Exciting Week of Authors Planned

I must have been crazy when I planned our return to school from Mardi Gras break. 


On Monday, Bookmarked will be skyping with Corey Whaley, the author of Where Things Come Back. Corey recently moved back to Louisiana but in the northern part of the state. I was hoping that we could get him to visit us in person, but his schedule just wasn't going to allow it. He agreed to the skype, and I think that the students in Bookmarked will probably enjoy that visit almost as much. 

Open here to listen to interview with the author on The Reading Life
Then on Tuesday, I was able to schedule Ruta Sepetys, author of Out of the Easy, to come visit us. She is making a world tour for her book, and her time in New Orleans is really tight. However, this book is set in New Orleans, and I had several students who read it and loved it. I thought it was one of the best books that I have read in a really long time. So I knew that I wanted her to visit Patrick Taylor. Unfortunately, she is coming during the lunch period, and we can't hold her talk in the cafeteria. We have to use a classroom which means fewer students get to meet her. If you want to know more about her and this wonderful book, please click here to listen to her interview on The Reading Life with Susan Larson at WWNO. The interview is about 15 minutes long, and it is at the beginning of the podcast.

On Wednesday, we are hosting Cory Doctorow, author of a slew of books, but he is touring to promote Homeland. He is on a busy tour also, and initially, I had heard that he was not going to make any school visits. Lucky for us that was just an ugly rumor. His stories are embedded with technology which holds a lot of appeal to the boys. It is hard to get high school boys interested in reading. I am hoping that there will be students clamoring to purchase his books when he finishes speaking. We have scheduled his talk with the entire high school. I think that it is going to be a blast, and I can't wait. 


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Happy Holidays from BRiMS and Bookmarked

I run two book groups at Patrick Taylor. My high school book group, Bookmarked , was created in the fall of 2007 which was my second year as librarian at the school. The students really wanted a library club, but the square footage of the library was so small that I could not imagine how any students could do any actual library work. Instead I created a book discussion group. Not only did we meet to talk books, but I tapped these students to help me with fundraisers and special programming like Teen Read Week. Helping me with these special activities seemed to appease the members. I waited until February of 2009 to institute a book discussion group for my middle school students called BRiMS, or Books Rule in Middle School . Both of the groups meet during lunch, and this year, the school added a third lunch. Now BRiMS is made up of only 6th and 7th graders. Bookmarked has 8th-12th grade students. This has actually worked well because in 2014 and 2015, Bookmarked lost a lot of members w
Read more

Banned Book Week: Students Make Comments Pro & Con Censorship

Image
This blog post is being designed as a lesson for the English I students at PFTSTA. The teachers and I have collaborated on an activity to celebrate Banned Book Week (BBW). Many times in the past during BBW, I have invited the 8th graders into the library to discuss the banning and challenging of books in schools and libraries. I usually show some videos and share books owned by our library that have been banned or challenged somewhere in the US. This activity always spurs great discussion among the students and teachers. This year we wanted the students to create a written response to the presentation. We thought there was a real world connection if we had the students post their opinion online as a comment to someone writing about censorship in schools. The teachers and I want the students to learn how to compose a well thought out comment that is supported by evidence and concrete details. How more real world could it be than having the students comment directly on their librar
Read more

Students Weigh in on Banned Books and the Freedom to Read

Image
Every year, for Banned Book Week, I prepare a lesson for our 8th graders. It was always teacher directed with discussion until last year . The English I teachers and I created a lesson for the students that included research and writing. I pulled the materials that I wanted them to read, and the students would write a very short essay declaring their belief in the need for teens to be able to exercise their freedom to read what they want to or the need for certain books to be taken off the shelves of the library or pulled from the English curriculum.  Above is the slide presentation that I have made for the students. Included in the slides are several videos that I thought would get the students thinking. There are slides with links to specific articles that we want the students to read and use for the concrete evidence to support their stance. A rubric is included at the end so the students know exactly what is expected. The teachers and I want the writing to have a rea
Read more