Full Moon Soup or The Fall of the Hotel Splendide

During class on Monday 9/8, I mentioned the picture book entitled, Full Moon Soup, by Alastair Graham. This book is exclusively illustrations with no text. It has been a favorite of mine since I was a young girl and I think many of you will find it very entertaining to look through. It tells a story about the collapse of a hotel in a 24 hour period. The illustrations are very vivid and detailed. What makes this book so entertaining is the fact that, on each page numerous events occur and you must have a good eye to be able to pick out the abundant amount of details in the drawings. I would recommend this book to anyone. If I am able to locate this book I will make sure to bring it in for others to appreciate!

Session 4: Where the Wild Things Are discussion

In next week's session we'll be having our first small group literature discussion!

• Read Where the Wild Things Are. (I would suggest you read it several times. I usually do my first read "just for pleasure" and then do more careful reads.)
• If you don't know, check the list on Angel to see what letter you have been assigned. Then check the schedule to see what response role you will be taking on for the book.
  
• Refer to the syllabus for a description of your role and write a response. Those who are assigned artistic response need to create a response and write a paper. Those who are assigned intertextual response need to look for one or more other "texts" to bring to their reading of WtWTA.
  

• For those who are doing Textual, Critical, or Intertextual responses, submit your papers to the Angel dropbox by 6 pm the night BEFORE class meets. To clarify, you should upload your paper as an attachment. The attachment should be labeled according to the directions in the syllabus. Do NOT cut an paste your paper in the box!

• For those who are doing Artistic or Personal/Facilitator responses, remember that you need to bring your work to class as well, even though you'll be submitting parts 1 and 2 of your papers the following week.
  

• Everyone should bring a hard copy of your paper to class for reference and to give to your facilitator.

• Don't forget that you need to post or comment during the first 5 weeks of class!
  

Finally, please read and bring your copy of "Accountable Talk" (in the coursepack) to class!

Next week we'll share our responses in our small groups, debrief with the whole class, and watch a video that shows what literature circles might look like in the classroom.

Comment on this post with your questions as they occur to you! If you have a more particular question, please email me!

The Man Who Walked Between the Towers

Yesterday in class, when we were going through different picture books at each table, our group started to discuss the book The Man Who Walked Between the Towers, by Mordicai Gerstein. We contemplated what genre the book would be considered because it is about a man who actually walked on a wire between the twin towers, but we were not sure if everything in the book was fact. After looking at a few reviews, I have come to the conclusion that most people consider the book a true story.

Another thing that my group was thinking about was whether or not the book was written before September 11th. At the end of the book, Gerstein mentions that the towers are no longer there and we wondering if those pages were added after 9/11 for marketing or other reasons. After class, I found out that the book was not published until 2003 and some people think that it can be used as a good way to introduce a serious topic, like 9/11, to children. It does not go into detail about the incident, but it would allow for children to ask questions and it may make it easier for parents or teachers to bring up such a serious subject. Since tomorrow is September 11th, this may be a good book to read with any children who may realize that it is a significant day but are not really sure why.

One more thing, Gerstein also wrote a highly praised book titled What Charlie Heard. This book is also about a real person, American composer Charles Ives. I have not read the book, but it sounds very interesting because its about making music and Gerstein translates noises that are usually heard into words.

Daily Reading Challenge!

If you haven't checked out the "Daily Reading" description on page 8 of the syllabus, here it is! Although we aren't going to do this as a formal assignment, I encourage everyone to participate:

Many teachers ask students to set aside time for independent reading, whether that be in the classroom setting as part of Sustained Silent Reading (S.S.R.) or Drop Everything and Read (D.E.A.R.) program or at home. The goal is to provide students with opportunities to select and read books for pleasure.

In this spirit, I will be asking each of you to set aside 30 minutes each day to read children’s or adolescent literature. (I will be participating as well!) Although you are welcome to keep track of what you are reading for your own benefit, this assignment is ungraded. Think of this as an “excuse” to settle in with a good book! (Imagine saying to your roommate, "I can’t help with the dishes right now, I’m doing my homework!")

Throughout the semester we will have class discussions about how we are selecting books and what is challenging or rewarding about this type of regular reading. As we come across books we enjoy, we’ll also have the chance to share titles with each other informally in class discussion and/or through our blog. As time permits, we may also discuss the growing number of informal book clubs and social networking sites which provide opportunities to find, share, and discuss children’s literature.

Honors Option Projects

For anyone interested in taking our class for honors, I've posted the description of the requirements and project on our Angel site.

If you are interested, please talk to me in the next couple of weeks. I'll ask you to send me an email confirming your interest (for my records) and we can start discussing which author you are interested in researching for your final project.

Session 3

Hello everyone,

We'll have two themes in sessions 3: learning to read picture books in more complex ways and practicing the different types of responses to literature so that you'll feel more comfortable preparing for our first literature discussion.

To prepare, please:

• Read chapter 2 ("The Art of Picture Books" and chapter 3 ("The Content of Picture Books") in the C & G textbook. Come prepared to apply what you are learning to some books!
• Read Rudiger (2006) "Graphic Novels 101". What are graphic novels? What types of visual literacy skills might we use to read them?
• Review the Luken's Genre chart. This will be a resources we use throughout the semester!

Optional:

• Read the Kiefer (2004) and Sipe articles. They'll provide useful vocabulary for discussing illustrations.
• Check out this post and resource on manga!
• Bring in a graphic novel, manga, or picture book that you would like to discuss.

Valerie

Inheritance Series

Hey Everyone!

I was just curious if anyone has read the Inheritance Series? They consist of Eragon, Eldest, and Brisingr. Brisingr is being released September 20th. It was suppose to be a trilogy, but the 3rd book is being spilt into two books now. So if anyone reads this series or is interested in reading a fantasy series I would love blogging about it.

Also if you watched the movie... I will just say it was nothing compared to the book. It was poorly made and I was very disappointed.