Happy Random Acts of Kindness Day!

No matter how you came to this blog post today, by chance,

by intention,

or simply by Good Luck,

may I be the first to wish you Happy Random Acts of Kindness Day!

Yes, you read that right: February 17 is Random Acts of Kindness Day.

Not to worry if you didn’t know this fact.

I know I didn’t, until I turned to today’s date in my copy of Eileen and Jerry Spinelli’s newest book, today I will (Knopf, 2009).

I’d been savoring the moment (translate: assigned blog posting date and subject matter) to kindly share this newly-published small but useful and inspiring book with TeachingAuthors readers and writers.

Today’s post became that random moment.

How perfect is that!

I ardently believe in Paying Kindness Forward.

I practice it daily.

I believe in Good Karma.

So consider this introduction to the Spinellis’ book my February 17 Act of Kindness.

FYI: February 15 through 20 has been designated Random Acts of Kindness Week!
Googling left me thinking the Acts of Kindness Foundation was behind the designation.
No matter the Who, though, or even the How. I’m smiling and paying kindness forward to you.

I’d purchased the Spinellis’ book fully intending to use it as a journal-writing tool with my Young Writers.
The review blurb highlighted the book’s simplicity. In a single page entry for each day of the year, the Spinellis
(1) share a quote from a children’s book, referencing the title and author;
(2) reflect meaningfully on the quote;
(3) make a “today I will….” promise that relates to that reflection.
The February 17th quote?

“Kindness comes with no price” from Tongues of Jade by Laurence Yep.

The Spinellis’ reflection?
Talk is cheap but kindness is free. Why isn’t there more of it?!
Their promise?

"I’ll make sure February 17th lives up to its name. And it won’t cost me a penny!”

I love that the Spinellis used children’s books as their source of thought-provoking, heart-grabbing journal prompts.
The middle-page responses make perfect practice for students boning up for the reflective reading passages in any and all state achievement tests.
The “today I will…” promise makes the reader sit up straight, indeed stand up tall, to claim his reflection and translate it into action.

The quotes offer a wide sample of titles, from Alice Dalgliesh’s The Courage of Sarah Noble and Natalie Babbitt’s Tuck Everlasting to Sarah Dessen’s Keep the Moon and Carolyn Mackler’s The Earth, My Butt and Other Big Round Things.

The Big and Small topics range from Fear and Failure and Thinking about Others to Hope and Choices and Asking for Help.

The book’s turquoise back cover says it all:
“…look inside. Turn to today. And make a promise to yourself.”

Being kind to yourself is now downright doable, daily if not randomly, thanks to this small book.

And passing word of this Important Truth on to you, our readers?
I’m simply paying it forward…hoping you will do the same.

Happy Random Acts of Kindness Day!
Esther Hershenhorn

Writing Workout

Copying is the supreme compliment, yes?
So, why not create your own book of quotes, notes and promises to yourself!
Any book or writing vessel will do: a commercially-sold composition book or a purchased blank journal or diary, books with folded and gathered, pull-out or accordion-style pages. Leaf books. Shape books. Scroll books.

• At the top of each page, copy a favorite quote from a children’s book. Include the title, author, perhaps the character who spoke the words.
• In the middle of the page, respond thoughtfully to the quote. Why did it touch you? How did it speak to you? What do the words mean to who you are now? Do they inspire, encourage, comfort, acknowledge, advise, recommend, illuminate, give hope. You choose the verb and the accompanying emotion and memory.
• At the bottom of the page, make a real-and-doable promise based on your reflection. Now I will….
• Decorate front and back covers and/or personalize each page with an image or symbol.
• Gift yourself. Or gift another.

          Either way, it’s an act of kindness.

The First Book I Ever "Owned"

Ever since I was a girl, I've dreamed of living in a house with its own library. You know-- the kind of room wealthy people in movies always have, with floor-to-ceiling-built-in bookshelves and a rolling ladder to reach the top shelves.

