Category: Teaching

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?

Catherine Flynn10 Comments

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I brought a stack of books home with me from NCTE, and I’ve had fun making my way through those over the past few weeks. Today I’m highlighting two of my favorites.

Although I was overwhelmed by the Exhibition Hall at the Hynes center, this immediately caught my eye at the Clarion booth:

Clarion, 2013

I love teaching with wordless picture books because they are accessible to all students, and David Wiesner is a genius of the form. The level of sophistication in his wordless picture books make them especially appealing to older students. Mr. Wuffles (Clarion, 2013) is one of his best. At first I was surprised by the slightly cartoony quality of the cover. But, after reading the first few pages, my notion that this might be a departure from Wiesner’s usual photographic style was gone.

Mr. Wuffles can’t be bothered with the many toys his human has tried to lure him with. Nestled in amongst the stuffed mice and jingle balls is what at first glance might be a tea infuser or some other forgotten mid-20th century kitchen gadget. Mr. Wuffles ignores this too, until something about this curious little silver ball catches his attention. Then the fun begins. Priceless facial expressions tell much of the story, and Wiesner plays with point of view throughout the book. Rich with details, Mr. Wuffles is a treat for picture book lovers of all ages.

Meet the model for Mr. Wuffles and learn more about Wiesner’s creative process in the book trailer:

Another highlight of my visit to the Exhibition Hall was meeting Gae Polisner and getting a signed ARC of The Summer of Letting Go. (Algonquin, publication date: March 18, 2014) Gae is one of the forces behind Teachers Write! and her kind and generous feedback about my writing was a real boost to me last summer. This may make me biased, but if I hadn’t liked this book, I just wouldn’t have written about it.

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And actually I didn’t like it. I loved it. I wish my 14 or 15 year old self could have read this book. It would have been such a relief to know that other girls were insecure about their looks or felt like they couldn’t do anything right. Francesca, aka Frankie, worries about all this and more. She feels responsible for the drowning death of her younger brother four years earlier, and she worries about her parents, who are each coping with this tragedy in their own way. The Summer of Letting Go is the story of Frankie’s journey to forgiveness and acceptance; to understanding that “not even the ocean can drown our souls.”

Be sure to visit Jen at Teach Mentor Texts and Kellee at Unleashing Readers to find out what other people have been reading lately. Thanks, Jen and Kellee, for hosting!

Poetry Friday: What the Heart Cannot Forget

Catherine Flynn11 Comments

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My head is still full of wisdom and inspiration from NCTE, but thoughts of Christmas are starting to push them away. As I pondered what to share today, my mind kept returning to my family’s Christmas traditions. My search for a poem that matched my thinking led me to this lovely work by Joyce Sutphen, Minnesota’s Poet Laureate.

 What the Heart Cannot Forget

by Joyce Sutphen

Everything remembers something. The rock, its firey bed,

cooling and fissuring into cracked pieces, the rub

of watery fingers along its edge.

The cloud remembers being elephant, camel, giraffe,

remembers being a veil over the face of the sun,

gathering itself together for the fall.

The turtle remembers the sea, sliding over and under

its belly, remembers legs like wings, escaping down

the sand under the beaks of savage birds.

Read the rest of the poem here.

Wildlifeppl at en.wikipedia via Wikimedia Commons
Wildlifeppl at en.wikipedia via Wikimedia Commons

Once I found “What the Heart Cannot Forget” I copied it into my notebook. I suddenly realized I was doing exactly what Linda Rief described during her session with Georgia Heard and Tom Romano at NCTE. Taking Georgia’s “heart maps” a step further, Linda has her students create “heart books.” These books are collections of poems that reflect a topic on their heart maps. (Vicki Vinton describes Linda’s process beautifully at her blog, To Make a Prairie. Linda Baie also wrote about using heart maps with her students at Teacher Dance.)

Maureen Barbieri introduced Linda as a teacher who “encourages her students to share their voices so readers will see the world in new ways.” Joyce Sutphen’s words made me see the world in a new way. More importantly, they spoke to my heart.

Please visit Robyn at Life on the Deckle Edge for the Poetry Friday Round Up.

