Giants Beware is a Fun Graphic Novel

On my last trip to Cover to Cover Sally handed me a copy of Giants Beware by Rafael Rosado and Jorge Aguirre. She'll be participating in the publicity of this new graphic novel and wanted to know what I think.

I think I like it! The heroine in the story is Claudette, a tom boy who dreams of nothing more than slaying giants. She is tired of the town historians telling the story of the battle against the Baby-Feet Eating Giant and how he got away. Claudette is tired of living in a town that lives in fear of the beast and wants to find him and slay him. Adding fuel to her fire is the fact that her father, the famous sword maker, was maimed by a giant during his giant hunting days. She wants to continue the family tradition, hunt down this gruesome beast and kill him once and for all.

The scrappy Claudette enlists the help of her friend Marie, a wannabe princess and her brother Gaston, a wannabe pastry chef/sword maker. The three of them set off with Claudette's dog, Valient, on an adventure that takes them through the Forrest of Death where they encounter an old crone who used to be the Maiden of the Forrest. Then they come to the Mad River where they meet the Mad River King and his son the fish face. Throughout all of the adventures humor prevails. When they finally meet the giant the fun doesn't stop and with the help of some "magic" berries they conquer him too.

While I'm not a huge fan of the graphic novel genre, I know a lot of my students are so I'm always on the look out for some good stuff to add to our collection. I'll be adding this one and telling Sally I like it a lot!

It's Monday, What Are You Reading?

Even though I have a million other things I need to be doing (grading, parent-teacher conference forms, lesson plans), and a head cold to boot, I just had to jot down what I've been reading this past week.

The books I've finished in the past week are:

• Charlie Joe Jackson's Guide to Extra Credit (this was an ARC - thanks to the kind folks at the MacMillan booth at NCTE for sharing) - this book is not due out until August 7, but it is a great follow-up to Charlie Joe Jackson's Guide to Not Reading
• Kindle reading -- I'm a huge fan of spy and intrigue, so I finished Kill Shot by Vince Flynn.  Please don't judge me by the title :) , but I love the main character, Mitch Rapp.  This type of book and romance books are my once in a while guilty choices when it comes to reading.
• Max Quick: The Pocket and the Pendant - this is fantasy/mystery for children.  I really enjoyed it and hope there are more to come.  Thanks to Susan Dee for the recommendation!
• And as our committee had to make the final decision about which nonfiction picture book for this year's Cybil Award (to be announced Feb. 14!!), I reread the wonderful books in this stack.  Each book brings a different gift to nonfiction reading and writing, and are definitely books you should know!

So, that's my list for the past week and a half, but I am practically salivating over time to read next weekend.  After reading the first chapter of The Fault in Our Stars by John Green, I knew it demanded every ounce of my concentration, so I needed to wait for the perfect time.  Next weekend is that moment.  It's loaded on my Kindle and just calling my name. I can't wait!!

Dragons Love Tacos in THE PIT

On our recent Central Ohio Bloggers day at Cover to Cover, my friend Beth showed me the galley of Dragons Love Tacos by Adam Rubin, illustrated by Daniel Salmieri, you know, the guys from Those Darn Squirrels another PIT favorite. That's me holding it in the photo.

I read it in the store and of course, there I was laughing out loud in the store. The book will be released in June so place your orders now, you won't be disappointed.

Obviously the book tells of the dragons' love of tacos, it doesn't really explain why they love tacos, it doesn't even really matter why they love tacos. It does, however, explain in detail that they hate spicy salsa. All kinds of spicy salsa, spicy green salsa, spicy red salsa, spicy chunky salsa, spicy smooth salsa, all kinds of spicy salsa. It makes their ears smoke, their noses snort sparks and gives them the tummy troubles.

Most of the kids predicted the ending of the book, but it didn't take anything away from the fun, colorful illustrations. Just like Those Darn Squirrels, the book made all of us laugh and that's a good thing.

It's Our Birthday!!

