The Marvels, and a Reflection of Myself as a Reader

I wanted The Marvels the second I heard @MrSchuReads talk about it.  I think he had an early copy of it, because I went to Amazon right away and tried to buy it.  No luck.  A few months later, it popped back into my head again, so I ordered it.  And it came.  It was beautiful, with gold embossed pages too!  That day, I say in the entryway to my house and read as many of the 400 pages of pure images for about half an hour before it became completely necessary to give my kids a bath.  Brian Selznick has created his own genre that combines visual literacy with text.

I call it awesome.

I brought the book to school, showed it to some teachers, and then it sat on my shelf.  Waiting.  Waiting for life to calm down so that I could enjoy it fully.

A few weeks ago, I found my niece's copy of The One and Only Ivan, and I got incredibly excited.  Abby is old enough to read books that I enjoy!  The literacy coach in me couldn't help but go home and order her Crenshaw and The Marvels for Christmas.  Crenshaw, because she loved Ivan, and The Marvels because I love it.  Even though I hadn't read it... yet.

Then, finally, an ice storm hit Chicago.  We are on winter break, and winter arrived in the form of sleet and ice and rain.  There was no chance that I would head outside today.  It was finally time to read The Marvels.  Now that my niece has a copy of the book, what if she wants to talk about it?  I felt driven to read it.  Plus, we are reading with a Husky paw over break and tagging the pictures with #HiawathaReads.  It seemed perfect.

So, this mom hid in her bedroom, covered in blankets and with a cup of hot cocoa, and read it from front to back.  672 pages or so in one day.  There was a stop for lunch when my husband made us spaghetti, and a stop for a performance of the Nutcracker by my kids.  At some point I also had to take some pictures of a LEGO creation for my son, because he wants to be in their magazine.  And, there were sections of the book where my kids played around me as I continued to turn the pages.  I was going to read this book.

And I did.  And it is glorious.  (So was my cocoa.)

I would love to tell you about the book, but I won't.  Amazon calls it a narrative puzzle of pictures and prose.  I think it is something that needs to just be read.  But, if you read it, I'd love to talk to you about it.  In case you wanted a sneak peek, here is a Vine made by Mr. Schu with a little preview:
https://vine.co/v/O0gDxF31DHT

The one thing I will mention is how much I love the message it sends about the impact books can have on us.  I found this section of text early on, which was perfect since I was in a snowstorm of my own a few days after Christmas:

The character regularly got lost inside stories, quoting excerpts of famous books and carrying texts with him like his prized possessions.  He spent a lot of time "lost inside stories" and on this wintery day it was easy to say that I did the same thing.  Later in the text it quoted Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea and said:

You will not regret the time you spend reading this book, in a land of Marvels.

However, the reason for this post is not for a book review.  It is for a reflection of myself as a READER.  The reader that hid from her family so that she could continue reading to find out what was going to happen next.  (My husband was home, but still...  This mom tries to be present with her kids.)  But, I HAD to keep reading.  I kept doing what good readers do, and had questions and predictions in my head and I just HAD to find out what came next.

When is the last time your students read like that in class?

The truth is, they usually don't.  They usually read books that they enjoy, but stop and start and sometimes stop and never restart.  So what makes the difference?

I think that the more we put ourselves into the role of readers ourselves, the more we can figure out the answer to that question.

I never once stopped to name a trait of any of the Marvels.  Nor did I track his change over time, or compare them to characters in other novels.  RL3
I never came up with a big theme in the book, and found key details to support that theme.  RL2
I did stop and snap pictures of some favorite quotes alone the way, so I was on my way to analyzing the craft of the book.  But, that would be a stretch.  RL 4 and 5
I wished I could compare it to Hugo, but I left that in my office at school.  No RL 9 today.

I guess my point is this:
While I did not specifically do any standards work today, I could certainly do any of those standards if I was put into a conversation with someone about The Marvels.  I might have to refer back to the text, or think about it a little before I respond, but I can do it.  Since I have been taught those strategies already, I can apply them to any book I read.  But, that doesn't mean that every book I read needs to be picked apart and reduced to standards work to prove that I read.  Trust me, I read that book.  My kids are relieved that I finished, in fact.  :)

Sometimes, readers need to read for the enjoyment of it.

