Reaching Reluctant Readers, Poetry Friday, and a CWIM Giveaway!

Happy Poetry Friday, Everyone! Today I'll be sharing a fun, "spooky" poem by David L. Harrison. But first I'll tell you about my latest publication, an article in the 2015 Children’s Writer’s and Illustrator’s Market (Writer’s Digest Books), edited by Chuck Sambuchino. Then, at the end of this post, you'll find instructions for how to enter to win your very own copy of the 2015 Children’s Writer’s and Illustrator’s Market!

If you're not familiar with the Children’s Writer’s and Illustrator’s Market (also known as the CWIM), here's an excerpt from the book's blurb.

"If you write or illustrate for young readers with the hope of getting published, the '2015 Children's Writer's & Illustrator's Market' is the trusted resource you need. Now in its 27th edition, 'CWIM' is the definitive publishing guide for anyone who seeks to write or illustrate for kids and young adults. Inside you'll find more than 500 listings for children's book markets (publishers, agents, magazines, and more)--including a point of contact, how to properly submit your work, and what categories each market accepts." 

In addition to the market listing, the CWIM includes great articles, interviews, and success stories. This year's edition features my interview roundup article, "Writing for Boys (and other 'Reluctant Readers')." The piece contains advice and insights from four award-winning authors known for writing books that appeal to reluctant readers: Matt de la Peña, Lenore Look, David Lubar, and Steve Sheinkin. 

Although  these authors write a wide variety of books, and everything from picture books to young adult novels, there was one bit of advice they all agreed on: If you want your writing to appeal to boys and other reluctant readers, don't try to target this particular audience. That's right, DON'T target them. Instead, write what moves, excites, or interests YOU. Then, "revise it over and over until it hums," as Matt de la Peña said. All four of the authors shared additional, specific advice on how to reach reluctant readers, especially boys. So be sure to enter our giveaway below for a chance to win your own copy of the CWIM!  

In researching "Writing for Boys (and other 'Reluctant Readers')," I discovered some very discouraging statistics about boys and reading. Not only do girls, on average, score higher on reading tests than boys, but the gender gap is widening. Fortunately, the news isn't all dire. As Jon Scieszka, the first National Ambassador of Young People's Literature and founder of Guys Read points out on the GuysRead website: 

". . . the good news is that research also shows that boys will read—if they are given reading that interests them."

Poetry can be a great way to hook boys (and other reluctant readers), especially if it's short, funny, and/or focuses on boy-friendly topics, such as sports, adventure, animals, and the supernatural. You'll find some wonderful books that fit this bill on the GuysRead list of poetry books. I also recommend just about anything written by David L. Harrison. His book Bugs: Poems about Creeping Things (Wordsong), illustrated by Rob Shepperson, is chock-full of poems with lots of boy-appeal. Here's one example: 

              cicada ghosts

              Haunted skins
              cling
              emptily
              to the rough bark
             of the hackberry
             tree,

             and farther up
             where I can't 
             see,
             ghosts are 
             buzzing 
             eerily:
             zz-zz-zz-zz
             zeeeeee!

          © David L. Harrison, all rights reserved

If you'd like to see the wonderful illustration that accompanies this poem in Bugs: Poems about Creeping Things, visit this page on David's blog (after you enter our drawing below!). Also, David is celebrating the fifth anniversary of his Word of the Month ("W.O.M.") poetry challenge.  This month he's hoping for 100 poets to share poems inspired by this month's word: "spree."  Adults who'd like to participate may post their poems here. Young poets may post their poems here.

For additional resources on poetry and reluctant readers, see the Poetry Foundation article "Against Slogging: Engaging Poetry in the Classroomon" and the WBEZ piece, "Writing Poetry Improves Reluctant Readers." If you're a parent or teacher, you may also be interested in Literacy Connects compilation of activities to use with reluctant reader. 

Finally, before you head over to check out these resources or the other great poems in this week's Poetry Friday round-up at Today's Little Ditty, you'll want to enter to win your own copy of the 2015 Children’s Writer’s and Illustrator’s Market. You can do that via the Rafflecopter widget at the end of this post. You may enter via 1, 2, or all 3 options. For option 2, "Leave a Blog Post Comment," you must share a comment to TODAY'S blog post and include your name!
(If you prefer, you may submit your comment via email to: teachingauthors [at] gmail [dot] com. )

The giveaway ends on Oct. 31. 

Good luck and happy writing!
Carmela

P.S. If you've never entered a Rafflecopter giveaway, here's info on how to enter a Rafflecopter giveaway and the difference between signing in with Facebook vs. with an email address. Email subscribers: if you received this post via email, you can click on the Rafflecopter link at the end of this message to access the entry form.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Lucky, Lucky Me!

