The Unquiet Librarian

I have a marathon of grading tonight, so this will be a short post…I will try and blog more next week when summer school is over, and I can catch my breath. 

I just had to share with you one of the reading journals from one of my students, Bryan.  He is a student who has struggled with school, and as you will see below, he is a bit spelling challenged (he can never remember to hit F7 to spell check in the new Word 2007).   His reading journal is part of our Peach Book Project—my students got to choose any Peach Book nominee they wanted to read independently (they had class time, and I am very much an advocate of the Atwell mantra of “time” and “ownership”.)  Their task was to write 5 reading journals, create 5 multigenre learning artifacts, and to compose a final reflection essay we did today in the library (of course!) . 

As I said, spelling is not his forte, but he has worked so hard the last three weeks—he is not the greatest speller, but he tries, and that is everything in my book.  The emotion and heartfelt sentiments he expressed about his book, The First Part Last by Angela Johnson, literally brought tears to my eyes; I had recommended it to him, and as you can see, he took to the book like a duck to water.   To see any student, especially a tough guy like Bryan, react to a book like this….well, his post says it all.  Here is what he said in his final reading journal from our blog:

June 25 2008
The frist part last
110-end

this book had and surprising sad ending that almost made me cry. Bobby talks about heaven and he wishes that he could go back to all the places his friend thought was whack and at the very end he wished to hold his baby in his arms again. his grandmother witch its his mom only smiles at Feather when Bobbys not looking.

i loved this book so much it has been a wonderful book that enspired me in my life and if it hadn’t been for the peach book project i wouldnt have enjoyed the experince of getting into a book i liked. toward the end i was hoping it wouldn’t end. everytime i fliped a page i would get exictied because there would be more and more .THANKS MRS. HAMILTON! =)

I would consider this to be one of our greatest accomplishments in summer school!  Bryan D., thank YOU!

Information for Teen Read Week 2008 is now available from YALSA!  This year’s theme is “Books with Bite”—how delicious!    Teen Read Week will be celebrated October 12–18, so now is the time to start planning ahead!

One terrific resource is the Teen Read Week 2008 Wiki!  This wiki is truly a gold mine of ideas and resources for celebrating Teen Read Week and ways to incorporate the theme, “Books with Bite”, into your festivities! 

Teen Read Week – YALSA

 Another fabulous resource is the Programming Ideas page at http://www.ala.org/ala/yalsa/teenreading/trw/trw2008/activities/index.cfm. Here you can read more about ways to incorporate podcasts, tech programs, a fim festival, a taste test, display contests, and more for your week of celebrations!

If you are a librarian, go to http://www.ala.org/ala/yalsa/teenreading/trw/trw2008/registration/index.cfm to register now!  There are some great incentives for the first 100 registrants, including the following:

2008 Registration Incentives

1. The first 100 registrants to sign up for YALSA’s Teen Read Week will receive a free, unabridged young adult audiobook compliments of Teen Read Week Promotional Partner Listening Library. Teens at your library will enjoy hearing their favorites novels come to life on audio.
2. All new regular members of YALSA who join through the Teen Read Week Web site will receive two free paperbacks courtesy Promotional Partner Scholastic.
3. The first 4,000 registrants will receive one free paperback from Galaxy’s Golden Age series, courtesy Promotional Partner Galaxy Press.
4. Register by midnight on July 14 and you could win a free copy of Breaking Dawn, the latest entry in the Twilight series by Stephenie Meyer, courtesy Promotional Partner Hachette Book Group USA/Little, Brown & Co. On July 15, we’ll select 200 registrants at random.
5. Twenty-five registrants will be chosen at random to receive a complete set of titles from Zest Books (about fifteen books total). The drawing will be held on Mon. Sept. 15, 2008.
6. One lucky registrant will win alibrary of Mirrorstone titles, approximate value $500 and based on availability. Five runner ups will win an autographed copy each of Sucks to Be Me and The Stowaway. The drawing will be held on Mon. Sept. 15, 2008.
7. All registrants can download YALSA’s pocket-sized, illustrated Books with Bite Recommended Reading Pamphlet, full of recommended titles drawn from YALSA’s awards and booklists and annotated by YALSA’s Teen Read Week committee. These trifold pamphlets can be printed on 8.5 x 11″ paper, cut to size, and then handed out to teens by the dozens.