It is the fourth year Bill and I have been blogging together and what a great time we've had!!  Thanks for joining us for all our posts, but some that are really memorable are:

• Picks From the Pit feature from Bill
• our notes as we participate in the 48 Hour Challenge each year
• our annual Looking for Newbery series
• thinking from NCTE, Choice Literacy, and Dublin Lit conferences
• sharing our get-togethers and book buys with fellow Central Ohio bloggers

Some new things we are looking forward to:

• Bill's thinking about how he will be using he NCFL grant
• Karen will start participating regularly in "It's Monday, What Are You Reading?" meme
• cross-blogging from time to time at the Nerdy Book Club blog
• and hoping to get more active in Poetry Friday as well

Thanks again for joining us on our adventures with students and books!!

It's Monday, What Are You Reading??

I have been following the bloggers who post on Mondays about what they've been reading, and have loved seeing the variety of books and materials being read.  So, I've decided to join in the fun.  And yes, I do know that today is Tuesday, but my blog partner had such a great post on Monday about what he was doing with a NCFL grant he received, I didn't want to steal his thunder.

So, here are the books I was reading on Monday, or getting ready to read!!

First of all, this past Saturday, many of the Central Ohio bloggers met for breakfast and book browsing at our favorite independent children's bookstore, Cover to Cover.  You know what happens when a bunch of book-lovers are all in the same place?  Recommendations out the wazoo and my credit card getting a strenuous workout!!  But seriously, how fortunate I feel to live so close to such great people, great readers, and great minds!

Second, Bill and I wrapped up our Looking for Newbery series, and we both made the same commitment - we need to read more and track our reading throughout the year.  I have actually set a goal of reading 150 books this year (way up from last year's number), and GoodReads tells me I'm 5 books ahead of where I need to be.  Hope I can keep this up!!  This past week, books I read were:

• Scumble by Ingrid Law
• Neversink by Barry Wolverton
• Eye of the Storm by Kate Messner

In addition, I am one of second round judges for the Cybils nonfiction picture book category and our conversations are starting to intensify, so I finished reading all the finalists in my category as well.  Though, I can't talk about them in depth here, let me say that each book has some great entry points for students.  Here is a picture of those books:

Finally, I am eagerly looking forward to the stack of books I brought home from Cover to Cover last Saturday.  So many great choices, it's hard to know what to read next!  Next week, I'll have more information about what those choices are.

Hope everyone has a great reading week!  Head over to Jen and Kellee at Teach Mentor Texts to see what even more people are reading!

An NCFL Grant to Extend My Wonderopolis World

A few months ago, several of my Dublin colleagues and I received $500 grants for technology that would allow us to increase literacy in our classrooms. The grant was awarded by the National Center for Family Literacy (NCFL) the sponsors of the Wonderopolis web site. NCFL was looking for ways to help teachers use technology in creative ways to increase literacy.

My friend Maria at Teaching in the 21st Century, an ambassador for Wonderopolis before she was even selected as an official Wonder Ambassador, told me I needed to apply. I've been using the Wonderopolis web site in the library for a while now, since she put me onto it and have found it to work well with all of the kids grades 1 - 5 that I have each day. I figured I had nothing to lose and knew I had been wanting/needing to get some iPads for our library so I applied. Lo and behold, not only did I get one, Maria got one and our kindergarten teacher Kitsy got one. It seems the good folks at NCFL were intrigued by the collaboration possibilities of three recipients in one building. In order to seal the deal the three of us had to sit down and come up with a way to collaborate with the iPads to bring Wonderopolis to a new place at Bailey.

It's been an exciting journey so far and I think we've come up with some pretty good ideas with our collaboration. For example, I've been playing with QR codes this year, I've converted my Amazing Library Race clues to all QR codes, I've been placing QR codes in random books with links to web sites or extensions of the books and recently I've been going through the non-fiction section and putting codes that link to Wonderopolis where the Wonder of the Day extends the book.

