Jeff Smith's BONE

How does one succinctly explain BONE? BONE is a comic book epic. It's 53 comics books to be exact, which should give you some idea about the size of the adventure the three main characters endure. 

Phone Bone, Phoney Bone, and Smiley Bone are cousins outcast from their community (for very humorous reasons) to a world completely new to them. The world at large is drawn realistically and inhabited by the good, the bad, and the still deciding. 

The cousins spend a great deal of their unintended quest searching. They search for one another, escape from peril, and the truth to evil in the world. The also have one heck of a time along the way. 

BONE has something endearing for everyone who reads it. Jeff Smith wrote and drew the story in a manner that any age reader can access it by tapping into familar characters of the past. Phone Bone, Phoney Bone, and Smiley Bone look very much like smurfs. Their cute, largely innocent ways, are reflected in their soft rounded looks. The Rat Creatures are terrificially dangerous looking and create just the right balance between being outright frightening and merely intimdating. Grandma is a hoot and has many Popeye-esque qualities to her. Thorn is a beauty! Need I make the comparison here? 

In BONE, it is almost as if Jeff Smith decided to take all of his favorite cartoon characters and set them out on a mythical quest with parallels to Moby Dick, The Lord of the Rings, and the Illiad- minus all the dense reading required of those classic works. 

Make no "bones" about it. This is a classic- a children's classic.  

Who had the Greater Reward?

Have you had the opportunity to share something with others that made their eyes light up? Maybe you gave a gift and they unexpectedly rejoiced. They simply gushed over your choice and exhibited unchecked appreciation for what you brought before them. It’s as rewarding a moment for you as it appears to be for them.

I have been in this position, along with a colleague from the Language Arts department, the last few weeks. My colleague, Mrs. Nelson, had expressed frustration over one reluctant group of student readers. She decided to reach out to as many as she could to find a way through the problem. And, in her desperation, she turned to me. I jest of course. I’m grateful that Mrs. Nelson was candid enough to seek my help.

Over the course of several discussions Mrs. Nelson kept hitting on a common phrase: “I just want them to read and enjoy what they read.” To that end, she pulled together a wide range of fiction and non-fiction books possessing great appeal with the help of other Language Arts colleagues and the school librarian. The result was a rolling cart of books, which while they may not be heralded as American classics, that covered the spectrum of reading and interest levels. Seriously, I wanted to plop down and work my way through quite a few of the titles. Instead I settled for browsing a handful of books, as did Mrs. Nelson. We would present them to this group on a Wednesday and let them chose their top three.

Whether is was our individual presentations, the variety of interesting books, the pleasure of knowing you have a choice in what you read, or a mix of all three, the day was a smashing success. The students tracked our every move during the class, hands shot up frequently, and sometimes mouths fired off too –Can I have that book? Will you put that aside for me?, etc. The students toured the room as they reviewed each selection making a case along the way for why they wanted to read particular items.

Now, as the saying goes, getting something is sometimes not as pleasant as wanting something. Thankfully, the opposite has proven true. This class is reading! They’re choosing to move in lock step in smaller groups so they can all discuss their reading, they’re demanding the next book in a series, and their eyes are lighting up because of books.
So one may well argue that my colleague’s efforts have proven to be the greatest of rewards for her students who have stepped more boldly into the world of the written word, but I’ll happily argue the point. We’ve been acting fairly giddy ourselves as we share our pleasure in knowing we had a direct hand in helping a group of students want to read.

What Matters Depends on Where You Get Your Newspaper

Boy did I want to give this website a BIG thumbs up, but ultimately I could not. 

This "newseum" hosts the first page of of nearly 500 newspapers from over 50 countries around the globe. It holds the promise of letting a visitor scan the front page of each of those newspapers. Now that's interesting! Really! 

I checked in one day not long ago and saw that a road race to benefit the needy and a  terrorist attack were the big two stories for The Sacramento Bee. Meanwhile, along the same half of the USA, The Anchorage Daily News was focused on new methods for making sand work better on icy roads during the coming winter and how President Chavez is offering free heat to Venezuelans. See? Interesting.

My half-hearted endorsement comes from several items. It lists papers in a few different groupings such as world region (Caribbean, Middle East, European, etc.), alphabetically, or bypins on a map, but only the regional list is useful. The pages are a tad load intensive and can slow down viewing. Also, other than a peek at each page, there's not much here. The analysis of what each paper deems "newsworthy" is left to you to examine. 