The fantasy was inspired not only by my love of reading, but also by the fact that we had very few books in our house when I was growing up.  (One of the few I can recall was a light blue softcover my father studied to prepare for his "citizenship" test.)  For my working-class Italian-immigrant parents, books were a luxury we couldn't afford.

Then one day when I was around ten years old, a door-to-door encyclopedia salesman rang our front bell. You can imagine my amazement when the salesman managed to convince my father to buy a brand-new 20-volume set of the World Book Encyclopedia. I don't know how the salesman did it, but he was my new hero! And since my younger sister and brother were too young to read at the time, I considered the set mine.

As nerdy as it may sound, I loved reading those books. We didn't have the Internet back then, and a trip to the public library meant taking two buses each way. So having my own encyclopedia was indeed a luxury. I used it not only to research class assignments, but for recreational reading, too. I never read a volume from front to back as you would a novel. Instead, I flipped the pages until something struck me as interesting.

I tell students at school visits that my favorite volume was the letter "B," and it's true. As a girl, I pored over the color photographs of Birds and Butterflies from around the world. I studied the rules of Baseball and memorized the stats of many of the record-holders. (I believe Joe DiMaggio still holds the record for the longest consecutive hitting streak at 56 games.) I learned the hand signals for right and left turns on a Bicycle.

Those books held more than information for me. They took me places I could only dream of visiting. They introduced me to presidents, poets, and painters. They sparked my curiosity in mathematics and music.

As I grew older, I became more interested in reading fiction and drifted away from the encyclopedia.  But every so often, I still went back to my old World Books. And every time, I inevitably learned something new and interesting from their pages.

I'm happy to say I still own that set of encyclopedia--you can see it pictured here:

Now, whenever I pull out the "B" volume, I'm reminded of how it felt to be ten years old and own not only one book, but a whole set of 20. I was the richest girl in the world!

* * * * *

This is the last in our series of posts for the National Day on Writing, sponsored by NCTE. I will be submitting this entry to the "A Lifetime of Reading" Gallery of the National Gallery of Writing. I hope you'll use the following Writing Workout to inspire your own contribution to the gallery.

Writing Workout

The first book I ever owned . . .

What's the first book you recall as your very own? Was it a picture book, a reader, a novel? Was it brand new, or a hand-me-down? Who gave it to you? What memories are evoked when you think about that book?

Post the title of the book as a comment here on our TeachingAuthors blog, then write a 250-500 word description, essay, or anecdote about the book. When you're done, I encourage you to submit your piece to the gallery called "A Lifetime of Reading," curated by Franki Sibberson and Mary Lee Hahn, who blog at A Year of Reading. You can read more about the gallery at their blog.