I was thinking these thoughts, because I think sometimes as a literacy coach people think that I will be happy if the Common Core standards are always front and center, and that the kids are showing their ability to do them.  BUT...  I think that first and foremost we need to have kids who consider themselves READERS.  Kids who know the standards today, and USE them as they grow into adult readers.  The standards make students think critically, and those critical thoughts will help them living in the world, both in books and in the actual world.  But, if learning the standards means reading is always a chore, will they actually continue to read on their own?

I was debating this post, and then I jumped into a #learnLAP Twitter chat and this tweet by @Kevreaddenn made me think, "YES!!!"

BALANCE.  We need to teach them how to read deeply, but also how to love reading deeply.

If you are looking for a book to enjoy, I do suggest The Marvels.  :)
It's glorious.

If you want to let your kids love reading and escape into the world of a book, let them do just that.  Let them just read sometimes.  

Readers Read

     There are so many, many things I took away from my conference with Donalyn Miller on Monday.  The 6 sketch notes below (made with the Paper 53 app) show her wisdom, and some of my reflections on it.

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    When you walk away with a lot of new and inspiring things, sometimes you have to stop and ask yourself what the BIGGEST take away was.  So, I spent the drive home thinking about it, and then the drive to work today thinking about it, and then it hit me.  

Readers read.
Teachers are readers.
We need to read, too.

     OK, I already knew that.  But, did I LIVE it?

     It sounds simple.  Read.  But, it isn't that easy in the day to day world of the classroom.   It is so easy for the Lead Reader (aka the Teacher) to not read, but rather to support readers.  But, it's those read alouds, and those conversations with students in groups around a book that we have *actually* read, that makes us readers too.  It's the books we read personally for fun, and the books we read to learn, that remind us what real readers actually do.  And, it's the love of reading that we bring to the classrooms where we teach.

     Teachers need to read, and love reading.

     They need to see us as readers, blessing titles for the class.

     They need us to really KNOW books, so that we can match books to OUR readers.

     We need to read.

     I came to this realization, of course, watching Donalyn talk about all the books that mentioned yesterday.  For every lesson she could possibly teach, she can name a book to teach it with.  Honestly, that is a strength of mine as well.  But, when Donalyn starting talking about sets of texts, with true knowledge of the craft and author's purpose of each, I knew that I needed to get better.  And I now have an Amazon cart FULL of books waiting for me to explore.

     So, here's the challenge.  In my pursuit of elaborating upon my list of great texts, let's build it together.  Hiawatha, let's unite in the sharing of books and text that we love!!!  If you read a book to your class, or if you as a reader finish a book, or if a student recommends a book to you, tweet about it using #HiawathaReads.  You can include the focus strategy you used, or just simply share a great title worth sharing.  Either way, let's use Twitter for the targeted purpose of growing our list of books we love.

     Here's an example!

      The best part?  You could see that tweet and walk down the hall and ask Lori Horne to borrow the book!  Or, if someone reads a book and tweets about it, you could invite them to your class to do a quick book talk!  Or, you could invite them in to be a guest reader!   Can you just imagine the possibilities that #HiawathaReads could bring?

     My goal, this year and last, has been to read the books our Hiawatha students read.  Perhaps I need to expand that goal to finding new books to share as well.  Let's read books that we love, and model for our students the joy that literacy can bring!

#HiawathaReads    #HiawathaPride

 ***If you are not from Hiawatha, please share titles with us too!!!

If you are interested in reading more about Donalyn Miller and her book Reading in the Wild, check out this post here.  It will take you to our district blog book study.

Trick or Treat?

     This trick or treat is coming from the 3rd grade team at Hiawatha!

     Every year, Halloween comes, and so do the costumes and the parties and the boundless energy that seems to exude from the students.  Pumpkins and music and Halloween read alouds fill the classrooms in anticipation of the big day.  Oh, Halloween.  We either love it, or we hate it.  

     This year, our third grade team decided to let Charlotte's Web take over their Halloween festivities.  There is not a whole lot of Halloween in the book, except for the fact that the main character is a spider.  But, when that novel falls as your read aloud in the month of October, it only makes sense to make a big deal about it.  

     So, what did they do?

 

     For starters, they made the characters come alive by dressing as Charlotte, the web, Wilbur, and Fern on Halloween.  They even "recreated" the cover of the book in costume for a team picture.  :)

     

    The messages from the web were their classrooms decorations, both on windows and in costume.  