Poetry Friday: Georgia Heard, Roque Dalton, and Unlocking the Door to Poetry

Catherine Flynn7 Comments

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Poetry filled the air last weekend at the NCTE Convention in Boston. One of the highlights for me was hearing Georgia Heard, Tom Romano, and Linda Rief speak about the importance of “Keeping Poetry at Our Core.”

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Georgia Heard began the session by pointing out that “poetry is in every single strand of the CCSS.” She urged us to grow poetry slowly, not to wait until April, but to make a place for poetry in our classrooms every day. “Poetry changes us,” she said, “it changes our writing and our living.”

With these thoughts about the importance of poetry in mind, Heard went on to give us steps to guide our work. The first step is to “choose poems that are accessible, non-threatening, and relevant” to our students. Once we’ve done this, the next crucial step is to help students connect with a poem by guiding them “toward finding themselves and their lives inside the poem.”

Heard also shared that we have to give our students the tools they need to analyze and interpret poetry. Through close reading and asking questions such as “How does this poem relate to your life?” and “What is the impact of this poem on your life?” students can “unlock the door of a poem.” Then they will be able to analyze the meaning and craft of a poem for other layers of meaning.

Heard inspired me to be even more mindful about helping my colleagues share poetry with students when she closed her part of the session with the wisdom of Matthew Fox:

“The Celtic peoples…insisted that only the poets could be teachers. Why? I think it is because knowledge that is not passed through the heart is dangerous.”

This quote can also be found in Georgia’s book, Awakening the Heart (Heinemann, 1999, pg. 118). As I revisited my copy of this classic, I rediscovered this poem by Roque Dalton, another reminder that poetry is for everyone.

“Like You ”

Like you I

love love, life, the sweet smell

of things, the sky-blue

landscape of January days.

And my blood boils up

and I laugh through eyes

that have known the buds of tears.

I believe the world is beautiful

and that poetry, like bread, is for everyone.

And that my veins don’t end in me

but in the unanimous blood

of those who struggle for life,

love,

little things,

landscape and bread,

the poetry of everyone.

(translated by Jack Hirschman)

Tom Romano and Linda Rief were just as eloquent and inspiring, so, in the weeks to come, they will each have their own well-deserved post. For more inspiring poetry posts, NCTE-related and otherwise, be sure to visit Carol’s Corner, for the Poetry Friday Round Up.

Slice of Life: NCTE Edition

Catherine Flynn18 Comments

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“The universe is made of stories, not atoms.”

 ~Muriel Rukeyser~

I arrived at the Hynes Convention Center in Boston on Thursday evening for my first NCTE Convention filled with anticipation about the upcoming three days. To say my expectations were fulfilled is an understatement! From meeting authors Jane Yolen, Gae Polisner, and Kate Messner, to having breakfast with fellow Slicers, to learning so much from all the amazing presenters, it was a weekend I will long remember.

My head is still filled with the wise words shared not only by the teachers, authors, and poets in front of the conference rooms, but with everyone I chatted with throughout the day. How to share all these thoughts swirling around my brain, like the leaves on the streets of Boston Sunday morning? As I pored over my notes, a pattern of recurring words and phrases began to emerge, and I “found” this poem:

Open the door…

welcome to this safe space.

A space to share our voices,

and tell our stories,

through poetry,

movement,

and art.

A place to explore,

imagine,

speculate,

and connect.

A space to find surprises,

insights,

knowledge,

and trust.

This place is a source of joy.

It has the power to change us; to

help us discover what’s in our heart.

It gives us the courage

to take our message

out into the world.

Thank you to Judy Blume, Nancie Atwell, Helene Coffin, Georgia Heard, Linda Rief, Tom Romano, Chris Leheman, Kate Roberts, Maggie Beattie Roberts, Joyce Sidman, Jane Yolen, Jerry Spinelli, Glenda Funk, Cherylann Schmidt, Kate Messner, Gae Polisner, Jo Knowles, Jen Vincent, Brian Wyzlic, Sara Egan, Brian Fizer, Sean Ruday, and Miriam Kopelow for so generously sharing these words, your experiences and your insights with teachers; for giving us the knowledge and the courage and the power to change our students’ lives.

Please visit Two Writing Teachers, where many wonderful and courageous teachers share their stories each week.

