BY ALLY HAUPTMAN
The Steps
1. Choose a text. It might be a brilliantly written and illustrated picture book, an excerpt from a middle grades or YA novel, or even an interesting infographic. 2. Share the text with your students and model what writing ideas you have based on this text. 3. After reading, ask the questions, “What writing ideas do you get from this text? What are the possibilities you see as a writer?” 4. Get out of the way and let kids write and create! 5. Give students time to share and learn from each other. That’s it...five steps that lead to important discussion and writing possibilities. The following is an example of this writing lesson in action with two of my own children. I started by reading Malala’s Magic Pencil by Malala Yousafzai. The book begins with Malala talking about a television program she used to watch. The show’s main character was a boy with a magic pencil who Malala saw as a hero, always helping others. She dreamed of having her own magic pencil. She goes on to tell her story of fighting for girls’ education, realizing that she really did have a magic pencil all along. She was able to change the world with her pencil as she fought for educational equality. The last line in the book reads, “One pen, one teacher, one student can change the world.” Here is the key to this lesson, and this is how I get out of the way of their creativity. I asked my children to write for ten minutes about what ideas they got from Malala’s Magic Pencil. It is as simple as that. I did not give them my prompt that might be presented from this book such as, “What would you do with a magic pencil?” I let them figure out how this book would be a mentor text for their own writing. The beauty of presenting a text and then letting students figure out their own writing possibilities is that they bring their background knowledge, voice, and writing style and combine it with the author’s ideas from the text presented. When you present a mentor text and ask the students to see the writing possibilities, the variety is astounding. Just with my own daughters, my fifth grader, who is the youngest and always trying to prove herself to her sisters, wrote about a magic tree. In her story, no one believes her that this tree is magic and she hatches a plan to show everyone that she is right. She brought in her ideas and showed strong voice. My eighth grade daughter decided to write about the Infiniti Pen. It is worth mentioning that all of my daughters are obsessed with Marvel movies. So, the Infiniti Pen was inspired by Thor’s hammer in that only the worthiest person in the village could pick up the pen because of its persuasive powers. In this piece, my daughter chose to bring in her own voice and combine Marvel with Malala’s ideas. These writers were able to choose their ideas and use their voices. When we present possibilities through mentor texts, readers also begin to read like writers. Try it. Read a book and ask your students to find writing possibilities, to write for ten minutes and see where it may lead! The following list includes texts I have used to spark writing ideas over the past few years with teacher candidates, K-12 students, and my own children. 25 books with endless possibilities…
After the Fall by Dan Santat Animals by the Numbers by Steve Jenkins Bookjoy, Wordjoy by Pat Mora, illustrated by Raúl Colón Camela Full of Wishes by Matt de la Pena, illustrated by Christian Robinson Claymates by Dev Petty, illustrated by Lauren Eldridge Coco: Miguel and the Grand Harmony by Matt de la Pena, illustrated by Ana Ramírez Cute as an Axolotl by Jess Keating, illustrated by David DeGrand Drawn Together by Minh Lê, illustrated by Dan Santat Dude! by Aaron Reynolds, illustrated by Dan Santat Dreamers/Sonadores by Yuyi Morales Friends and Foes: Poems About Us All by Douglas Florian Imagine by Juan Felipe Herrera, illustrated by Lauren Castillo Jabari Jumps by Gaia Cornwall Love by Matt de la Pena, illustrated by Loren Long Malala’s Magic Pencil by Malala Yousafzai, illustrated by Kerascoёt Maybe Something Beautiful: How Art Transformed a Neighborhood by F. Isabel Campoy and Theresa Howell, illustrated by Rafael López Nope! by Drew Sheneman The Day You Begin by Jacqueline Woodson, illustrated by Rafael López The Girl With a Mind for Math: The Story of Raye Montague by Julia Finley Mosca, illustrated by Daniel Rieley The Wolf, the Duck, and the Mouse by Mac Barnett, illustrated by Jon Klassen The Word Collector by Peter H. Reynolds They All Saw a Cat by Brendan Wenzel Water Land by Christy Hale What Makes a Monster? by Jess Keating, illustrated by David DeGrand Wild World by Angela McAllister, illustrated by Hvass & Hannibal Ally Hauptman is a CLA Board Member and is the Chair of the Ways and Means Committee. She is an associate professor at Lipscomb University in Nashville, TN. Image by Tookapic from Pixabay
BY JEANNE GILLIAM FAIN
These are hard times. Many of us are scrambling to figure out a schedule that keeps us all from losing our minds. One important part of your schedule should definitely include the power of the read aloud. This is a wonderful time to facilitate reading aloud digitally. There has never been an easier time to get to know some of the fantastic authors that are online. It would be easy to send your students a link and have them check out a favorite author (provided that they have online access). Many authors are spending valuable time reading online via YouTube, their websites, Instagram, and there are even author posts via twitter. These digital resources were created by the author and read by the author. As a reminder, it’s completely fine to read books aloud in a classroom or library setting but the rules change when it comes to a digital platform. So be wary of reading books online to your students*. Here are a few of my favorite authors and some of their websites.
