Pennypacker, S. (2006). Clementine. New York: Scholastic, Inc.
Just like Clementine discovered that "the most exquisite words in the world are on labels you will find in the bathroom”, I have discovered an exquisitely funny book that I can read over and over and still find new laughs. Pennypacker writes with such simplicity and with the beguiling outlook of a third grader. The fact that she plans to smoke cigars, but not have a husband, only adds to her hilarious outlook on life. The book is entertaining without pushing the fact that it is actually a children’s book. Pennypacker adds small details like Clementine’s attention “problem” (she IS in fact paying attention…to everything) and adults’ expressions. Clementine has her own way of recognizing and naming these expressions, and she is right on target with each one. The illustrations only added to the humor and brilliant expression in the book.
http://www.amazon.com/review/product/0786838833/ref=cm_cr_pr_link_2?%5Fencoding=UTF8&pageNumber=2
Thursday, April 24, 2008
Sheldon Alan “Shel” Silverstein was born on September, 25, 1930 in Chicago, IL. He grew up there and attended the Chicago School of Performing Arts and other schools surrounding the Chicago area. Shel went on to have two children, Shanna and Matt. Shanna died at the age of 11 due to a cerebral aneurysm, and Matt was born in 1983 and presumed to still be alive. Shel died during the weekend of May 8, 1999 of a heart attack. Shel was a composer, an artist, and the author of numerous books of prose and poetry for younger readers.
Shel’s writing started kicking off when he was in the military in the 1950s. He wrote adult cartoons for the newspaper, Starts and Stripes. Some of his classics include:
Uncle Shelby’s ABZ Book (1961)
Uncle Shelby's story of) Lafcadio: The Lion Who Shot Back (1963)
The Giving Tree (1964)
Where the Sidewalk Ends (1974)
A Light in the Attic (1981)
Falling Up (1996)
Runny Babbit (2005) (published posthumously)
Don't Bump the Glump! and Other Fantasies (2008, originally published in 1964)
A Light in the Attic was actually the first children’s book to be on the New York Times best sellers list, and it stayed there for 182 weeks. Publishers Weekly did an interview with Shel on February 24, 1975 where he mentions when he was a young adolescent he wanted to be a star baseball player or a hit with the girls. However, he wasn’t great at either one so he started to draw and write, and that is when he developed his own style and own talent. He definitely has a unique one! Here is a list of some of the awards and honors Shel accomplished in his life:
1974 New York Times Outstanding Book Award for Where the Sidewalk Ends
1980 Michigan Young Readers’ Award for Where the Sidewalk Ends
1981 School Library Journal Best Books Award for A Light in the Attic
1982 International Reading Association’s Children’s Choice Award for The Missing Piece Meets The Big O
1983 Buckeye Award for A Light in the Attic
1984 George G. Stone Award for A Light in the Attic and Where the Sidewalk Ends
1984 William Allen White Award for A Light in the Attic
1985 Buckeye Award for A Light in the Attic
Shel was known and appreciated by many children as well as adults. People saw him as both wicked and giddy. His work is seen as sly and serious, and gruesome as well as just plain old silly!
Bibliography
Books:
Silverstein, Shell. Uncle Shelby’s ABZ Book. Simon & Shuster: New York, NY. 1961.
Silverstein, Shell. Uncle Shelby’s story of Lafcadio: The Lion Who Shot Back. Harper & Row :New York, NY. 1963.
Silverstein, Shell. The Giving Tree. Harper & Row: New York, NY. 1964
Silverstein, Shell. The Missing Piece. Harper & Row: New York, NY. 1976
Silverstein, Shell. Where the Sidewalk Ends. HarperCollins: New York, NY. 1974
Silverstein, Shell. A Light in the Attic. Harper & Row: New York, NY. 1981
Silverstein, Shell. Falling Up. HarperCollins: New York, NY. 1996
Silverstein, Shell. Runny Babbit. HarperCollins: New York, NY. 2005.
Silverstein, Shell. Don’t Bump the Glump! and Other Fantasies. HarperCollins Publishers. New York, NY. 2008.