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? Randolph Caldecott: The Man Who Could Not Stop Drawing

Catherine Flynn8 Comments

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When I was a kid, I always sought out the picture books with the shiny gold and silver stickers on the cover. I had no idea what these stood for, but like a magpie searching for glittering baubles, I was drawn to them for the magical illustrations they contained.

I learned soon enough what these stickers represented, but still only had a vague sense of who Randolph Caldecott was. Thanks to Leonard S. Marcus’s wonderful new book, Randolph Caldecott: The Man Who Could Not Stop Drawing (Farrar Straus Giroux, 2013) I know much more about this pioneer of picture books for children.

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Oversized and printed on heavy, creamy paper, Randolph Caldecott: The Man Who Could Not Stop Drawing follows Caldecott from his birth in 1846 to his early death at the age of 39 in 1886. Caldecott found joy in nature and humor in everything. He went to work as a bank clerk at the age of 15, but spent most of his free time sketching. He was soon selling illustrations to newspapers and on his way to becoming the inventor of the modern picture book.

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This book is lavishly illustrated. Scenes from Caldecott’s sketch books are interspersed with both black and white and color illustrations published throughout his lifetime. Caldecott’s drawings are filled with humor and energy.  He wrote of his art, “Please say that my line is to make to smile the lunatic who has shown no sign of mirth for many months.” (p. 36) And an 1883 illustration from The Fox Jumps Over the Parson’s Gate shows hounds racing through a graveyard with headstones for Peter Piper, Mary, and Thomas Blowhorn.

As I read this book, I thought of Artist to Artist: 23 Major Illustrators Talk to Children about Their Art. Published in 2007, Artist to Artist is a collection of essays by picture book artists, many of them Caldecott Medal and Honor winners, telling the story of their careers with young readers. It’s so important for students to learn about the often long and arduous path so many artists take on their way to success. Learning about their creative process can take the mystery out of becoming an artist and make it seem within reach. Sharing these stories with our students can inspire them to pursue their own passions and create their own art, because, as Caldecott himself reminded a young fan, “there are so many beautiful things waiting to be drawn.”

Be sure to visit Jen at Teach Mentor Texts and Kellee at Unleashing Readers to find out what other people have been reading lately. Thanks, Jen and Kellee, for hosting! And thank you, Colette, for giving me this lovely book.

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?

Catherine Flynn5 Comments

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I love going to conferences and workshops. They’re so invigorating. Sometimes an idea I have is confirmed, or I’m reminded of a strategy or activity I haven’t used in a while. But the best sessions are those where I learn something new that I can immediately use in my teaching and moves my thinking about a topic forward.

This happened on Saturday at the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project Saturday Reunion. Carl Anderson’s session on analyzing informational texts for teaching points to support student writing caused a noticeable shift in my thinking about these books.

Anderson, author of the classic book on conferring, How’s It Going? (Heinemann, 2000), opened his talk by reminding us that using mentor texts is essential if we want our students to write well in any genre. They have to “imagine the shape of their drafts.” In order to do this, they’ll need lots of exposure to models of the genre before they write.

Teachers should look at possible mentor texts through several lenses, including meaning, structure, details, voice, and conventions. Anderson’s words came back to me a few hours later while I was browsing the shelves at Bank St. Book Store. Astronomy has always fascinated me, so Jessie Hartland’s new book, How the Meteorite Got to the Museum (Blue Apple Books, 2013), caught my eye. As I flipped through the pages, I realized I was reading the book differently that I would have just the day before. Many elements of the book’s structure and style popped out and grabbed my attention.

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Told as a cumulative story in the tradition of “The House that Jack Built,” How the Meteorite Got to the Museum combines scientific facts with the daily lives of the people whose path the meteor crossed, making the story more interesting and engaging to readers. Hartland infuses the story with humor with lines like “Your car was in an interstellar collision!”

The Peekskill Meteorite’s descent to Earth is described with vivid details that include all the senses. Witnesses’ reactions are chronicled with a variety of verbs each time they’re mentioned, as is the meteorite’s journey itself. Hartland’s colorful, engaging illustrations, which remind me of Maira Kalman’s work, include diagrams, maps and other typical of non-fiction features.

