Slice of Life - A Reading Life

Yesterday I woke up at 7 am, went for a run, returned to read just a little more in my current #bookaday – House of Secrets. Luke and Liam were reading as well – Chamber of Secrets for Luke, Chris’s old comics for Liam.

Around 9 I took Luke to his first ever band lesson and book talked with some incoming fifth graders in the line. Then I spent about another thirty minutes talking about the teaching of reading and writing with a colleague.

Rushed home to prepare for reading camp. From 11-12 I taught the first eleven kids. We discussed books - how sometimes they are slow to start. We shared titles, Skyped with Tony Keefer’s class and got book recommendations. I finished up by sharing the three picture books in this month’s Sharp-Schu book club with them.

From 12-1 I had a book club with seven middle school kids and we discussed Gae Polisner’s Pull of Gravity. The kids had great questions, made me laugh, and I reflected how much I missed these former students. We even had the opportunity to Skype with Gae towards the end of the class and the students were brilliant.

For the next few hours Luke, Liam, and I took to different corners of the house. We read, used the computer, and relaxed.

Around five we headed to the ballpark for the next two hours of baseball games. I read more from House of Secrets while waiting for the games to start – book talking it with at least five kids and one adult. I also had the chance to catch up with a former student and enroll her in the middle school book camp, talk to many students from last year and ask what they were reading, and give some parents advice about how to keep their kid reading over the summer – all while watching Luke and Liam’s teams play ball.

After dinner out with my mom, we came home just before nine. Crashing into bed I finished House of Secrets and debated what to read next as I reflected over my day.

I’ve always loved to read, but reading is a bigger part of my life now than ten years ago. I grew up loving books and always had something that I was currently reading. I know my interest waned a bit in middle school and high school. I think part of that would be just the age, but most would be the lack of choice in reading for school. This would be just one reason I’m such a proponent for choice as part of reading class.

In college I still read, but I didn’t talk about books very much. Even when I first started teaching, I loved to read, talked to my students about books, but it wasn’t the first thing people associated with me.

Now, it’s a given. Students enter my class for the first time and usually say something like – you’re that teacher who loves books. Yep, that’s me. I’m sure there are other things that people could associate me with, but the person who loves books works for me. I think books are so closely linked with my identity for a few reasons. One, I do read more than I ever have. Two, I am more vocal about reading and teaching than previously. Three, with the advent of social media, I share more of myself with a wider group than before.

Looking over my day from the viewpoint of my bed, I see all of the ways books or teaching are intertwined throughout. Why do I spend so much time reading kids books or talking to kids about reading? I know how much richer their life will be if they can just read – and enjoy it. I’m grateful for two boys living in my house who have both caught that reading bug and I will continue to help as many children as possible catch it as well. J

Slice of Life is sponsored every Tuesday by Stacey and Ruth from Two Writing Teachers

Connecting through books

 I am a woman with a mission. Every year I try my hardest to help around 70 kids develop a passion for reading. I write them letters (HERE), help them meet authors on the internet (HERE) or in person (HERE), and purchase more books for my classroom than my salary really affords. Sometimes I pause and wonder why I do this?

It isn’t easy, that is for sure. I rarely watch TV because I am trying so hard to fill my time with reading. Honestly, from what I can tell, I’m not missing much on TV and books do fill me up, but I read and read and am never caught up.

I plan, looking at the CCSS or Illinois Learning Standards to decide on lessons for the week. I conference with kids, searching for lessons I need to share. I grab picture books, articles, excerpts of texts – and work hard to teach them not only to become better readers but also to fall in love with the world of books.  

And then, I have moments where I know exactly why I am doing this. It is these moments that I grasp on to when the overwhelming negativity of the current education climate becomes too much. When I can’t possibly handle one more mandate forced upon me by people that have never taught a day in their lives. That wouldn’t have the slightest idea how the mind of an eleven year old works. These are the moments I share with my students. To tell them that yes, they need to become readers. Because the world is a better place when you do. Those moments.

Moments like receiving a text from a colleague today… Something is wrong with Augustus….isn’t there??? I read that text at six am today and goose bumps rose up on my arms. I had loaned her John Green’s amazing The Fault In Our Stars and knew exactly what she was feeling. A connection through books.

Moments like having Haley come up to me in class today, cradling Jo Knowles See You At Harry’s as she said, in a whisper, “Has she written anything else? I need more.”

Moments like talking with Josh today as we looked over Amy Timberlake’s One Came Home and discussing what we would do if our sibling took off, would we have the guts to go after them as Georgie does? Would we be as brave?

Moments like sitting with a student for the last half hour of our reading class today, side by side, as I read Riordan’s The Lightning Thief. He wanted to give up; he does not read books this long. But I implored him to stick with it. He needs this book. He is Percy. He needs to see the goodness in Percy, in himself. I promised to read to him for a half hour to help him get into it. Our discussions over Percy’s mom and the Minotaur showed me, he’s hooked.

