Slice of Life: Stories Connect Us

Kate DiCamillo, the winner of this year's Newbery Medal for Flora and Ulysses, is also the National Ambassador for Young People's Literature. As National Ambassador, she carries this message: "Stories Connect Us." 

We connected with Kate DiCamillo today for World Read Aloud Day. It was fabulous. She was fabulous. My students will not soon forget this event.

But that is not my Slice. My slice is about a "stories connect us" moment that occurred two days ago.

My first graders were visiting via Skype with Ame Dyckman, author of Boy + Bot and Tea Party Rules. On this day, we were participating in two literacy initiatives: World Read Aloud Day (week) and Read Across America. The visit was great, but that again is not the subject of my Slice.

During our visit, Ame held up books that she loved as a child. There was one book that she held up that made me catch my breath, a book that I loved as a child and that my children adored, but that does not have the popularity of other books like Frog and Toad or Where the Wild Things Are. I am not sure any of my students recognized the book. I didn't say anything, but went home, pulled the book from the shelf, snapped a picture, and Tweeted it to Ame. The book is The Tiger Who Came to Tea by Judith Kerr.

 We then traded favorite lines from the book. Her line was my line. 

"...and he drunk all the milk,

and all the orange juice,

and all Daddy's beer,

and all the water in the tap."

I think I came to love this line when reading it aloud to my children, because it is so wonderfully impossible; to think of drinking all the water in the tap is thinking about a tiger who is really thirsty! This one book had now connected me to my parents, connected me to my children, and now connected me to an author/friend.#coolbeans

Here in this moment, all that LitWorld is saying and doing and all that Kate DiCamillo is saying and doing came to fruition. That's right, stories connect us.

Slice of Life: Sometimes all it takes is time

Sometimes all it takes is a few minutes to lift my mood, sometimes it takes a few hours to shift my perspective. This is just a matter of timing, my mood, and the activity. Sometimes, there are hours within minutes and both mood and perspective are shifted, and that is magical. This past Saturday, that's just what it was like.

After working around the house for a few hours, my husband and I set out for a walk around Jamaica pond. It was a beautiful spring-like afternoon. No hats! No gloves! AND, it was also 3:00 and the sun was still high in the sky (*raises hands in silent cheer*). 

There were all sorts of people out and about enjoying this slice of warm weather. As with any outing I am on these days, we stopped often to take pictures. I stepped close to photograph the ducks, when they got spooked and took flight. I only had my cell phone, so did not expect to catch the event, but I did. (Magical mood shifter!)

This guy stayed put, brave soul.

The next stop was the Top of the Pru 

(Prudential Center) to watch the sunset!

We stayed around to watch the city lights come to life.

Five hours, a walk around the pond, capturing some birds taking flight, watching the sunset from the 52nd floor of the Pru, and seeing the city below come alive. It felt like I had been away for a week. Sometimes all it takes is a few minutes to lift my mood, sometimes it takes a few hours to reset my perspective, and sometimes there are minutes within hours and hours within minutes where both mood and perspective are shifted.

Integrating World Read Aloud Day into a School Library Classroom

Looking for ways to integrate World Read Aloud Day into your school library or classroom?

Here are some of the projects and activities from years' past:

5th Grade Ambassadors

Bookmarked

5th Grade Wordles and Tagxedos

WRAD Celebration 2013

Summary of the best of 2012

Join the WRAD Movement

on March 4th.

World Read Aloud Day

Wednesday, March 5th, 2014
is 
WORLD READ ALOUD DAY

Raise your voice 
for the 793 million people who cannot yet read or write. Let's create a reading ripple effect that will resonate around the world.  

Register for World Read Aloud Day.

Take action for global literacy

On March 5th, educators, children, parents and a host of literature loving  people will participate in LitWorld's World Read Aloud Day. LitWorld is a nonprofit organization whose mission is to grow and support literacy leaders and literacy programs.

"Take Action for Global Literacy, 

Celebrate the Power of Words, 

Change the World."

Show your support for literacy as a human right by reading aloud, giving away a book or participating in a local event. Need ideas? Check out the WRAD Calendar.
Explore activity ideas.

The key to changing global literacy rates is...

Your involvement.
Join World Read Aloud Day.

World Read Aloud Day Blogging Challenge

Raise your voice in support of global literacy!

Take part in theWorld Read Aloud Day "Raising Our Voices" Blogging Challenge. World Read Aloud Day is an international event, created by LitWorld, to raise awareness of the importance of global literacy efforts. 