    They have also been using Charlotte's Web as their anchor text for developing character.  They are working on RL3.3, and have been developing strong character traits across the grade using Charlotte's Web as their example.  Before their party in 3ROWA, they had the kids write about an assigned character on giant writing paper.  Then, at the party, they were give a pumpkin to decorate as their character for their Character Pumpkin Patch!

Welcome to the Character Pumpkin Patch!

Wilbur

Charlotte

Templeton

Charlotte

Wilbur

     Thanks to our third grade team ( +Anna Waszak +Christine Flowers +Kathy Ross Theresa Carrillo)  for bringing their love of literacy into fun activities for the students!  They will certainly never forget this book!  Thanks for modeling that reading can be FUN, and that when we read books that we enjoy, the possibilities are endless.

Mining for Junie B: A Slice of Life

Writing teachers need to write themselves.

I am participating in the Slice of Life 2015 Challenge, 

where I attempt to write stories and narratives about moments in my life.

I apologize if this blog post veers off the informative "literacy lens" I usually write through.

This month I am pretending to be a writer, for my students' benefit (and my own).

Writers write. 

#SOL15

The prospect of literacy gold is high.

Snuggled under the covers, zoo pink plastic miner hat on, bedroom lights off. Let the exploration begin...  Page by page, we look for gold as we read the words of authors.  Tonight they were mining Junie B.

"I just like the B and that's all."

"Its name is birthday cake."

"...a meanie boy named Jim"

"Cause something had gone a little bit wrong here, I think."

The text has clues scattered like diamonds, and the illustrations light the path to big ideas.  Sometimes, questions arise.  

Is she going to get in trouble, Dad?

She should just say she is sorry.

Can I have cake, too?

Every night, our journey through books is the bedrock of all our literate lives.  Tonight, we ended on a piece of text that erupted us into laughter and put us at a bit of a crossroads.

"Hey!  I just figured out where I can move to!  It's called It's a Small World After All.  And it's at Disneyland!  'Member that, Daddy?  It's where all those puppets keep on singing that same song over and over and over again."

For my husband, this chapter might add a soundtrack to his dreams that will border on a nightmare.  

For my son, with his deep obsession for the Small World, the bedtime story will lead him to sweet dreams as we say goodnight to this day.  He can ride that joyful boat, this time with Junie B, for hours in his dreams.  I imagine he will be singing along.

Miner hat off, book closed, kiss goodnight.  

Gold was found.

(Junie B. Jones and that Meanie Jim's Birthday by Barbara Park)

Blasting Off A Great Year (with No, David!)

     One of my favorite books to start the year off right in primary grades is the David books by David Shannon!

Image From Kayla at The Chalkboard Garden

     At the beginning of the year, we are always trying to not only get literacy instruction off on the right foot, but we also want to set clear behavior expectations, too.  The easy readability of the No, David books (as I lovingly call them) paired with the engaging illustrations make for a great mentor text!

3 Ways to Read a Book Mentor Text

     When using it to set literacy expectations, it is a great book to read as a mentor text for a 3 Ways to Read a Book lesson.  For those of you who aren't familiar with the Daily 5 and the Sisters, they have a mini lesson where they teach their students the 3 ways that readers might "read" a book during Read to Self.  They are:
1.  Read the Pictures
2.  Read the Words
3.  Retell the Story

     I like this lesson so much, because it really makes ALL the students in the room readers.  In one simple lesson, the emergent readers, as well as those who are decoding and reading fluently, can read and practice stamina. The two anchor charts below are both examples from my building using
No, David to teach the 3 ways to read a book.

This anchor chart was in Molly Surma'a kindergarten room, and actually has a picture of each child reading, using one of the ways to read a book, during their stamina practice.  

This anchor chart was in Stacy Rammer and Maggie Daly's 2nd grade room, also as an example of the three ways.  This one used illustrations from the books to demonstrate the meaning of the 3 ways to read a book.

       When I went into the 2nd grade room today, I saw their 2nd mini lesson about the 3 ways to read a book.  Yesterday, they went over "Reading the pictures" and "Reading the words."  Today, they were using a hand graphic organizer to retell the same No, David story and they modeled the 3rd way to read a book.  

Behavior Mentor Text

     The reason the No, David make a perfect back to school mentor text is because not only does it help teach some literacy behaviors, but it also serves as a model for behavior expectations.  David makes some poor choices, but he is a good kid.  He learns lessons, and he tries again.  Just like our students!  