Essays:
Thomas, Joseph T. "Reappraising Uncle Shelby". Horn Book Magazine. May/Jun 2005, Vol 81 Issue 3, p.23-293.
Myers, Mitch. "Shel Silverstein". Rolling Stone. June 1999, Issue815, p26.
Interviews:
Lingeman, Richard. "The Third Mr. Silverstein". New York Times Book Review. April, 30, 1978.
Mercier, Jean. "Shel Silverstein." Publisher's Weekly. Feb., 24 1975
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
Revised Lit Auto
Ever since I was a little girl, I read. I was a little nerd. My parents and my grandparents also read to me all the time. I still love the feeling of starting a new book.I think a big benefit for me was that my mom is a second grade teacher. She loves to read, and she passed that love to me. I took a book everywhere with me. I used to read at the dinner table too. I got in trouble a few times for that. To this day I still read when I eat at home. It is about the only time I can find to read something that is not a textbook.I read all kinds of books when I was younger. When I started I read Dr. Seuss and Disney books. My mom told me about a time when I was in her classroom when I was about 3. She said one of her kids saw me "reading" a Dr. Seuss book. She told them that I really just had the book memorized because she had read it to me so many times. She read me my favorite Dr. Seuss books. I am pretty sure I picked out the same few books over and over. One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish was one of my favorites. I read Baby Sitter’s Club, Goosebumps, and Nancy Drew. I liked going to the library to check out books too. My favorite kinds of books to check out were science books. I know I checked out a book about the Bermuda Triangle a lot. I loved reading the stories about the unknown. I remember having that book and then figuring out that my parents were going on a trip and they were going to fly through the Bermuda Triangle. I was so scared that they were going to disappear. I still like hearing or reading about things that are unexplained.
We had the AR reading program in my elementary school. I actually enjoyed it. I liked reading and I was always a few levels above. I do not know if it was supposed to be a competition, but I felt like it was and I liked that. I was on a basal ball team in elementary school. Basal ball is a reading competition. We read words out loud from a screen. The words were on different levels of difficulty. Some were first base words, second base words, and so on. We also had home run words. I loved this competition. We scored points for every time we crossed home base. We traveled around and competed against other teams. I learned a lot of words through this competition.
In junior high I began to read more difficult books. I read John Grisham’s A Time to Kill and loved it. It was so intense and I loved the trial aspect of it. I still read a lot on my own, but we also started reading out loud in literature and language arts classes. The only thing I can remember reading specifically in class was The Odyssey and a lot of Greek mythology stories. I was not a fan. We also memorized poems and the Preamble to the Declaration. We did read some Edgar Allan Poe poems and I started reading some of his work on my own.In high school we read so much Shakespeare, I could care less to ever read another work by Shakespeare again. I did actually like to read the plays out loud. I also read "The Great Gatsby" and "To Kill a Mockingbird". Those are two of my favorite books now. I hated reading "The Metamorphosis", and I had to read it again in an Introduction to Fiction class three years ago. I still do not see the beauty or brilliance of this story. I hate that reading in high school somewhat darkened my view of reading. I really enjoy poetry, but I hated over-analyzing and memorizing it in class. We could not just read it and appreciate it; we had to find iambic pentameter and deeper meaning in the words. I still to this day cannot figure out why that was necessary.Although now about the only time I read for pleasure is to read children’s books, I still love to read. I love opening a book for the first time and that feeling of finishing a good story.
We had the AR reading program in my elementary school. I actually enjoyed it. I liked reading and I was always a few levels above. I do not know if it was supposed to be a competition, but I felt like it was and I liked that. I was on a basal ball team in elementary school. Basal ball is a reading competition. We read words out loud from a screen. The words were on different levels of difficulty. Some were first base words, second base words, and so on. We also had home run words. I loved this competition. We scored points for every time we crossed home base. We traveled around and competed against other teams. I learned a lot of words through this competition.
