Marguerite deAngeli

Monday Morning Inspiration

Here's some pessimism for you today. Have a good week!

"When somebody tells you nothing is impossible, ask him to dribble a football. - Unknown



"The early bird gets the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese." - Unknown



"Anybody can win, unless there happens to be a second entry." - George Ade

My vote goes to...

The 2011 John Newbery medal will be awarded tomorrow morning, as well as a plethora of other awards. I tried my best this fall to read many of the contenders for the award. Here they are with a short summary and review.

1. One Crazy Summer by Rita Williams-Garcia

I'm not sure what the hype was over this novel except that its subject centers around the Black Panther movement in Oakland, California. Delphine, Vonetta, and Fern are sisters from Brooklyn whose mother left them when Fern was still nursing. Delphine is now eleven, and her father thinks it's a great idea for the girls to spend the summer with the mother who abandoned them and wants nothing to do with them even when they get there.

The sisters spend their days at the local People's Center, where they eat breakfast and lunch and attend a children's class to learn about the "people's revolution." The reader hopes for the tender moment when the mom will begin to see the error of her ways, look at her girls, and realize she loves them and needs them in her life. It doesn't quite happen that way. This isn't enough of a historical fiction novel that you'll learn anything new, and it wasn't a story that I could put in my students' hands and they would love me for it. It was okay.

2. Turtle in Paradise by Jennifer L. Holm

This is another story set in the past (1935) that doesn't really doesn't have anything to do with the history of the time. This time the daughter, Turtle, is being sent to live with her aunt and cousins in Key West because her mother's new employer doesn't like children. There is a bit of adventure and a bit of self-discovery. I purchased this for the classroom, and while it was enjoyed by a few, the book fell apart too quickly, and who wants to read a book with its pages falling out? Overall, not the winner, but still a light-hearted read.

3. The Strange Case of Origami Yoda by Tom Angleberger

Whoa! Searched this on Amazon just using "strange case," and this title appeared before Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Crazy. While this strange case isn't as classic as the latter, it was still a good read. I knew the kids would love it because the book, from its cover to its pages, are set up similar to the Wimpy Kid books, it has an origami Yoda on the front, and directions for how to make one it the back. That was really the best of this book for my students, the how-to directions.

Many students used this book for their reading response journals, and I was surprised to find many of them were unimpressed with the story. The biggest complaint? The story lacked character development because each chapter was merely a "case file" with a new character's personal account of his or her interaction with Dwight/OY. They felt the book was a bit gimmicky and that the sixth graders weren't relatable. Did I mention my reading students ARE sixth graders? I was pretty impressed with their observations, and I think author's should take note to remember whom they are writing for. Don't get me wrong; they will still pick this up because it is a quick and easy read. They call this kind of book (just like the Wimpy Kid books) a "break" from real reading.

4. Out of My Mind by Sharon M. Draper

This is the story of a girl with cerebral palsey. Melody is highly intelligent with a photographic memory, however she is unable to speak and is confined to a wheel chair because she is unable to control her body in the least. As she gets older, she becomes more and more frustrated that no one understands her. The only way to try to get her point across is by throwing a fit, and that doesn't always lead the recipient to guess correctly why Melody is upset.

Melody eventually gets a medi-talker and is finally able to communicate with those around her. However, it doesn't solve all her problems. People still view her as "retarded" because of the way she looks and acts, including a teacher at her school. (That ticked me off.)

Again, I was hoping for a Rudy moment, where underdog Melody can show everyone up, but the end takes a surprising turn that I didn't much enjoy.

5. My pick for this year's Newbery medal goes to Countdown by Deborah Wiles. The only reason I think it may not win is because it is very similar to last year's winner, When You Reach Me, sans time travel. This is a fun story of a fifth grader named Franny who has to deal with her best friend hating her for no good reason in the midst of the Cuban missile crisis.

This book has to be read, not listened to on audiobook, because it is part documentary, part fiction. I read this aloud to my students, and I knew, even with scanning the pictures, showing actual footage from YouTube of Bert the Turtle and JFK's speech, as well as playing the music Franny listens to in the story, that they still needed to see the words on the page. In almost every chapter there are historical quotes and lyrics to songs interspersed in the story. It sounds confusing to the students when I go from reading the narrative to reading the lines for "It was an itsy bitsy teenie weenie yellow polka dot bikini that she wore for the first time..." I just began skipping reading those parts because my kids kept asking, "Huh?" Also, Franny's thoughts can be random and strung together, having nothing to do with the current situation, so I would sometimes skip over her rambles.

Just Finished Reading...

For Christmas, I got the Barnes & Noble Nook. It is awesome. The first book I completed on it was The Forest and Hands and Teeth by Carrie Ryan. I heard about this book a couple of years ago, but based on the age group of my students, I never picked it up, because I knew I wouldn't be able to recommend it to 5th and 6th graders. Now that I have 7th and 8th graders, I am able to select more and more YA novels, and I'm so glad!

The Forest of Hands and Teeth is my first foray into the zombie genre, and I enjoyed it. Mary lives in a village in the middle of a forest of Unconsecrated, undead humans infected and hungering for blood. The press against the fences that surround Mary's village unrelentingly. Mary has already lost her father to the Forest of Hands and Teeth, but he will not be the only loved one Mary loses.