     My building uses PBIS, and our first few weeks spend a lot of time naming specific behaviors that model our rules. 

Be Ready  

Be Respectful  

Be Responsible

     The anchor charts below are from our bilingual kindergarten class.  They used David as their model for bad behaviors, but also for good behaviors.  They then hung the charts side by side and had anchor charts for behavior in their classrooms.  

Ms. Gelacio's chart, just waiting for her kindergartners to arrive.

These are both anchor charts of the "bad choices" David made.  The first one is from Lucy Carrera's bilingual kindergarten, and the 2nd is from Molly Surma's class.  They also posted the "good choices"  David made as well.

These "Davids" were made by Sarah Berry's first graders.  They wrote the lessons they learned about behavior from David on the shirts.  

     Students come to school with so many emotions, and David is a very helpful resource when it comes to naming them and helping them pay attention to body language of themselves and others.  Below is a graphic that might help name feelings students' are feeling, especially during team building and cooperative activities.  Right from the beginning, if we train our students to be aware of their own feelings as well as those of their classmates, our rooms will be more conducive to learning. 

Image from Kayla at the Chalkboard Garden

Year Long Mentor Text Possibilities

     No, David is a mentor text!  Don't just use it at the beginning of the year.  Come back to it all year long!

     Think about it... If you start to think about all the things that, throughout the year, David can teach us, you will soon see it as one of the well loved books that keeps coming back, again and again and again.  Let me list a few mini lessons off the top of my head:

• Fluency lessons:  Just imagine the fluency you can model with all the yelling, text sizes, and punctuation in that book.

• Inferring character's feelings:  Our little friend David goes through quite the emotional changes through the course of the book.  Just look at his face and body language- they say so much!

• Themes:  There are few books that teach the theme of compassion and forgiveness like No, David.  Just think about the end of the book when David's teacher gives him a gold star, even after his naughtiness.  Or perhaps when his friends are waiting to play with him, despite his behavior in school.  What a great lesson for our kids.

• Character Development:  Read a few of the David books together, and you have a character study.  

• Personal Narrative Genre:  This is an excellent example of a personal narrative.  David Shannon wrote the stories about himself as a child.  What a great way to get kids writing stories that are true about them!

• Vocabulary:  The reading level for the book is in the first grade band, but there are a few good words that could be vocabulary words.  "NO! It's not my fault! I didn't mean to! It was an accident!"  Ask any young kid to define "accident" and you have a good discussion.  :)

• 3 Ways to Read a Book:  The text is nice and simple to read, the pictures practically tell the story all on their own, and the kids love to retell this one!  

• Rereading Text:  Kids are always so hesitant to read texts more than once, but for some reason David allows them to do that.  The David books are often the ones that fall apart due to overuse.

• Voice:  One of our 6 Traits of good writing is found abundantly in the words of the No, David! books.  

     Thanks for reading my first blog hop post!  On to the next stop you go!

Close Reading with Tim McGraw

Day 26 of #BTBC14

What kinds of music do you enjoy most?

     I have previously blogged about Justin Timberlake here.  I definitely enjoy his music.  He should make this post, too.  :)

***Disclaimer:  Many of you know that I am a literacy nerd, and post pictures with or tweets from literacy gurus.  Well, my passions in life do not limit themselves to literacy.  I am also a huge Tim McGraw fan.

Here comes Tim McGraw!  (He is blurry because I was jumping up and down.) 

     Since I have had children, I have learned that it is not really about my favorites anymore.  The kids always seems to have songs they want to hear in the car, and my husband is always playing his music around the house.  Basically, that's ok with me, because I really do like most types of music.  The one that is definitely mine, though, is Tim McGraw.  My friend, Jaime, and I go to see him in concert every time he comes to Chicago.  We have gone to Indiana and Wisconsin along the way, too. It has been our "thing" that I really embrace now that we both have little kids.  We have seen him 14 times now (15 if you count the book signing we went to).  Last year he walked into the concert through the audience, and I actually got to touch his hand!  It was glorious.

 

     So, how does this tie to literacy?  Two ways!  First, we went to his book signing a few years back at the Borders in Chicago.  I guess officially he is an author, an actor and a musician!  He started with co-authoring a book about his music career, and then went on to co-write children's books about being a dad.  I like his autobiography, especially since mine is autographed, but I also really enjoy reading his picture books to my kids.  They are filled with themes of adventure, and family, and love.