Moments like reading Sharon Creech’s Hate That Cat to three different classes on Tuesday. Each time, I broke down. In one of Jack’s early poems he thanks Miss Stretchberry for moving up with his class. He asks if she can move up every year with them. And then says, You understand my brain. I fought back tears every time.

What I had to explain to my students is that I had a class I looped with too. They are seventh graders now. And when I read this book to them three years ago, they cheered at this part, begged me to continue to move up with them. And then I’d find the post-it notes written and left on my desk You understand my brain.  The whispers of it when I helped one with an essay. The sweet comments that I was their Miss Stretchberry. I love all of my classes but looping with that group was special. And I can’t possibly read this book, this passage, without thinking of them. Wishing them well. And my heart hurts because of a connection to students I love through a book.

And so, when I think over moments like these, moments like these that I have every single day, I can’t help but realize that at the center of it all, there are books. Books are how I connect to others. Books are how others connect with me. Books are how I connect to myself. And I hate for anyone to miss out on this. I delight in the child that rushes in to tell me they were chastised by their parent last night, up reading late again. That they can’t believe how strong Max is to take care of her flock. That Ivan and Ruby are breaking their heart.

Books.

Connections.

Moments.

I’m so glad I get to witness these. 

Sharing my reading life

I have Nancie Atwell and Donalyn Miller to thank for two huge changes in my relationships with my students over the past few years. Six years ago I saw Nancie Atwell speak at a conference. She talked about how she shared her life with her students – that they knew so much about her, they even knew her favorite candy. Two years ago I saw Donalyn Miller for the first time. She explained that we needed to share our reading lives with our students. We needed to explicitly teach our reading habits to help our students develop their own reading lives independent of us.

So, what am I doing with that information? Well, as a result my students know a lot about me. They know the basics – who my husband is. The fact that he is six foot seven and I am five foot two – it makes for an interesting photo. J They know about my boys and my dog. They know my “favorites”, for example the know my favorite spot to eat by myself in Champaign is Café Kopi (I can read there.) They know my favorite store is Barnes and Noble. They know I REALLY like M&M’s. They know I drink Coke Zero. They know that if the room is messy, especially my desk, I can’t concentrate. They know I am a huge fan of Apple products. They know I love to read and write. They know my dream is to write a book that would help teachers.

As a reader they know where I like to read – Café Kopi or my favorite reading chair at home. They know that I always have a reading plan and they have seen pictures of my “to read” shelf in my bedroom. They know that I try and read for a certain amount of time each day. They know I am trying to read all of the Newbery winners in order. They know I have friends that are readers just like me. They know I plan for reading when we go on a break like the past two weeks. And they know I make a goal for every year related to reading.

So, why are these shared items important? I am a big believer in relationships. In fact, almost every paper I wrote in grad school had some element of the importance of relationships with your students in it. Once the relationship is built, you can get your students to really grow because of that relationship. It goes without saying, just as I let my students know me, I work hard to really know them.

Knowing all of this I came away from this Christmas Break with three items I want to share with my students on Monday. Three new realizations about reading that I think will help them in their own reading lives.

One I have already touched on – the Book Gap Challenge. Realizing I have avoided reading “the classics.” I already have a list of books I want to tackle this year as a result. This will be important because I am teaching a non-fiction unit in January. I will be asking them each to read non-fiction books. This is a gap for about 90-95% of my students. We will discuss why recognizing our gaps and trying to fill them is important. 

My stack a few days ago. I had read the ones on the right.

Another item I want to share with them is something I realized as I read so many books over break, the first 50 pages or so are tough for me. I read really fast, but only when I’m “hooked.” Most books take me at least 50 pages to get hooked, to really understand the characters. For the first 50 pages I put the book down a lot, check Twitter, bake cookies, etc. This is when most of my students tend to abandon books, so I think this is something they will identify with. I will talk about how I do abandon books, but only have I have gone past the first 50 or so. This does not mean I will tell them they can’t abandon before page 50, just that I know myself and that’s what works for me, they need to discover what works for them.

Finally, I was reminded again last night of the importance of having friends that read. I was finishing The Raven Boys and I knew I had a friend who had read it. The book had hooked me – after the first 50 pages, of course – and I kept questioning what was going on. Because my friend is also a reader, we proceeded to text on and off as I finished the book – over the next four hours we exchanged over fifty texts. They began with questions about a character from the book and how sad I was that something had just happened. The texts then extended to symbolism in the books, connections to characters from other books, and more. I need to share this with my students so they can see why having friends who read AND discussing books with them would be beneficial.

Come Monday morning these three realizations will be shared with my students during our mini-lesson. I hope they will help my students continue to reflect on their reading lives and what their own habits are. I can’t wait to be back in the classroom and discussing books with the kids.