All of these touches give this book a depth that will draw kids back to it again and again, a depth I might have missed if not for Carl Anderson’s ideas about analyzing mentor texts. How the Meteorite Got to the Museum is an ideal mentor text for 3rd or 4th grade students who’ve been writing informational text for a few years and are ready to stretch their writing wings and try a new text structure. And they’ll learn a few facts about meteorites along the way.

Be sure to visit Jen at Teach Mentor Texts and Kellee at Unleashing Readers to find out what other people have been reading lately. Thanks, Jen and Kellee, for hosting!

Poetry Friday: Love after Love

Catherine Flynn8 Comments

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Kate Roberts and Chris Lehman have just written a new book, Falling in Love With Close Reading. For the past seven weeks, they have been hosting a blog-a-thon to celebrate their book’s publication. Last week, Kate’s contribution on her blog, Indent, was about closely reading her life. She shared a few the insights and revelations she gained by spending one day being truly observant of her actions and reactions. One of her statements resonated with me:

“Chris and I believe that the skill of reading our world closely allows us to live richer, more beautiful lives.”

This line made me think of an episode of Krista Tippett’s On Being which featured an interview with Jon Kabat-Zinn about the science of mindfulness. At the end of the interview, Zinn shared this poem.

“Love after Love”

by Derek Walcott

The time will come

when, with elation,

you will greet yourself arriving

at your own door, in your own mirror,

and each will smile at the other’s

welcome,

and say, sit here. Eat.

You will love again the stranger who was

your self.

Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart

to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life…

Read the rest of the poem and learn more about Jon Kabat-Zinn here.

Only through knowing ourselves can we be open to the love of others and fully love them in return. Thank you, Kate and Chris, for reminding me of this. Thank you for helping me find my way back to this poem. For poetry is all about reading our world closely. Poetry allows us to live richer, more beautiful lives.

Be sure to visit Cathy Mere at Merely Day by Day for more enriching poetry.

Slice of Life: Surviving a Cataclysm

Catherine Flynn8 Comments

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My husband and I recently attended a live performance of the NPR show, Radiolab. Titled “Apocolypto,” the thread tying the stories together was endings. The first story the hosts, Robert Krulwich and Jad Abumrad, told was about recent research on the extinction of the dinosaurs. Previous theories proposed that the dinosaurs died off slowly from starvation because the debris-filled atmosphere prevented sunlight from sustaining plant life, thus disrupting the entire food chain. Based on new evidence, some scientists now hypothesize that the dinosaurs were wiped out in a cataclysm of fire that lasted only a few hours. The sights and sounds that accompanied this tale of death and destruction made it seem even more horrific.

By Don Davis/NASA [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons
By Don Davis/NASA [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons
This got me thinking about cataclysmic change. We don’t handle it well. Indeed, it is often deadly. Recent events bear this out: whole neighborhoods in New York and New Jersey are gone because of Superstorm Sandy, the recent floods in Colorado, wildfires throughout the West, earthquakes in Japan and other parts of the world. The list is long. People do recover from these events, but it takes time. These disasters leave both internal and external scars. The people and the landscapes are changed forever.

I feel like the world of education is in the midst of a cataclysm. CCSS, SBAC, and SEED (Connecticut’s acronym for our new teacher evaluation system) are causing huge upheavals across the country. Teachers are doing their best, just as they always have, to keep a steady focus on their students and what they need to learn and succeed. But it’s not easy. Every day it seems like there is some new demand that drains more time and energy away from our students.

But times of cataclysmic change and natural disasters also bring out the best in people. Communities come together to help and support one another as they get back on their feet. We have to remain supportive of each other as we navigate these changes. Instead of feeling like those dinosaurs on that really bad day eons ago, we should feel like we are part of the creation of a better education system for all children.

The physical world is in constant flux, and it’s an illusion to think that the day-to-day world of our lives is any different. Our survival depends on the attitude we bring to those daily challenges. Radiolab’s final story that evening was about two actors, both diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease at about the same time. Rather than let their disease get the best of them, they teamed up to perform Samuel Beckett’s play, Endgame. Their determination not to be crushed by their disease allowed them to overcome its devastating effects.

