Informational Book Review

DTaylor_ Informational Text Book Talk

Fly Guy Presents Sharks by Tedd Arnold

De La Cruz_book talk

Hello, everyone. I have attached my video about informational text featuring the world of microbes! 

Text: Tiny Creatures: The world of Microbes By Nichola Davies and Illustrated by Emily Sutton

(Published in 2014)

Joyce Book Talk

Joyce Book Talk: Separate Is Never Equal By: Duncan Tonathiuh

Nguyen_Book Talk

Keeley ~ Informational Book Talk ~ Drum Dream Girl

Hello Everyone,
Below is my informational book talk on the book Drum Dream Girl by Margarita Engle and illustrated by Rafael Lopez.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qxvj6_QLu_g

Montgomery_InformationalBookTalk

Hey everyone! Here is my book talk on Girls Think of Everything written by Catherine Thimmesh and illustrated by Melissa Sweet. Enjoy :)

Carr_Informational Book Talk

Droege- Informational Book Talk

This is my informational book talk on "Why Couldn't Susan B. Anthony Vote? and other questions about women's suffrage" by Mary Kay Carson.

Rinehart - Informational Text Book Talk

This is my Informational Text Book Talk about the children's book A Butterfly is Patient by Dianna Hutts Aston and Sylvia Long.

Newton_Book Talk Luna and Me

 

Book Talk featuring children's book Luna and Me based on a true story of a girl who lived in tree to save that tree.

Shelow Book Talk: Funny Bones

Hi everyone! Below you will find my book talk about Duncahn Tonatiuh's book Funny Bones: Posada and His Day of the Dead Calaveras. Enjoy!

Hinchliff Book Talk Galápagos George

Hello. The following link will take you to my book talk on Galápagos George by Jean Craighead George.  

 Hinchliff Book Talk  

Fitzpatrick Informational Book Talk

Below please find the link to my recorded informational book talk on The Most Famous Duel in American History: Aaron and Alexander by Don Brown.

fitzpatrick informational book talk on youtube

Migrant families

The use of literature in the classroom provides a window of opportunities for teachers to talk about topics that students in the classroom may identify with. Like Kiefer and Tyson (2014) have mentioned, selecting a good book that incorporates characters or themes about certain topics, is a great way for teachers to encourage discussion about these topics. One topic that I think may be of interest for teachers to address is the lives of migrants. An excellent children’s picture book that depicts this is Amelia’s Road, written by Linda Jacobs Altman. This is a story about a young girl named Amelia, whose family is constantly moving because they are farm migrants. They move when the harvest moves, meaning that they aren’t in a permanent place for long.

All that Amelia wants is a permanent house to call her own, which leads to her hatred of roads because when their family is on one, or even mentions roads, it usually means that they have to move. One day after school, she finds an accidental road leading to a tall, sturdy tree. She claims this tree as her own and admires it because of how permanent it is. When the day comes for her family to move again, she digs a hole next to the tree, and places a box with some of her favorite things into it. She then tells the tree that she will be back and leaves happily knowing that the tree will always be there.

I believe that this book offers plenty of discussion questions about the lives of migrant workers. It can teach students to value what they have and to acknowledge the fact that sometimes other children aren’t as fortunate when it comes to having a permanent home. It also touches on the topic of poverty as Amelia’s family has very little money.

For educators, I think that this book explains the real life situation for some of our own students, which may explain why some of the parents of these children aren’t as easily accessible to talk to, because they are busy. Overall, I think that this book highlights some of the struggles that these children face, and should encourage educators to make sure they are given assistance when needed. 

This book can be easily fit with Common Core Standards for ELA Reading for second graders such as: CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.2.2 Recount stories, including fables and folktales from diverse cultures, and determine their central message, lesson, or moral. Or CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.2.3 Describe how characters in a story respond to major events and challenges.

A great organization for teachers to find resources geared to English Language learners and their families is ColorinColorado.org, which I recommend highly to teachers who may have ELLs in the classroom. There are great book recommendations that address diversity and culture as well as teaching resources for the teacher.

Kiefer, B. Z. & Tyson, C. A. (2014). Charlotte Huck's Children's Literature A Brief Guide (2nd ed.). New York City, New York: McGraw-Hill. 

Altman, L. J. (1993). Amelia’s Road.  New York: Lee & Low Books.