"By raising our voices together on this day we show the world’s children that we support their future: that they have the right to read, to write, and to share their words to change the world."

The Raising Our Voices Blogging Challenge begins the week of February 10th and runs through the week of March 9th. Each week you will be asked to write a post in response to a prompt or question (outlined below), for a total of 4 posts counting down to March 5, 2014, World Read Aloud Day.

I participated in the blogging challenge last year. Here are my posts:

Week 1: What do you think is special about reading aloud?

Week 2: Reading: Now and Then

Week 3: A Snapshot of My Reading Life

Week 4: Read it Forward 

2014 Weekly Blog Challenge Schedule

Week 1: February 10 - 16
What is your earliest or fondest memory in which someone read aloud to you?

Week 2: February 17 - 23
Answering the following questions with a child. The child can be a student or your own. Please share both of your answers to the following questions:
1. I think everyone in the world should read…

2. If I could listen to anyone in the world read aloud to me it would be…

3. When I read aloud, my favorite character to impersonate is…

4. The genre or author that takes up the most room on my bookshelf (or e-reader) is…

5. My favorite part about reading aloud or being read to is...

Week 3: February 24 - March 2
A Snapshot of My Reading Life
Post a photo that gives readers a glimpse into your reading life. 

Week 4: March 3 - 9
Raising Our Voices
Share what you will be reading on World Read Aloud Day, and why you chose this particular piece to read aloud.

If you choose to take up the WRAD Raising Our Voices blogging challenge, make sure to tweet your weekly posts to @litworldsays and use the hashtag #WRAD #readaloud.

Happy blogging!

Slice of Life: A Visit, A Storm, and Some Inspiration

I headed into the city just as the snow was starting to fall.  It was beautiful and the melting drops on the windshield made the world magical, a precursor of what was to come...

A Visit
I was visiting with my parents and after catching up on the events of the day, my mother turned on the television to find out the latest on the storm. To do this, she didn't get up and walk over to turn on the T.V. and change the channel, as we had done for almost 40 years in this kitchen. She picked up the remote and pointed it at the flat screen television.  Little things like this are still slightly unsettling, they remind me that although, I am sitting in this kitchen, in my chair, in the same place I have always sat, that although I could so easily be seventeen years old again, I am not. Time feels fluid and magical in this place.

A Storm
Something else has not changed much since my childhood, the storm reports on the local stations. The first "storm central" report comes in from Scituate, where my maternal grandfather's grandmother built a house in the early1800's. The house was sold in the mid-1970s, but we all still feel connected to place (not the place, but place).  I asked my parents what they thought it was like for those early ancestors who built their house on the beach. Erosion and shifting shore fronts have brought the water closer to the old front door of the house, but even then, a storm at high tide must have been terrifying. This conversation contributes to the fluid and magical nature of the visit. Scituate has always been "storm central" and today's nor'easter looks to be a good one.

Some Inspiration
After listening to the forecast, I shared with my parents that I wished I could travel back to the 1800's to see the lone house on the beach, take in it's surroundings, and understand what it was like to live in that place at that time.  I would also like to experience a winter storm, knowing of course that this very solid house survived all that mother nature wrought, including the Blizzard of '78.  This comment started us on a conversation about place and time travel. My parents began to name and talk about places they would like to see (or see again).  Those of you who read the blog regularly know that my father has a brain injury and that each visit with him is it's own gift.  My father liked this conversation and could contribute. We talked about Cap a l'Aigle, a place north of Quebec where my father's family visited. I wish I could see my father and his siblings running around as teens in the 1940's.   

We went on to talk about being able to travel back to events in family history or to specific places.  I'd like to do both.  My father and I recounted a story about his parents that would have been fun to witness. My father's mother dressed up like a man to play a prank on the new young seminarian studying with her father (an Anglican priest), apparently he appreciated the humor, since they later married! From the stories my father has told, she had a great sense of humor all through her life.

Here I am, almost midnight, reflecting on the events of the day. Here's my thought: I can't time travel, but I can travel back in time - I can talk with my family.

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The folks at Two Writing Teachers host a Slice of Life writing challenge. If you want to participate, you can link up at the Slice of Life Story Post or you can just head on over there to check out other people's stories. For more information on what a Slice of Life post is about, go here.

Slice of Life: Bringing a Bit of Fun to a Faculty Meeting

My principal is gracious enough to give me about 45 minutes of a faculty meeting at twice a year. I may be brought in on other occasions to roll out district-wide professional development, but these other times are mine to use the way I want and the way I think they will best benefit the faculty and build collaborative bridges. I am grateful for this time.