Last week, I had the opportunity to attend David Harrison’s “Poetry for the Delight of It” workshop, organized by the Highlights Foundation. I’m happy to report that I found not only the poetry but the entire experience delightful. From my ride from the airport to the tour of the Highlights for Children offices to the comfy couches where we discussed poetry to the massive fireplace on the patio where we roasted s’mores, every detail was taken care of so that I didn’t have to think about anything but poetry. And the food—oh, my! We were spoiled. During breaks and in the evenings, we retired to our own cozy cabins with rocking chairs on the porches and plenty of wonderful books to read—a writer’s heaven!

David Harrison (a Guest Teaching Author in 2012) led group discussions with a reassuring blend of wit, humor, explanation, and examples. He supplied writing prompts that resulted in humorous and heartfelt poems, and he provided perceptive, encouraging critiques of our work. Poets Jane Yolen and Kenn Nesbitt visited via Skype to share their own tips and examples. Boyds Mills Press Senior Editor Rebecca Davis participated in a session about editorial and marketing practices, and Executive Editor Liz Van Doren joined us for dinner.

Lucky me! I’m still floating.

Here’s a poem I wrote there, inspired by one of David’s prompts, about waking up early:

Day 

Catbird screeches up the morning.
Acorns drop to mark the minutes.
Knock! Woodpeckers count the hours.
Crickets sing me back to sleep.

Another lucky surprise: I got to meet and hang out with our longtime friend Linda Baie, who wrote about connecting the experience to writing in one of her blog posts. What fun!

Today’s Poetry Friday Roundup is at The Miss Rumphius Effect. Enjoy!

JoAnn Early Macken

Interview with Poet David Harrison, Writing Exercise, & Book Giveaway for Poetry Friday!

.
Howdy, Campers, and happy Poetry Friday!  We have an interview, a poetry exercise and a book giveaway for you today--wowee kazowee, let's get started!

I'm proud to introduce poet David L. Harrison, a friend and a gentleman with so much energy I'm sure he wears the Invisible Energizing Cape of Poetry.

Note: it's almost as hard to see as his cape,
but his website URL includes his middle initial, L: http://davidlharrison.com/

Fun facts about David L. Harrison (read more on his website) :

• David's first book for children, The Boy With a Drum, a Little Golden Book, sold over two million copies. 
• He received the Christopher Award for The Book of Giant Stories. 
• He's published over eighty titles that have sold more than fifteen million copies and earned numerous honors. 
• He's been anthologized in more than one hundred books and appeared in dozens of magazines and journals. 
• His work's been translated into twelve languages.
• David holds science degrees from Drury and Emory universities and honorary doctorate of letters degrees from Missouri State University and Drury University. 
• He is poet laureate of Drury, MO.
• There's an elementary school named for him.
• David and Teaching Authors Carmela Martino and JoAnn Early Macken all have poems in the forthcoming poetry anthology, And The Crowd Goes Wild! A Global Gathering of Sports Poems!

I think I want an elementary school after me, too.  Yeah, I do.

And yee-haw--here's another fun fact!  To celebrate summer and his appearance on our blog, David has donated an autographed copy of COWBOYS, perfect poems for your buckaroos!  To whet your whistle, here's what Publisher's Weekly said about Cowboys: "Readers who long to ride and wrangle should be entranced." Details on how to enter are at the end of this post.

So, David--let's begin!  How did you officially become a TeachingAuthor?
Like most authors of children’s books, I’m invited to visit schools. A school visit is a serious responsibility. The first time I spoke in public as an author was at Lindenwood College in Missouri soon after Little Turtle’s Big Adventure came out in 1969. Nancy Polette invited me. I was scared silly. Whether conducting writers’ workshops, speaking at parents’ nights, facing classes of graduate students, or presenting at conferences where you can barely see the back of the room, I’m always a little nervous. I think it’s nervousness that generates the energy we need to stand up and begin. Somewhere along the line I’ve turned into the last thing I ever expected to be: a teacher (of sorts).

Okay...what's a common question students ask and how do you address it?
Questions are experience related. Little ones get hung up on who makes the covers. Second graders ask how many books I can make in a day. Fifth graders wonder where ideas come from. (Wasn’t it Ted Geisel who told people he bought his ideas in a sack at a store with a funny name?) Middle schoolers worry about looking dumb and high school kids are way too grown up to ask a question about writing. Like, duh, who cares?

So you take ‘em as they come, respond honestly, and attempt to wear away natural resistance to having meaningful, two-way conversations about writing. Adult students are another matter. When I began writing, I made all the usual mistakes and didn’t know how much I didn’t know about my chosen profession. (Don Rumsfeld would have approved that sentence.)

So I approach every adult student with the respect he or she deserves, given the enormous amount of time, energy, and sheer cussed determination it’s going to take before they can hold their first victory dance around an acceptance letter. Writers must know their audience. They must study the market. They must seek fresh ways to express their ideas. They must develop the patience to rework the same page, paragraph, sentence, a dozen times, two dozen, as many times as it takes, until it’s ready. If writing for children were a recipe, those would be the main ingredients.

Would you share a favorite poetry exercise for our readers?
I love to work from lists. Begin with themes: family, friends, hobbies, school. Make a list of subjects related to the theme. Turn the subjects into poems.