The three of us have some big plans for using Wonderopolis to create a file of QR codes that link to Wonders of the Day that will connect to the curriculum standards and beyond and I'm working on some sort of Wonderopolis scavenger hunt for my 4th and 5th graders. It's amazing what great professional development comes out of three teachers sitting down and working together for the good of the students in their building. Amazingly we didn't talk about data or statistics or grades, just how the creative and innovative use of technology will increase our students knowledge base and literacy. Can't wait to get started.

Thanks NCFL for your support of good teaching!

How I Help My Kids Have Reading Lives (and Join the Nerdy Book Club)

Wow!  What a week this has been for me!  First, we start with all the exciting ALA announcements on Monday.  I had a personal record this year -- I had read and reviewed two of the three Newbery winners in our "Looking for Newbery" series!!  Then, this Saturday, all the Central Ohio bloggers will be gathering to celebrate the awards with breakfast together, followed by a trip to our favorite independent children's bookstore, Cover to Cover.  And I know there will be much conversation as well.

But to top it off, I have an opportunity to do a guest post at The Nerdy Book Club blog today.  I am cross-posting my thinking here, but if you haven't checked out the NBC blog yet, you really need to!  Lots of great weekly posts and ideas!!

I love my job!!  On a daily basis, I have the opportunity to model for my students how I am personally part of a much bigger reading community than just the four walls of our classroom.  I frequently talk to them about my reading life, their reading lives, and how I want them to live the lives of readers. 

I look at how many ways we've been able to break down the physical walls of our classroom, and extend into the virtual reading community; many of those experiences grounded in conversations I had with other book lovers via Twitter.

It was through Twitter that I met Susan Dee (@literarydocent), and discovered that we were both going to begin reading Out of My Mind to our students at precisely the same time.  I teach in Ohio and Susan teaches in Maine.  In 140 characters or less (multiple times!), we came up with a plan for how we could connect our two classrooms via Kidblog.  As we each read this powerful book aloud to our students, we had them take the time to respond to the book on the blog several times a week, and then also respond to each other's thinking.  Their conversations were amazing!!  We capped the experience off with a Skype visit between our two classes.  They were so excited to put names and faces together, especially with the people with whom they had had rich online discussions.  Their "in person" conversations were as thoughtful as their responses on the blog - so delightful!

It was also through Twitter that I met Laurel Snyder (@laurelsnyder), a wonderful author of children's books.  With the upcoming release of her latest book, Bigger Than a Breadbox, this past October, she was offering free Skype visits to classes who might want that experience.  That was a no-brainer for me - I definitely wanted that experience for my students.  Laurel visited us via Skype, but the way she set it up, if felt like we were right there in her living room, just chatting about her book and other issues pertaining to being an author.  After reading the book together and then having a conversation with Laurel, my forty-eight students felt so connected to this author who lives in a different place than they do.  They were thinking and responding like readers in a virtual world.

This year, I have a different teaching situation than before.  I've always taught in a fairly self-contained elementary classroom, but this year I am teaming with another teacher, and I teach two sections of 5th grade language arts each day.  From the beginning, my goal was not to have them be two separate classes; instead, I wanted the physical walls to come down, and have them be part of the same larger reading community.  I turned to my trusty KidBlog again.  I've opened the virtual walls between the two homerooms so that they have conversations with each other about books, recommendations, our read aloud, and their lives as a reader on a regular basis, even when they're not in the same room.  KidBlog is the perfect tool to enable these ongoing discussions.

Recently, I became a member of the Nerdy Book Club (actually, I've been a member all my life; it's just nice to have people organize it so well now!).  I shared my membership in this club with my students, and then asked them what they thought it meant to be part of a book club.  What great conversations ensued!  From the obvious ("you get together and talk about a book") to the more thoughtful ("it gives you a sense of what other people think about the same book you read"), the discussions have been thought-provoking.  And how did I hear about the Nerdy Book Club??  You guessed it -- Twitter again!

Hopefully, the message my students get on a daily basis is that we are all part of a global reading community, and to keep those communities alive, we need to actively participate in them.  I really do want my students to be readers for life, both inside and outside our four classroom walls.   Making that happen is why I love my job!!