Happy writing!
Carmela

Living Inside the Story

     From the time I taught myself to read, I have been an obsessive reader. My mother used to joke that the first time she saw me without a book was at my wedding. (Little did she know that one of the things that worried me the most that day was knowing that I didn't have a "good book" to take on my honeymoon!)
    As a child, I was an undiscriminating reader. I read in the book aisle at E.J. Korvette's while my parents shopped. I borrowed books from friends, relatives, the neighbors. I read newspapers left in busses and cabs. Cereal boxes. Anything.
     Finding reading material when I was in elementary school was not that easy. Public libraries in the 'burbs were either non-existent or meagerly stocked. I never knew that schools were supposed to have libraries until I moved to Mississippi in the fifth grade. There was the school book club catalog, but once you'd ordered the five or six books you wanted to read, that was it for the year. A book store was an exotic destination, found only "downtown" in large cities.  I spent a good chunk of my day finding books to feed my habit. (Yes, this does sound like something from Intervention.)
     It was during those years, that I found the four books that formed me as a reader, a writer, and as a person. I didn't just read these books. I read them to shreds. I climbed inside them and lived there for weeks at a time. And when I finished the 515th reading of one of these books, I would read it again. And again. They have followed me to college, into marriage and motherhood, and are on my shelf today.
      Three of these titles are Charlotte's Web, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn and The Diary of a Young Girl. The fourth was the first to show me how writing could transcend the printed page and become a part of my life. This was a religious experience for a fourth grader.
     Fourth grade stunk on ice as far as I was concerned.  I had managed to run afoul of my teacher the first week of school, and things grew progressively worse as the year wore on. My saving grace was the classroom copy of Depend on Katie John by Mary Calhoun. As an adult, I can see how the fourth grade me could identify with the tomboyish-always-in-a-jam Katie John.  What made the book memorable was that it made me laugh out loud.
     Unfortunately, this happened during arithmetic.  I was supposed to be listening to my teacher explain the intricacies of long division, not reading a book tucked under my open math text. This didn't happen once; it happened over and over until my teacher confiscated the book, for the rest of the year.
    I felt as if I had lost a friend. Not just a friend, but one who could always cheer me up and make me laugh. If fourth grade had been a long slog so far, without Katie John, it threatened to turn into a death march. Losing the book certainly didn't improve my attitude toward my teacher. My school day was already an eight-hour tightrope walk, trying not to tick off The Teacher. Without Katie John, I found it hard to keep my balance.
     Life took a turn for the better when my father gave me my own hardcover copy of Depend on Katie John for my tenth birthday. I didn't know that regular people could own hardcover books; I thought they were something special only for libraries and schools.
     "Don't take that book to school," my mother warned. She didn't have to worry. No way would I risk my precious book and friend falling into the clutches of The Evil-Math-Loving-Book-Hating Teacher. I really did depend on Katie John. That book was the flotation device that kept my head above water until the end of fourth grade.
    I had always loved books, but the power this book held for me was something magic. How did this Mary Calhoun person put those words together in a way that made me laugh every single time? Even though I had been writing for several years already, I began to wonder could I ever be that kind of writer? One who could make a kid laugh, could create a character more real to me than my best friend?
     I have spent my life so far, trying to live up to the challenge of Mary Calhoun and Katie John.
     And speaking of reading...
  
What I've Been Reading
Adult memoir: Mennonite in a Little Black Dress by Rhoda Janzen; The New York Regional Mormon Singles Halloween Dance by Elna Baker; Half-Broke Horses by Jeannette Walls (technically this is fiction, but it reads like a memoir)
Adult non-fiction: The Most They Ever Had by Rick Bragg
YA fiction: Almost Perfect by Brian Katcher; The Sister Wife by Shelley Hrdlitschka; The Sniper by James Riordan; Love is the Higher Law by David Levithan, Flash Burnout by L.K. Madigan. The Goodbye Season by Marion Hale; Liar by Justine Labalestier, Crossing Stones by Helen Frost; Death on the River by John Wilson; Going Bovine by Libba Bray
Graphic novel:  The Storm in the Barn by Matt Phelan
Middle grade non-fiction:  Marching for Freedom by Elizabeth Partridge; Eleanor, Quiet No More by Doreen Rappaport
Picture Book: You and Me and Home Sweet Home by George Ella Lyon; Subway Ride by Heather Lynne Miller; Crow Call by Lois Lowry

National Gallery of Writing Now Open for Your Viewing!

JoAnn is unable to post today as planned, so we will continue our series in celebration of the National Day on Writing next week. Meanwhile, I want to remind everyone that the National Gallery of Writing is now open for viewing. I invite you to visit the Gallery called "A Lifetime of Reading," which features entries by members of the Kidlitosphere. And don't forget to contribute your own work, be it a story, poem, recipe, email, blog post, or even audio, video, or artwork, to the Gallery--NCTE's goal is to collect 100,000 pieces of "writing" by next June!

So get writing!

Carmela

Write? Right!

Write? Right!

And, especially today, October 20, our National Day on Writing as declared by the National Conference of Teachers of English (NCTE).

TeachingAuthors joins other Kidlitosphere bloggers in submitting this, our third post, to The Gallery A Lifetime of Reading, curated by Franki Sibberson and Mary Lee Hahn, two teachers who blog at A Year of Reading.