What's interesting about this story is that the reader knows just about as much as Mary does about the Return and the world outside of Mary's village, not a whole lot. So when Mary enters the Sisterhood, I was thinking she would be uncovering some deep, dirty secrets of the sisters. Instead, there is a breach, the village is wiped out, and Mary, along with her closest loved ones (how much did she luck out?) flee the village and enter the "forbidden" path. The reader begins to hope that this path is going to lead to the group's salvation, but, well, you'll just have to read it to figure out whether Mary ever makes it to her precious ocean or not.

Themes: hope, faith, and zombies

What May Come

2011 is a year full of optimism, opportunity, and potential. I've struggled to make myself a regular participant of the blogging world. While I have hope that I can do better, I know my life makes it impossible at times to keep up. January is no exception.

I like Saturday mornings for looking through all the posts on my Google Reader, updating my To Do list, and taking notes and making plans with all the great information and ideas I've read. And lastly, most sparsely, I sometimes update my blog.

Here are some goals I've already set for myself this year, as well as some upcoming activities that are going to keep me busy:

1. Goodreads Reading Challenge - I challenged myself to read at least 50 books this year. I had initially set my goal for 75, but I didn't think that was a realistic, attainable goal. There are only 51.2 weeks in a year; I'd have to finish more than one book each week to accomplish that goal. If I read more than 50, sweet; if I only read 50, I am still successful.
2. Read 10 Non-Fiction titles in 2011 - I got this idea from Beth @ PointsWest. I don't read enough non-fiction, and I'm not talking about professional books on education. I want to read biographies, histories, amazing facts, etc. I want to learn about more than how to be a great teacher.
3. I'm participating in MotherReader's Comment Challenge 2011 - If I want to take blogging more seriously and make a real effort to exist in the blogosphere, then I need to start putting myself out there. Let's be honest. I've not had a single comment on this blog since I first revamped it in 2009. Pathetic.
4. At the beginning of February, I'm attending the FETC technology conference in Orlando. Our middle school classrooms became one-to-one classrooms this year thanks to the generous donation of a friend of our school's company. It completely changes the pedagogy of the classroom. Our reading classrooms have begun using Goodreads as a way to discuss and share our reading. For the first time, we are also using NoodleTools to instruct and let students write research papers. And the coolest thing that's happened with technology this year is students are bringing their e-readers in for independent reading. They are reading more simply because they have a cool new toy to do it on.
5. For three Saturdays, two this month and one in February, I will be participating in my college alma mater's education program's grant project. It's called a Democracy Lab. I'm not quite sure what's in store for me there, except that I will be spending the bulk of my Saturday morning and afternoon at JU, and will be presenting something to my co-educators at work. Hopefully, I will be getting some valuable, if not useful, information out of this program. And the most exciting part of this prospect? They are going to pay me to participate AND give me some money to use for my classroom. I'm in!

I'm off now to work on my goals: comment on four more blogs, finish reading The Dead-Tossed Waves, write a blog about the upcoming Newbery Award, and a "Just Finished" review on The Forest of Hands and Teeth.

Fall Into Reading Fail

Well, I had the best of intentions, but... this reading challenge didn't pan out for me, once again. I believe there is only a week or two left before the end of the fall season, so unless I'm getting a lot of reading done in the three days I have between the last day of school and heading north for family time, this will more than likely be my only update.

Since the beginning of FIR'10, I have completed only three books. Pathetic, I know, but work often leaves me in a zombified state by the end of the day. I pick up a book, and I'm out like a light within the first ten pages.

1. Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortensen (The Young Readers Edition) -

I can't say I was terribly touched by this one. It was an interesting enough read that I was curious about this man everyone seemed to be talking about. The writing and sentence structure was very simple, making for an easy read. While I was interested enough to keep reading, I don't feel changed in anyway by having read this story. It did, however, make me upset with my own students for not realizing how valuable their education is. Sigh. Oh well.

2. The Lost Hero by Rick Riordan -

Last spring, I read The Maze of Bones and tried to read The Red Pyramid, both by Riordan. I wasn't impressed with the first installment of the 39 Clues, and so had no intention to read any more. The dialogue and narrative of The Red Pyramid was just too wacky for me. I couldn't find defining voices for Sadie and Carter and would often forget whose point of view I was reading, as they both sounded the same. Yes, even though one is a boy and the other a girl; one an American accent, and the other English. The characters also felt entirely too similar to the brother and sister from the 39 Clues. But what really turned me off was the albino alligator and baboon that only eats things ending in "O."

But I'm here to talk about Riordan's next series: The Heroes of Olympus. The Lost Hero is the first in this new series set in Percy Jackson's world. I read the first two chapters online when it was still just a sneak-peek, and I loved it. I will say the wind gods, the monsters, and the minor characters did not impress me as much as the more well-known gods and creatures of the first series did. What I did enjoy was that Riordan incorporated Roman mythology with the already placed Greek, which makes it that more appropriate to share with my students as they study both aspects of mythology. The final revelation of who Jason is was a bit obvious as soon as the first mention of the purple t-shirt in the cyclopes factory, but it took 500+ pages for all to understand. All in all, kids will like this one.

3. The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster -

I think someone may have been hitting the you-know-what a little too much when they came up with this story. I felt like I was in someone's cracked-out dream, going from one crazy character to the next. It reminded me of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, crazy. I get that Juster was playing with puns and idioms, words and sayings, and as an English teacher, you think I would have enjoyed it. But it was all a little too creepy of a world for me, and the illustrations didn't ease my consternation. Fortunately for me, the book is a glorified picture book, and required no time to complete. I raced through it to say I did it and can now return it to its rightful owner on Monday. It was a student's recommendation.