Theme: hobbies

Subjects: video games, collecting insects, memorizing license plates, writing stories, cooking, taking pictures, gardening, getting autographs, learning another language, swimming, building sand castles.
Poem: gardening

MY GARDEN
by David L. Harrison

What I planted:

Radishes,
beans,
corn,
tomatoes,
lettuce,
peppers,
onions,
potatoes,
squash galore.

What I got:

Caterpillars,
weeds,
bees,
ticks,
chiggers,
sore knees.

Next time
before I plant,
I’ll try the store. 

What one piece of advice do you have for teachers?I worry that too many teachers feel uncomfortable teaching poetry. Some may wish they could have special teachers in the building for poetry just as they have for art, physical education, and computers. I remind teachers that at the very least they know more about language and writing than the youngsters they teach so there’s nothing wrong with standing at the board and working on poems together. Poems written in elementary school are not destined to change the world. 

They are learning experiences. So is everything else during the school years. I say, “Your third graders move on each year but you don’t. And each year you practice with your latest crop, the more comfortable you are writing and teaching the subject and the better your poetry becomes. I offer three rules for teaching poetry in elementary school: 1) Keep it fun. 2) Keep it fun. 3) Keep it fun.

Can you share a funny story with our readers?
I love the telling thank-you note. Standard procedure calls for obligatory notes to authors following visits. I try to hang onto the ones that make me laugh.

Dear Mr. Harrison,

I think you’re the best author in the whole world!
P.S. I like Dr. Seuss better.


Dear Mr. Harrison,
Thanks for coming. I loved getting out of class.


Dear Mr. Harrison,
I love your books! I’ve never read a single one.


Dear Mr. Harrison,
I have to write this thank you note.
Thank you.

"The guy beside me is Ken Slesarik,
a poet and elementary teacher from Arizona.
He attended my poetry workshop

and photo-shopped me as a hunk."

  

What's on the horizon?
I split my time between trade books and books for teachers. I have fifteen projects in the works at various stages from early talks to manuscripts nearly completed. For trade books I focus on poetry, fiction, and nonfiction. If I have a favorite, it would be poetry, but I love all three genres.

My newest venture is a DVD series of writing tips for students in grades 3-5. There are twenty 5-minute tips, four each about Getting Started, Poetry, Fiction, Nonfiction, and Revising. Also included in the kit are a Teachers’ Guide, a set of twenty Student Writing Journals, and three of my trade books used as examples in the Teachers’ Guide. The package is published by Stourbridge Distributors and is called LET’S WRITE THIS WEEK WITH DAVID HARRISON. It will be on the market by late July or early August. Teachers can also take this as an online graduate course through Drury University.

Fifteen projects?!?!?!  Wow!  And finally, since it's Poetry Friday in the Kidlitosphere, would you share one of your poems with our readers?

Thanks for asking! Here’s one from my e-book, Goose Lake, a collection of prose and poetry about a year in the life of a small lake, which is listed on Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble.com. This selection will appear in the upcoming National Geographic Kids Book of Animal Poetry, edited by J. Patrick Lewis.

What Was That?
by David L. Harrison

If the lake were a mouth opened wide to swallow sky and popcorn clouds, the narrow strip of land stretched tight around it would be the lip. Seeds planted by wind and obliging birds sprout tangled gardens of saplings and weeds run amok. In rocky places, stones shoulder to shoulder wear sunbathing turtles like bronze helmets. 

The lip of the lake never sleeps. Life and death meet in the twisted underbrush where herons stand like statues of herons awaiting the unwary. A kingfisher that looks like it needs a haircut watches the shallows for a minnowy snack. 

Geese defiant with motherhood hiss away foxes with a hankering for gosling. Finches flit from limb to bank, ignoring sleepy-eyed bullfrogs that need their rest till sundown.

Ducks catapult into the water

and herons’ legs trail like kite tails

in their sudden flight to

somewhere safer.

Flat shells smack the lake.

Bony heads resurface,

stare at their forsaken thrones.

What was that?

Maybe nothing.

A dog barked,
a child ran,
a turtle slipped.

All’s clear
on the lip of the lake,
for now.

poems © 2012 David L. Harrison. All rights reserved

We're SO glad you stopped by, David--and good luck with your gazillion projects!  

Readers, to enter our drawing for an autographed copy of Cowboys, post a brief comment about a cowboy (or a cowdog...cowkid...cowdad?) in your life..or comment on anything David discussed that will stay with you. Be sure to include an email address (formatted like: teachingauthors at gmail dot com) or a link to an email address. OR...you can email your comment to teachingauthors at gmail dot com with "Contest" in the subject line. Entry deadline Wednesday, June 27,2012 11 pm (CST). You must have a U.S. mailing address to win. The winner will be announced on June 29th. Good Luck!

And thank you, Amy Ludwig VanDerwater at the Poetry Farm,
for hosting today!
And listen to Amy and Barry Lane's song, More Than A Number
on Amy's blog today (or click here to hear it) ~
a powerful anthem to right the wrongs of our education system...