On occasion (more often than not), these 45 minutes finish up a faculty meeting.  There have even been the meetings where last minute items are included in the agenda and my time is shortened and delayed.  Here you must understand that the teachers have spent a good part of the day teaching and have now been in a meeting for an hour and a half (with a ten minute break). They are tired and full of information, whatever I bring has to be good and engaging.

Knowing all this, I am lying in bed last evening thinking of how I can bring a bit of fun to the faculty meeting. Aha! I have this brilliant idea! (Confidence is important when one flies in the face of convention.) 

I head off to school with a few extra things in my work bag.

Fast forward seven hours.

It's 2:45.

Time to present!

I have my media cart ready to go: 

projector is on, Web pages are opened, and the speakers are up.

I slip out into the hallway 

as the previous agenda item conversation wraps up.

The principal segues into my time and asks, "Is Jen here?"

My friend clicks play on the YouTube video.

The Golden Globes theme music fills the room.

I walk back into the room wearing a full-length, velvet gown along with long leather gloves (my grandmother's), clasping a manila envelop and waving to an imaginary crowd.

Yep. 

The audience, I mean the faculty was speechless, 

when they were not laughing hysterically.

The fancy gloves didn't let me control my track pad, so I couldn't turn down my music, which is something I stated that real award presenters didn't have to contend with...

I proceeded to feign nervousness, proclaim excitement, and, when I dropped the envelop while opening it, to compare myself to Jennifer Lawrence (explaining that I was thankful there were no stairs in this room). 

I opened the envelop, pulled out the sheet, and stated, "The winner of the best audience of the year is...you!"

The rest of the presentation moved along normally, 

fancy gown and all.

The veteran teachers in the room took it in stride. As for the student teachers and new members to the staff, I think I made quite an impression.

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The folks at Two Writing Teachers host a Slice of Life writing challenge. If you want to participate, you can link up at the Slice of Life Story Post or you can just head on over there to check out other people's stories. For more information on what a Slice of Life post is about, go here.

Slice of Life: Feeling a bit bitter

This is not a nice thing to admit, I realize, but what is a Slice of Life post, if not honest?

I am feeling bitter because I came home from work today to be greeted by my college-age daughter thusly, "I re-read The Book Thief today. It was so good!  I can't wait to see the movie now. I know I will cry."

My daughter is home on break.  In fact, both my college-age children are home on break.  This means returning to a house that has been heavily lived in during my eight hour absence.  They generally do their dishes and are pretty good about cleaning up, but there are still signs: a squinched pillow where someone lay reading on the couch; unfolded blankets that warmed bodies in our cool house; pans, drying in the dish rack, that held freshly scrambled eggs; and, jackets, from outings, over every chair.

I was ready to return to work this week and have had a wonderful two days, but there is this little part of me that is a bit bitter that my two children are carrying on in the same vein of our vacation.  I would love to sit down and reread The Book Thief!

I'm really only a bit bitter though, because I have had two really fun days back at work and I missed that part of my life.  Besides, if every day was like vacation, would I still appreciate it?

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Every Tuesday, Stacey hosts Slice of Life at the blog, Two Writing Teachers. If you want to participate, you can link up at the Slice of Life Story Post or you can just head on over there to check out other people's stories. For more information on what a Slice of Life post is about, go here.

Slice of Life: The things I love about Christmas

There are obvious things that I love about Christmas, such as:

reading the family favorites;

finding a new wrapping paper;

baking and decorating cookies - 

especially gingerbread men;

(and eating them)

 finding the perfect tree as a family...

...and decorating it;

walking through the greenhouse to find a poinsettia;

 hanging lights, both inside and outside the house;

 spending time in Crate and Barrel;

 bringing special items down from the attic;

and, listening to favorite cds.

~BUT~

What I love most about Christmas is the thing I can't capture in a photograph.  I love the thankfulness that I feel.  I am thankful for being surrounded by family and friends. I am thankful for being able to buy gifts for people.  I am thankful for the good food I am eating. I am thankful for the gifts I receive. I am thankful for the traditions that make Christmas the gift that it is. 

Whatever your family tradition is on December 25th, I send best wishes for a wonder-filled, tradition-filled, food-filled, and family-filled day. 

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Every Tuesday, Stacey hosts Slice of Life at the blog, Two Writing Teachers. If you want to participate, you can link up at the Slice of Life Story Post or you can just head on over there to check out other people's stories. For more information on what a Slice of Life post is about, go here.