Let’s hear it for Story, both written and read.
It’s a technical wonder every bit as marvelous as any GPS; in fact, maybe even more so, to my way of thinking.
Not only can story help pinpoint the reader’s and/or writer’s location in Life, determining where he is at any given moment; it can help illuminate where he’s been and might be going.
Printed and bound, story is there for everyone to use, hand-held, heart-held, impervious to storms. Signal-sending story characters from time in memorial compute important date, cover to cover.
No, not for me, the alluring, beckoning Gypsy-like voice of today’s GPS.
No siree.
I prefer the voices of my tried-and-true story favorites.

For instance, the poignant heart-ful tones of Brave Irene, William Steig’s Heroine who braves wind, snow and cold, not to mention steep terrain, to deliver to the Duchess, (in the nick of time, of course!), the dress Irene’s mother had sewn for the ball.
I re-read this classic picture book whenever I’m lost, accompanying Irene on her obstacle-strewn plotline.
The burdensome box she totes provides her ticket out.
Her foe, the wind, becomes her friend.
Once again I pinpoint where I am on my journey. Once again I see where I’ve been and might be going.
In honor of our National Day on Writing, let’s hear it for Story, the ultimate Global Positioning System!

Esther

(A quick addendum: NCTE is holding an all-day webcast today in honor of the National Day on Writing. To take part, see the link on their page.)

Celebrate!

Today was the third day of our cold, rainy long weekend here in Maryland. Desperate to entertain our restless preschoolers, my husband and I took them to the mall. Wonder of wonders, we discovered that our high-maintenance children are finally old enough to play quietly at the train table long enough for me to browse in the children's section! Before my blissful browsing time was finally cut short by my son's proclamation of "Ew, stinky diaper," I had amassed a big armful of books to buy with a big, fat gift certificate from my boss, and I am still on a big high. (Writer in bookstore, kid in candy store -- I am equally dangerous in both situations.)

This week we honor the National Day on Writing.  Tomorrow is the official day of observation per resolution of the U.S. Senate (!), and I'm sure my English 101 students will be observably more thrilled about their classification essay assignment when I tell them of this momentous occasion.  When (if) someone asks about the preposition (why 'on' and not 'of'?), I will have to admit that I am mystified.  Anyone?

Like the fervent exercisers among us, there are those who can't start the day without committing their daily 500 words to paper.  Then there are the rest of us (professionals and students alike), who have lots to say but might need some measure of encouragement/prodding to get through the whole sweaty ordeal to the Finished Product. 

This day is for you (and me).  As in a 5-mile run, endorphins and that elusive high may or may not materialize, but at the very least, completion of a writing exercise will provide immediate beneficial results.

Last night I was ellipticizing to The New Yorker (blissful apart from the elliptical part) and found not one but two articles about children's books.  The first, nominally about Alloy Entertainment, essentially addresses the question of why kids read and why we write for them.  The second article, possibly even more interesting to me as the parent of a "willful" child (and on some days, two), discussed picture books as mirrors on the parenting trends of our times and the messages they send to our kids (and to us).

My children's preschool held its weeklong book fair recently, and my daughter begged daily that we buy her a copy of A Bad Case of Stripes. She is a huge fan of the No, David series (natch), and at the end of the week, she was finally rewarded for her patience.  I read her the book that night, and she was mesmerized until halfway through, when she became freaked out.  "I don't ever want to read that book again," she declared.  I put it away until she's a bit older and didn't think of it again for several weeks.

Meanwhile, I was browsing at the book fair in question when I got a call that there had been a staffing emergency at the community college where I'd previously taught.  I happily agreed to cover a class already in progress, though the ensuing childcare juggling meant that Kate had to go to beforecare at her preschool on two days.  These made for long days for a little girl and, while she ADORES her school and her teachers and was soon begging to go... at night, she started sleeping in our room.  We were tired, we were cranky, and my back really hurt by the time 5 a.m. rolled around and we had 4 people and 1 cat in our (not king-sized) bed. 