Kwame Alexander
Kwame Alexander is a poet and educator. He is the author of 32 books. He is known for his energetic approach to making poetry come alive in his writing. His website includes various read alouds and tips for teaching in the home.
Monica Brown
Check out Monica Brown’s website and YouTube video channel. Monica is a professor of English at NAU. She has authored many award-winning books. Her writing is inspired by her Peruvian-American Heritage. Her read alouds, like the example below, are in her second language, Spanish.
Kate DiCamillo
Kate is an award-winning author that writes books about the messiness of relationships with themes of separation and loss. She has a powerful video on the importance of read alouds:
Yuyi Morales
Yuyi Morales is an author/illustrator that uniquely uses texture and color in her picture books. She powerfully integrates her Latina cultural experiences into her writing. Check out Yuyi's YouTube Channel and her video "Why I Love Picture Books."
* Creating a recording of reading aloud a published work is subject to copyright law. Sharing copyright-protected work via a public platform and/or monetizing your recording is not allowed. Sharing a read-aloud via a Drive link you post only to your own classes is generally allowable under Educational Fair Use. However, posting to something like YouTube (which is by default indexed and potentially searchable) is not. The story Publishers Adapt Policies To Help Educators published in the School Library Journal (SLJ, March, 2020) offers some helpful guidance as to how children’s publishers have temporarily altered some of their policies to support teaching in the context of COVID-19
BY ERIKA THULIN DAWES The children’s literature course that I teach at Lesley University in Cambridge, MA is a survey course titled Literature for Children, Tweens, and Teens in a Diverse Society. Typically, when I introduce the idea of author/illustrator studies to the students in this class, I present groups of students with stacks of books to browse along with a curated collection of weblinks to explore. In the context of this survey course, this activity is framed as a teaching strategy and our class time is organized to introduce the goals and elements of an Author/Illustrator study and to provide a ‘tasting’ of what it is like to experience such a study. I’m careful to note that to experience the work of an author/illustrator in depth would take more time and more intensive study. When I learned I would be teaching this class ‘remotely’ from our Blackboard site, I wondered what the options were to replicate the book browsing element of this in-class activity. Introducing the Strategy: The readings below can support an introduction of the purposes and processes of an Author/Illustrator Study. Students can read with the following guiding questions in mind:
Experiencing an Author/Illustrator Study:
Once students have developed a concept of Author/Illustrator studies, ask them to opt into a small group to explore a collection of online resources on a single author/illustrator, simulating the experience. Students will read and view:
When I carry out this activity in class, I focus on picture books authors/illustrators because students working in small groups have time to read several picture books each. In follow up discussion, we note that the same strategies can apply to the reading of novels. In a remote learning context, students are reading eBooks. In the examples below, I make use of Epic! Books to provide access to eBooks. This platform is free to educators. I signed my graduate students up as a Class and submitted their emails, obtaining them free access until June 30, 2020. Additionally, I use two resources available through my university’s library database:
From the many wonderful author/illustrator study possibilities, I have selected four to share in this blog entry. If you have more names to suggest, for whom eBooks are readily available, please email me at ethulind@lesley.edu. Online Author/Illustrator Study Resources
* As mentioned above, I also provide resources from TeachingBooks.Net and Something About the Author for each of author/illustrator
Process: As your students read across the available books and learn about their chosen author/illustrator’s life stories and creative processes, ask them to make notes about:
Sharing Out: To share their learning with classmates, your students can use online collaboration tools such as Google Slides, Voice Thread, PowerPoint or Book Creator (some of these require a paid account). Since this is an abbreviated author/illustrator study (really, it is just an introduction to the body of work), let your students know that they are sharing their initial findings and wonderings. You could provide students with a structure for their presentations or leave it more open ended. In the past, I’ve asked students to share a general overview, their discoveries and connections, and their questions. They conclude with a listing of “Top Three Reasons to Check Out this Author/Illustrator.” |
Authors:
|
RSS Feed