Struggling with a Physical Disability

Physical disabilities are common among society and the eyes of children are innocent and they don't typically see any differences among others. It is society and parents that rob them of their innocence by teaching them to judge others and their differences. The two books that I read are Lemon the Duck by Laura Backman and My Friend Suhana by Shaila Abdullah. Both books are great examples of how we should love, help, and treat others as equals and are based on real life stories. Lemon the Duck couldn't walk but that didn't stop a classroom of students trying to find any way possible to make sure that Lemon could walk and lead as much of a normal like as possible. One day a little girl brought in a vest with holes in it shaped like a purse. Lemon put his legs in the purse vest so he could stand up while someone held Lemon up with purse strings. Lemon felt the love from all students and was so grateful for their help. My Friend Suhana is a wonder story about a little girl with cerebral palsy who is visited another little girl Aanyah at the community center. Suhana couldn't talk, stand, or communicate through language. The book focuses on what Suhana can do and not what she can't do. Suhana can wave arms/legs, roll around, clench her fists, and squeal with delight. Suhana abilities attracted a new friendship in Aanyah. These two girls had a friendship and a language of love between each other through the littlest things like just being there for them. 

General education classrooms may have students who have physical disabilities. The portrayal of characters in children's literature can be a very powerful influence and it is the responsibility of the teacher to find and establish a curriculum of books that will benefit all students in the classroom (Wilkins, Howe, Seiloff, Rowan, & Lilly, 2016). Many teachers may question when do we begin focusing on specific topics? Keifer and Tyson suggest that reading books as a resource for educating and talking about the tough issues in life can happen at any time. One study found that children's literature had a positive effect on children in kindergarten class by reading, discussing, and being around children with disabilities (Favazza & Odom, 1997). Teachers and parents cannot be afraid of introducing bigger book themes to younger children as they are sponges and desire to learn. Children's literature will not be acceptable if teachers are not prepared to have an open discussion with the students about the characters of the book. Teachers are in the position to influence the attitude and behavior of the students so it is important to encourage the students to share their views and then explain to the students if their view are appropriate or not (Wilkins, Howe, Seiloff, Rowan, & Lilly, 2016). Remember if you are not familiar with a topic, do your research and make sure you can answer and direct a positive classroom discussion for the students and talk about how they can help those who struggle to help themselves. 

ful influence on young children. Teachers have a responsibility to

expose children to characters of all types, including those with disabil-

References:

Kiefer, B. Z. & Tyson, C. A. (2014). Charlotte Huck’s Children’s Literature A Brief Guide (2nd ed.). New York City, New York: McGraw-Hill.

Favazza, P. C., & Odom, S. (1997). Promoting positive attitudes of kindergarten aged children toward peole with disabilities. Council for Exceptional Children, 405-418.

Wilkins, J., Howe, K., Seiloff, M., Rowan, S., & Lilly, E. (2016). Exploring elementary students' perception of disabilities using children's literature. British Journal of Special Education, 233-249.

Conformity Is A Dangerous Thing

"Power corrupts, and when you're in charge, you start doing things that you think are right, but they're actually not." - George Lucas

Children's literature, like all literature, is a power tool. I find myself using it again and again to help teach my students challenging and controversial issues. Whether I'm talking about bullying, poverty, race or religion I know there's a book to help me make my point. One of my favorite things to teach my students are the issues of conformity and power. I teach my curriculum through a social justice lens and have grown attached to use a book that I read when I was in middle school—The Wave.

It's a young adult novel written by Todd Strasser and it centers on an experiment that goes wrong at Gordon High School in the spring of 1969. A history teacher named Mr. Ben Ross is teaching his high school students about life in Third Reich Germany. Mr. Ross finds himself unable to answer his students' questions of how and why people went along with the Nazi regime so he begins an experiment which he calls The Wave. Its supposed to help his students understand how Germany allowed Adolf Hitler and the Nazi party to rise to power but the experiment goes horribly wrong. It's a fictional account of a similar real-life experiment that took place in a high school history class in Palo Alto, California. 

I am such a fan of the book and its teachings because I feel like it does it job well. If you want to use it to talk about race, religion and and sexual identity in Nazi Germany than it's perfect for that. Its modern day implementation of how sweeping power can be offers examples of why Hitler and the Nazis were so effective. If you want to use it to teach your students about the dangers of conformity and power, as I do, then there's not better book. Because I use it in my social studies classroom there are several Common Core standards that it connects to with WWI and WWII. For example: C&G.1.3 says to analyze differing viewpoints on the scope and power of state and national governments (e.g. Federalists and anti-Federalists, education, immigration and healthcare). and E.1.1 asks to explain how conflict, cooperation, and competition influenced periods of economic growth and decline (e.g. economic depressions and recessions). 

Both standards are great starters for teaching in the form of "big questions" that show my students how power can be a sweeping thing. It also speaks to something happening in a middle schooler's lives which is their desire to "fit it." The Wave does a great job of showing students the dangers in doing something simply because so many other people are doing it. It asks them to question the actions of those "in power" and pushes the reader to determine what their own morals are.