Kate now suddenly insisted that her room was scary and she "hated" it.  I did the math and figured that she must have developed a bad case of clinginess due to the extra hours at school.  Finally, on questioning about what was so scary about her room, one day she burst into tears and said, "We should have bought the The Star Wars book!"  My exasperated husband explained that he had joked that he would buy her this instead of the book she'd been begging for for days.  And suddenly it all made sense.  She was petrified.  It had all started at the book fair -- because, as she had already told me clearly, that book had scared her!

As I tell my students, words are powerful things (words like "liberal," "socialist," "fascist," "racist" -- how many of us reflexively cringe without really considering what they mean?).  Stories and books, a compilation of carefully chosen words, are exponentially more so -- especially if we are four years old and already spend half the day in the world of pretend.

And so, bearing the sacredness of your mission in mind at all times -- write on!

Writing Workout

In an effort to help my students avoid cliches, I asked them to write about fall and avoid the following words:
crisp, clear, clean, cool, colorful

I am teaching a class on writing college essays and scholarly papers, and one of my students wrote a lovely poem.  I love fall!  And I love teaching!

Joy, joy, joy! Writing about reading ~

Happy Poetry Friday! 
Today's poem and writing exercise are below.

Today begins our series of posts to commemorate
National Day on Writing.Yay!

But first, as the West Coast representative of TeachingAuthors, I have an announcement to make.  Something miraculous happened yesterday: it rained!  Real “I’d better hide my book under my sweatshirt as I sprint to the car” rain!  Usually when rain is predicted in Southern California, we roll our eyes and put on sandals, because by the time the storm comes panting down the coast to LA, it’s spent.  All it has left is one pathetic cough of drizzle.

The last time I actually remember it raining substantially was February.

I just had to share that because the rain is gone now and though the sky is sparkling blue and the streets are scrubbed clean, I wonder if it really rained here or if I imagined it.  I have to nail it down in words to know it happened.

  

Okay, back to our topic.  I’ve written a poem to post on the National Gallery of Writing.  You can, too.  In fact, there’s another one of TeachingAuthors’ famous Writing Workouts below to get your juices going.

As Carmela wrote in the last post, the National Day on Writing, sponsored by the National Council of Teachers of English, is meant to celebrate all forms of writing. In conjunction with the event, NCTE has created a National Gallery of Writing, a digital archive of writing samples showing how and why Americans are writing every day. The Gallery will be unveiled on Tuesday, October 20^th.

Teaching Authors will join other Kidlitosphere bloggers by submitting our posts to the Gallery called A Lifetime of Reading, curated by Franki Sibberson and Mary Lee Hahn, two teachers who blog at A Year of Reading. The details about their gallery and the process for submitting a piece of writing can be found in this post on their blog: http://tinyurl.com/nc4zga

TeachingAuthors offer no prizes if you post a comment on our blog this week, but we really, really want to hear that you’ve gone to the links above and hung up your own work of art—your own writing—in a gallery.  Report in!

*  *  *  *  * 

Years ago, when my golden boy was young, I went to pick him up from kindergarten and found the teacher and a few children reading a book under a tree.  That’s when I took a lovely deep breath and s-l-o-w-e-d down.

Then I took out my notebook.

I found the rough draft of the poem I wrote and today I reworked it.  Here it is. For you.  For the National Day of Writing.  For being outside.  For yesterday’s blessed rain.  For the holy goddesses of reading.  For all of it.

READING OUTSIDE

by April Halprin Wayland

She reads us a story,

just me and Theodore

under the sycamore.

Her voice surrounds,

we swim in her sounds,

she’s our very own troubadour.

We laugh on the grass

when the silly giraffe

gets the long words all wrong.

Under this sycamore,

just me and Theodore,

my toes in this grass,

my head on her lap,

listening…

I know I belong.