We can’t let ourselves be crushed by the changes we face. We have to go to school each day and support each other as we combine what is good about these new initiatives with what we know is best for students. That is how we can evolve and flourish in the aftermath of this cataclysm.

Thank you to Stacey and all her new co-bloggers at Two Writing Teachers for hosting Slice of Life Tuesdays.

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?

Catherine Flynn7 Comments

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You know how Garrison Keillor begins his monologues with “It’s been a quiet week in Lake Woebegone?” I want to steal his line but change it: “It’s been a hectic week in my hometown.” Better yet, it’s been a hectic MONTH! I’ve missed several weeks of IMWAYR because I haven’t had much time to read and I haven’t had that much time to blog about what I have read.

Thanks to Columbus sailing the ocean blue all those years ago, however, this weekend I was able to sit down with a few picture books and just read.

ImageFirst up was The First Drawing, by Mordicai Gerstein (Little, Brown; 2013). This book is a great example of a writer reading something in the news and asking “What if…?” Gerstein imagines an 8 year old boy living 30,000 years ago who encounters a wooly mammoth while out with his father. When he sees the mammoth in the shadows on the wall of the cave where he lives, he tries to describe it to his family. Frustrated by their inability to see his vision, he grabs a stick from the fire and begins to draw, and the mammoth comes to life for all to see.

I love that this book begins with the word “Imagine” and ends with “magic.” Capturing the often elusive images and thoughts that float through our minds through drawing is magic indeed!

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By pure coincidence, two Peter Brown titles were in my pile. YOU WILL BE MY FRIEND!  (Little, Brown) was published in 2011 and got lots of good press, but somehow I never got around to reading it. Desperate for a friend, Lucy sets out one morning determined to find one. Despite her good intentions, her day doesn’t go as planned and she’s feels “hopeless.” Just then, a flamingo wearing a bow-tie spots Lucy in her despair and asks Lucy to be his friend. On the last two pages, Lucy and her new friend take great delight in doing everything Lucy imagined she and her friend would: swimming, climbing trees, doing cartwheels, having a picnic, then a dance party.

Kids will enjoy Brown’s humorous illustrations of Lucy’s missteps along the way to finding her friend. This book would be a great mentor text for a book about making friends. On a side note, I couldn’t help noticing a resemblance between Lucy and her friend and another pair of friends 🙂

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The cover of Brown’s latest offering, Mr. Tiger Goes Wild (Little, Brown; 2013) is reminiscent of the jungle landscapes of  Henri Rousseau. After a lifetime of “always being so proper,” Mr. Tiger decides he’s had enough and follows his instincts to the wilderness where he goes “completely wild!” Kids will love this about Mr. Tiger. Parents and teachers will appreciate that Mr. Tiger comes back to civilization with his individuality in tact and his wildness in check.

Be sure to visit Jen at Teach Mentor Texts and Kellee at Unleashing Readers to find out what other people have been reading lately. Thanks, Jen and Kellee, for hosting!

Slice of Life: A Visit with Author Sarah Weeks

Catherine Flynn5 Comments

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Last week, Sarah Weeks, author of the novels Pie and So B. It as well as many picture books, including Oh My Gosh, Mrs. McNosh and Ella, Of Course, visited our school. There is nothing like an author visit to excite students about reading and writing, and Sarah’s visit was a huge hit.

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In words and pictures, Sarah shared her earliest writing and how she became a published author. She talked about finding ideas for stories everywhere and the importance of being observant. The kids loved Sarah’s honesty about tackling sensitive topics such as divorce and mentally challenged people in her books. Best of all, every topic Sarah discussed was infused with humor.

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Often students are reluctant to revise their first drafts. Sarah was clear that this just isn’t an option. My colleagues and I practically cheered when she told the kids that “no editor has ever said [your manuscript] is perfect, you don’t have to change a word.”

After reading all of Sarah’s books about Mrs. McNosh, our Kindergarten and first grade students created their own adventures for this wacky character.

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Almost a week later, students throughout the school are still stopping me in the hall to ask “Do you have any more books by Sarah Weeks?” A successful author visit inspires students to stretch themselves as readers and writers. Sarah Weeks did just that.

Thank you to Stacey and all her new co-bloggers at Two Writing Teachers for hosting Slice of Life Tuesdays.