Still, if you're the curious type give it a peek at

http://www.newseum.org/todaysfrontpages/default.asp 

Coloring our World Views

I first heard about The Atlas of the Real World by Daniel Dorling while listening to a podcast on an NPR show. (I don't recall which show.) The topic proved interesting enough that I decided to search for it on the Internet.

The concept is simple: Show how the world is, not through pie charts or bar graphs, but by land mass. (This area of study is called cartography and is sometimes subject to heated debates as a means of showing information.) Still, it can make for some interesting discussions.

E.g. if you follow this link http://www.creativereview.co.uk/crblog/the-atlas-of-the-real-world/ you can see some of the maps from the book. You should be prepared to be a little weirded out by the "maps" as they look completely foreign in their warped formations. As you review more of them, it becomes much easier to assess what's being demonstrated.

These are the types of discoveries that get me enthused as a teacher. I cannot help but think that such a book -or even concept- would be great fun for students of all ages to explore in social studies and apply in math. So, for example, if students generated a bar graph of the obesity rates throughout the world they could then map it using a cartographer approach to make it more meaningful. Bar and pie charts are great but leave a lot of personal connections on the wayside.

Anyway, it's worth looking this book over. If nothing else, it may color your view of the world differently, not for better or worse, but differently.

"I hate reading"

My job exists in many measures because the kids who come to me have lost their love of reading as a means of learning or being entertained. The reasons are many and not exclusive of one another. Some require time to process ideas and are left behind in class discussions as a result. Some have poor decoding skills and a weak vocabulary; so reading is more struggle than it's worth. Still others may have had several bad experiences with books in school. The list goes on certainly.

So, it comes as no surprise each school year when I hear the statement "I hate reading." I am the recipient of this statement in all its forms. Some students say this statement guiltily, as a mumble. Maybe they realize reading is important but still dislike it. Some will preface it with "I'm sorry Mr. L but..." These are the little cherubs who don't want to hurt my feelings. Still others will look me straight in the eyes as if to say "Go ahead and challenge me on how much I loathe reading stuff!" 

Hey there! Trust me, I get it. There are days when I am not a fan of the printed word at all. (Usually, these tend to be the days when I get a new property bill :) 

My first reaction in each instance is to say, "I hear you. We don't all love to read." There are no ifs, ands, or buts that follow. This doesn't mean I forget who needs encouragement on the necessity, value, or enjoyment that comes from time spent reading. I remind myself that no child hates a good story or dislikes learning interesting information. The problem is that this whole reading thingy gets in the way of good stories and interesting information. 

What it means, for me at least, is that I need to be more tactful about how I pitch reading, which is no easy feat in a Reading class. 

So, as examples

** I may begin class by asking a series of questions: Who's ever been embarrassed before? When was the last time you felt lost? Are adults the only people who have to make difficult decisions? 

Great discussions tend to follow as kids have oodles of personal stories to share on these topics. And then, guess what? I'll just happen to have a story related to our discussion.

** Another approach is to present a goal that can only be completed with some reading along the way: E.g.s We'll be writing articles that will be published and available to all students this year. We also have our class blog with a combination of teacher and student blogs.

The school publication is a BIG deal. They are writing for a very real audience, their teachers and peers. They don't want to embarrass themselves and so they're willing to complete the research (reading) needed to make for an informative article. The class blog site is another goal where reading is worth doing as they get to read the words of those they know on the Internet. 

** Sometimes I remind them of what is unavoidable. Reading is a matter of school life and Life in general. 

How will you apply for a college if you cannot follow the application process? How will you apply for a job? Study for your driver's test? Read a letter from a secret admirer? Read books to your children someday? (Um, hopefully, that's a long while from now of course.)

So yes, "I hate reading" is by no means unfamiliar to me. I understand why some children feel this way. It doesn't mean I plan to stand by and let that feeling go unchecked. 

I've decided to take another step in the right direction...I hope. I've established a website that will serve as a forum for discussions about reading.

My hope is that we can use this as another level of communication about language arts and education.

WARNING: The content you post is viewable by anyone. Do not put personal information that you would not want someone else to read.

You will need to visit this link ( http://groups.google.com/group/gw-reading-forum?hl=en ) and then seek an invite for membership. If you let me know who you are, I'll grant you access.

Finally, the site is bare bones at the moment. I created it in about 20 minutes! Oh the power of the Internet! I will need some weeks to add pertinent content.