Pages from My Little Girl (McGraw and Douglas, 2008)

   
     My daughter was given My Little Girl as a gift.  I was giddy that it was written by Tim McGraw,  of course.  But, I have written a few posts this year about close reading life, and this book definitely is a metaphor for that!  It starts out with the promise of having a spectacular day with dad.  "A better than chocolate ice cream with sprinkles" kind of day!  The main character, Katie, dresses up in everything that she own to prepare for that spectacular day.  (Everyone with a preschool girl relates to that).  The book then shows a dad and daughter, doing everyday things together.  They go to the store, look at clouds, swing on the tire swim, etc.  Just a regular day, that turned out to be a "spectacular, nothing-in-particular day" because they were together.  Now isn't that close reading life at it's best?

     The second way that he can tie to literacy is through his song lyrics.  Many of his songs are just meant to be fun, or are about love, so those wouldn't necessarily apply to the classroom.  A few have some deeper meaning and would be great to use with older students.  But, since I work with teachers, I think that some would be great to close read as a staff PD.  Take, for example, Blank Sheet of Paper.

"Blank Sheet of Paper"

I'm just a blank sheet of paper
This fool's about to write you a letter
To tell you that he's sorry
For the way he did you wrong
To ask for your forgiveness
For leavin you alone

He's been lookin down at me
It seems like forever
He takes the top on and off his pen
It's like he can't decide
What he wants to say
If he'd just tell the truth
I'd be on my way

But he just stares at me
And I just stare at him
He don't know where to start
To say he doesn't want it to end
Now its one hour later
And I'm still a blank sheet of paper

The sunlight is comin through the curtains
He's almost asleep pen in hand
There's a tear in his eye
That refuses to fall
If it would land on me
That would say it all

But he just stares at me
And I just stare at him
He don't know where to start
To say he doesn't want it to end
Now it's four hours later
And I'm still a blank sheet of paper

Oh but he just stares at me
And I just stare at him
He don't know where to start
To say he wants you back again
One broken heart later
And I'm still a blank sheet of paper

     Let's walk up the Common Core standards with this one.  At first read, it's about a guy who won't write a letter to his ex-girlfriend.  It is about asking forgiveness.  The guy would be described as sad, perhaps, or stubborn because he refuses to write the letter.  Hours pass, but the paper remains blank.  It then says "there's a tear in his eye that refuses to fall."  Is that because he is stubborn?  Or because he won't take ownership of his mistakes?  Or, perhaps, because he wants her back but he know she is better off without him?  It says the tear would say it all, and yet he refuses to let them fall.  Is this about him asking her to forgive him, or him trying to forgive himself and failing?  "One broken heart later" is how the song ends, but who is the broken hearted one?  It seems that he is pretty heart broken, as evidenced by his staring at the paper, his inability (or perhaps reluctance) to share his emotions, and the fact that he remained at the table for hours unable to change the blank sheet of paper.  But shouldn't there be two broken hearts here?  "One broken heart later" could imply she is really better off without him.  Is this song really about the sacrifices we make for the ones we love?  Or is it about pride, and how our pride gets in the way of our happiness at times?  The song being written from the point of view of the blank sheet of paper, instead of the guy, gives us some perspectives that we would not have had otherwise.  It is really taking a step outside of the character's shoes, but is still leaving the perspective of the woman missing.  

     I just used Standards 1, 2, 3, 4, and 6 to interpret the lyrics of the song.  I just wish there was someone else sitting here to have a discussion about it! 

     Who would have thought that Tim McGraw could help me close read?  Actually, it isn't a far stretch to make.  Close reading, according to Christopher Lehman in Falling in Love with Close Reading, is when: 
"a reader independently stops at moments in a text (or media or life) to reread and observe the choices an author has made.  He or she reflects on those observations to reach for new understanding that can color the way the rest of the book is read (or song heard or life lived) and thought about."

     Perhaps the secret to close reading is just that...  Giving our students the tools to stop and reflect and find new understandings on the texts (written, media, or life) that matter most to them.  We need to give them the tools they need to do that, but we have to allow them to apply them independently.  Close reading doesn't have to be something that we force our students to do.  It can be something that helps them stay on the path of being life long readers, because readers who create their own meaning continue to read.  (Even if they don't want to close read Tim McGraw lyrics.  That's ok.  I'll just continue to do that in the car when his songs come on the radio!)