All in all, I think the book does a great job of tying literature with historical information and modern day issues. If you haven't read it I definitely suggest it!

Nguyen _ Addressing Mental Health Issues in the Classroom

Increasingly, there has been a movement in education to address Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) in the classroom. The goal of SEL curriculums is to promote and enact, “a systematic, evidence-based approach to teaching kids how to achieve goals, understand and manage emotions, build empathy, forge relationships, and make responsible decisions.” (Clayton, 2017). One of the primary goals of SEL curriculums is to build a student’s social and emotional intelligence; this means identifying and processing their own emotions, as well as empathizing with the experience of others. Studies have shown that well-implemented SEL curriculums 1) Improve student’s academic achievement 2) Increases pro-social behaviors 3) Improves student attitudes towards school, and 4) Reduce depression and stress among students (Weissberg et al., 2016)

A successful SEL program is multidimensional, but it should unquestionably include mental health education. This begins with discussions around how we process universal emotions like joy, sadness, and anger, but should ultimately progress to a point where we can address and learn about distinct and diagnosable mental health problems.

Importantly, the discussion around mental health in the classroom should be built to help students evaluate their own mental health, but it should also help to build a community whose knowledge about mental health issues helps end the stigma. As educators, it is important to recognize that mental health problems can affect any student, but students from impoverished backgrounds, or students who have experienced trauma are particularly at risk (Jensen, 2009).

            As educators, where then, do we begin? Kiefer and Tyson suggest that books can serve as an excellent resource for bringing up tough issues in the classroom (Kiefer et al., 2014). Books are also valuable because of their variety, with Children’s literature addressing everything from dealing with our basic emotions (happy, sad, angry, etc.) to narratives about highly specific experiences with different mental health diagnoses. One book that I would like to highlight for use for teachers is Coralie Bickford-Smith’s, The Fox and the Star.

The Fox and the Star is beautiful and deeply insightful; the folk-like illustrations tell the story of a young fox whose joy and light are tied up with his only friend, a star. As the Earth rotates, the fox’s star disappears from the sky, and the fox retreats to his fox-hole where he is enveloped by darkness and loneliness for many days. Slowly, he emerges, and he sets off in search of the light of his star once more. The story culminates with the fox’s discovery of not one, but a sky full of stars. Part of the ingenuity of this text is the way it spans grade-level and experience; teachers of young students may decide to use the story to prompt a discussion about loss, loneliness, and/or emotions like sadness, whereas teachers of more mature children might begin to examine the metaphorical depiction of depression in the book and compare it with other curated sources on mental illness.

 

Although I don’t have the space to explore more titles in depth in this post, I would like to share the following titles I came across while creating this blog post. Each of these books could be successfully implemented as part of a literature-based curriculum that looks to treat the subject of mental illness, and although each text deals with the complexity of mental health issues and presents characters that are defined by more than a mental illness, I have included in parenthesis the primary mental health issue that the book addresses as a tool for selecting books that might be relevant to a particular unit or topic.

Elementary SchoolThe Princess and the Fog, by Lloyd Jones (Depression, Emotional Behavioral Disorders)

Everyone, by Christopher Silas Neal (Feelings, universality of feelings, coping & response)

Middle School / Junior High

Helicopter Man, by Elizabeth Fensham (Schizophrenia, Illness of a Parent/Guardian, Food/Shelter Insecurity)

Finding Audrey, by Sophie Kinsella (Anxiety, Relationships)

Every Last Word, by Tamara Ireland Stone (OCD, Anxiety)

References

Anderson, M. (2016, September 20). Here's How Schools Can Support Students' Mental Health. Retrieved July 16, 2017, from http://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2016/09/20/459843929/heres-how-schools-can-support-students-mental-health

Clayton, V. (2017, March 30). The Psychological Approach to Educating Kids. Retrieved July 16, 2017, from https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2017/03/the-social-emotional-learning-effect/521220/

Jensen, E. (2009). Teaching with poverty in mind: what being poor does to kids brains and what schools can do about it. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.

Kiefer, B. Z. & Tyson, C. A. (2014). Charlotte Huck’s Children’s Literature A Brief Guide (2nd ed.). New York City, New York: McGraw-Hill.

Stutterheim, J. (2016, March 03). Mind Matters: The Impact of Poverty on Mental Health. Retrieved July 16, 2017, from https://www.children.org/archive/2015/apr/mind-matters-the-impact-of-poverty-on-mental-health-

Weissberg, R., Durlak, J., Domitrovich, C., & Thomas, G. (2016, February 15). Why Social and Emotional Learning Is Essential for Students. Retrieved July 16, 2017, from https://www.edutopia.org/blog/why-sel-essential-for-students-weissberg-durlak-domitrovich-gullotta