Mr. L

November 4, 2008

Well, it’s Election Day and about the farthest notion from my mind is who will be our next president. I’m busy at the moment observing my colleagues during a half-day workshop. We are learning about a new web portal that our school system has adopted, but unlike most forays into new technology this process is not typical.

Typically, new technology is met with some nervousness, questions like what’s wrong with the old program, who is going to train us, and so forth. There is, inevitably, a healthy dash of confusion as we all wrangle with the ins and outs of a new program over a span of a few weeks or months. We’ve adopted in recent years new programs to assist with tracking grades, record keeping, and having a personal website. Some teachers are more adept than others with these technologies, but in each case the hurdle is not the program we need to learn but rather our lack of experience with them –their newness.

What’s atypical about today’s process is that the latest technology -and not its novelty- is the hurdle. As I scan the room, my colleagues’ frustrations are palpable as anguished sighing grows in volume, requests for personal attention climb and huffing has replaced murmured negative comments. It doesn’t help that the computers are also “slow today” making progress too deliberate.

To make the situation laughable, the new web portal we’re working with is designed for businesses, not educators. The phrase sticking a square peg into a round hole fits perfectly here (ba-da-boom!). This one-stop, fits-all program is wonderful I presume if you are running a big business with a department dedicated to using it. I again presume that most employees in such a company are not actually expected to establish their sites but rather are given a functioning site which they can ask someone in the technology department to modify to suit. We cannot expect that level of support here as good as our technology people may be. But hey, we’re educators surely we can figure this stuff out?

10 minutes later and another quick scan of the workshop suggests otherwise:
Is my computer the only one going slowly?

Wait, why isn’t this working now?

I need help!

OK, I did it. It works! Just don’t ask me how I did it.

Ugh!
(You get the idea.)

I’m no less guilty and I consider myself above average with the tech stuff. Still, today is my third workshop with the web portal and it’s not getting much better for me. I wanted to use my part of the portal to establish a web forum for parents and colleagues and a spot to read my blog. The former was a success, though I needed a tech support person to make it function properly. The later looked good until I realized it wasn't functioning properly and was quite poor when compared to many of the free blog spots on the Internet. This is why I’m posting this blog, not through our new web portal, but through other means.

This is the weakness in education at times. We are not a business and it is not easy finding programs that are a genuine fit, but it doesn’t stop such programs from being adopted and implemented. The school year is amazingly busy and reviewing giant web applications is therefore difficult.

Just the same as I listen to three of my colleagues complain (quite loudly) what a waste of time this was I can't help but think: If only we, the teachers using the technology, had been included in the review process we might have used an appropriate program to learn something new today. It will come together in the end if for no other reason than it has to.

October 1, 2008

Welcome to my first professional blog. Before you yawn loud enough to rattle a molar lose, you should be aware that the meaning of "professional" will be tested at times. I want this blog to be true to its original purpose: more a flow of comments and thoughts than a formal piece of writing. Topics will vary and may even -EEP- digress completely from reading or education. So, without wasting another keystroke, I begin...

We are approaching a time when many technologies are mixing together at an exponential rate creating events people a 100 years ago would have called magic for lack of a better explanation. Don't believe me? Can you recall when the original version of Star Trek came to viewers across the nation and people scoffed at the small units they used for communication? It's no laughing matter these days as those communicators are not only in daily use but also frighteningly smaller and more capable.

Now, let's take a common piece of school technology, one which costs quite the pretty dime mind you -the Smartboard. Think of how you oohed and ahhed when you saw it for the first time. It was quite cool and is still impressive. That experience came to me 5 years ago. Keep that number in your noggin. Here were are, the calendar reads, 2008 and anyone with an LCD projector, a Wii-mote, and an infrared pen can make a working Smartboard. Not possible right? Let, me turn you into a YouTuber (another amazing technological happening mind you) to show you how it works. Follow this link. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5s5EvhHy7eQ

(If this link doesn't work then follow this one:
http://www.boingboing.net/2008/04/11/ted-talks-johnny-lee.html)

Did some more oohs and ahhs escape your lips? I know they did from mine. This is the tip of what you, I and your children will see and use within the next twenty years. If you enjoy reading about the future, technology, and its disruptive nature check out anything written by Ray Kurzweil, in particular his latest book The Singularity is Near. Be warned. His material is very dense at times (yeah, I skimmed parts) but well worth the comprehension battle.

Mr. Lagana

The guy who wishes he were half as smart as the technologists he looks up to. Then again, given my propensity for sophomoric activities, maybe it's better I'm not so clever after all.