In junior high I began to read more difficult books. I read John Grisham’s A Time to Kill and loved it. It was so intense and I loved the trial aspect of it. I still read a lot on my own, but we also started reading out loud in literature and language arts classes. The only thing I can remember reading specifically in class was The Odyssey and a lot of Greek mythology stories. I was not a fan. We also memorized poems and the Preamble to the Declaration. We did read some Edgar Allan Poe poems and I started reading some of his work on my own.In high school we read so much Shakespeare, I could care less to ever read another work by Shakespeare again. I did actually like to read the plays out loud. I also read "The Great Gatsby" and "To Kill a Mockingbird". Those are two of my favorite books now. I hated reading "The Metamorphosis", and I had to read it again in an Introduction to Fiction class three years ago. I still do not see the beauty or brilliance of this story. I hate that reading in high school somewhat darkened my view of reading. I really enjoy poetry, but I hated over-analyzing and memorizing it in class. We could not just read it and appreciate it; we had to find iambic pentameter and deeper meaning in the words. I still to this day cannot figure out why that was necessary.Although now about the only time I read for pleasure is to read children’s books, I still love to read. I love opening a book for the first time and that feeling of finishing a good story.
Tuesday, April 15, 2008
Clementine - Sara Pennypacker
I read Clementine by Sara Pennypacker as my ninth book. I thought it was one of the funniest books I've read in a long time. It reminded me of Junie B. Jones, and I loved those books as well. My mom and I talked about Clementine, and we couldn't stop laughing as we recalled some of the funnier points in her story. I would definitely read this book to my kids because she is around the age the kids I will teach will be.
Chapter 17 - Motivating Kids to Read
Finding children's interests is crucial to motivating them to read. I can fully relate to disliking reading, for the first time ever, in middle school when I had to read something I didn't care about. I had to memorized things and actually pay attention to minute details that I didn't care about. I don't want to do that to my students, ever. I know assessment and teaching classics is important, but I would want to do it in an interesting way.
Craft Lesson - Zoom
The focus
Because of the focus on the earth itself at the end of the book and the fact that Earth day is approaching, I would like to have a craft lesson that works around that aspect of Zoom within a "Go Green" unit. Recycling and "Going Green" are such big issues now that it would be great to tie this in and relate to the kids' lives.
How To Teach It
One lesson would be to clean up campus and maybe do a writing activity about it. We could also create a comic book about a "Captain Planet" style superhero (maybe even watch a few "Captain Planet" episodes....). I would also have the kids create a brochure for parents and families, and possibly other classrooms, about the things they could do and steps parents could take to make their lives a little greener.
Because of the focus on the earth itself at the end of the book and the fact that Earth day is approaching, I would like to have a craft lesson that works around that aspect of Zoom within a "Go Green" unit. Recycling and "Going Green" are such big issues now that it would be great to tie this in and relate to the kids' lives.
How To Teach It
One lesson would be to clean up campus and maybe do a writing activity about it. We could also create a comic book about a "Captain Planet" style superhero (maybe even watch a few "Captain Planet" episodes....). I would also have the kids create a brochure for parents and families, and possibly other classrooms, about the things they could do and steps parents could take to make their lives a little greener.
Thursday, April 10, 2008
Chapter 16 - Controversial Books
Tunnel, M.O. & Jacobs, J.S. (2008). Children's Literature, Briefly. Pearson: New Jersey
The opening line of this chapter was very attention-grabbing. "Books are dangerous. They can undermine morals, fuel revolution, and indoctrine our children." I thought this was poignant. I do feel that certain things should be kept from children simply because of age, but to ban books seems wrong. I found the list of incidents with controversial books very interesting. The one about the woman who thought she was a witch and complained about a Halloween book was especially interesting to me. I just think she sounds ridiculous. I think it's funny that so many books considered classics and honorable are currently or were very controversial in their time.
The opening line of this chapter was very attention-grabbing. "Books are dangerous. They can undermine morals, fuel revolution, and indoctrine our children." I thought this was poignant. I do feel that certain things should be kept from children simply because of age, but to ban books seems wrong. I found the list of incidents with controversial books very interesting. The one about the woman who thought she was a witch and complained about a Halloween book was especially interesting to me. I just think she sounds ridiculous. I think it's funny that so many books considered classics and honorable are currently or were very controversial in their time.
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