© April Halprin Wayland

WRITING WORKOUT: Writing about reading

1) Look at the ideas that Mary Lee and Franki of  A Year of Reading listed to get our juices flowing:

~ an anecdote from childhood,

~ a recent experience around books or reading,

~ a memory from school (good or bad),

~ a vignette about learning to read,

~ the impact of a particular book,

~ your life as a reader.

If the list doesn’t bring up anything, observe children reading or someone reading to them.  Take notes.

2) Now—circle the topic that opens you up, that pulls you in.

3) Go outside or find a cozy spot and write as many ideas as you can about that topic.  Cover the page.  Write for ten minutes.  Or more.  Free associate.  Keep your pen moving.  Include vivid images, smells, textures—all five senses.

4) This is your compost, as Mary Ann calls it.  Your rich soil. 

5) Go now—work in your garden.  See what grows.

April

drawings by April Halprin Wayland

Announcements and Sneak Preview

We received many original and fun submissions for our latest giveaway contest in celebration of TeachingAuthor Esther Hershenhorn's S is for Story: A Writer's Alphabet. I have drawn a winner, but have yet to hear back from her. If she doesn't reply soon, I'll choose a new winner. Meanwhile, I'd like to share some other news. (See the end of this post for an updated announcement regarding our winner.)

First off, congratulations to our own TeachingAuthor Mary Ann Rodman. Her middle-grade novel Jimmy's Stars was named a 2009 Children's Choice for grades 5-6 by the International Reading Association and the Children's Book Council. See the complete list of winners here.

And if you're thinking of using Jimmy's Stars in conjunction with a study of World War II, be sure to check out the wonderful online resources set up by Usborne Publishing, the book's UK publisher.

Speaking of wonderful online resources for teachers, our friends April Pulley Sayre and Gretchen Woelfle of the group blog INK: Interesting Nonfiction for Kids have announced the launch of a free online database of nonfiction books called the InkThinkTank. The database is designed to help teachers, librarians, and homeschoolers find the books they need to meet curriculum requirements in grades K-12. We've included a link to the database in our sidebar.

Our loyal readers may have noticed some other new features in our sidebar, including:

• more links to reading lists, websites, graduate writing programs, and author/illustrator blogs 
• a new "search" function that allows readers to search for posts containing a word or phrase not listed in our subject index
• a "Bookmark and Share" link that lets you quickly add our blog to social bookmarking sites like Delicious and Digg, and/or share our blog with your friends and colleagues
• and, in addition to receiving our blog posts by email, as a Google follower, or via an RSS feed, you can now include it in your JacketFlap blog reader.

As always, if you know of other resources that would be helpful for aspiring writers or writing teachers, please let us know.

And now, for our "Sneak Preview:" In case you haven't heard, next Tuesday, October 20, is the National Day on Writing, sponsored by the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE).

According to NCTE:

Today people write as never before—texting, on blogs, with video cameras and cell phones, and, yes, even with traditional pen and paper. People write at home, at work, inside and out of school.

The National Day on Writing is meant to celebrate all forms of writing. In conjunction with the event, NCTE has created a National Gallery of Writing, a digital archive of writing samples showing how and why Americans are writing every day. The Gallery will be unveiled on Tuesday.

This Friday, October 16, we will begin a series of posts to commemorate the National Day on Writing. We will also join other Kidlitosphere bloggers by submitting our posts to the local Gallery called A Lifetime of Reading, curated by Franki Sibberson and Mary Lee Hahn, two teachers who blog at A Year of Reading. We hope you'll make plans to take part in the National Day on Writing, and post those plans here on our TeachingAuthors blog!

I'm updating this blog post a few minutes past noon on an overcast day here in the Chicago suburbs, but the sun is shining on our latest giveaway winner: Kristy Worden of Fort Myers, Florida! For her entry, Kristy wrote:

"I say, A is for Arc. Your story must get from its compelling beginning through the challenges of the middle and finally arrive at a most satisfying conclusion."

I'm happy to say that Kristy's entry led to a "most satisfying conclusion" for her. For those of you who didn't win, we hope you'll enter our next giveaway, which will be announced in early November.
Carmela