Exploring Learning

… what we have loved, Others will love, and we will teach them how (Wordsworth, 1888). This quote embodies my belief about reading and is at the top of my Books 2014 page, which charts my attempts to read 100 books this year. It also heads my latest essay documenting my research into the impact daily reading can have on overall achievement in middle-school learners. ***** I have always believed that reading has a significant impact on our understanding and appreciation of the world. As both a life-long passionate reader and an experienced English Language Arts teacher, I have witnessed first-hand the impact that reading has on the ability of learners in terms of comprehension, grammar, empathy, confidence, vocabulary and expression. This has however , only ever been phenomenological through informal observations in the classroom, and in an effort to incorporate sustained silent reading (SSR) as a regular, valid and essential practice, I have embarked upon this resea...

Little Brother by Cory Doctorow If ever I read a book that advocates the teaching of code to school kids, this is it! All teenagers need to read this to think about the implications of technology - about how it helps but more importantly, WHO it helps. It paints a dark portrait of a not-too-distant future in America, where our every move is tracked and analysed . BUT it also shows how those who can get beneath the surface of computers, can change the world. Computers are not new anymore - but the facade that we see masks what is really going on. Children need to be able to go behind the facade that presents our interface as beautiful and learn to control and manipulate it. The future is not about those who can use a computer because let's face it, two years olds can do that. The future is about children who can get behind the pretty and into the nitty gritty. Many educators are coming around to this notion and lots of us are introducing basic code into our classrooms ...

Creating an interactive book using iBook Author, Makey Makey and Scratch. In January, I wrote a post about a unit I was planning that would explore the Future of Fiction with my Year 7s. We have just come to the end of this great unit, and the work they have produced is amazing. Creating a story to record on iMotion This post outlines what we did and what the learners achieved. It also links to the learning site that I built to deliver this unit, which was successful in teaching not only story elements, storyboarding, drafting and creating, but also problem solving and critical thinking. Our aim was to try to re-tell a story using a technological tool, to see if we think technology can help tell a story. Ultimately, we  were trying to decide  where we think the future of fiction might be going. We began by learning about the elements of stories and then used the classic book  Where the Wild Things Are to learn about the story m...

Sometimes, with all the best will in the world, and even with eons of research and hours of planning, the best lessons are the spontaneous ones. The ones that serendipitously arise from teachable moments. I experienced such as occasion over the past week. Laurie Halse Anderson, The Impossible Knife of Memory My Year 8s are learning about different cultures and traditions around the world. Underpinning the unit is the novel T ies That Bind, Ties That Break by Lensey Namioke, which concerns foot binding in China at the beginning of the twentieth century. From this, I teach note-taking and search strategies, while groups learn to research customs and traditions of a country of their choice. The culmination of the project is an exhibition of their findings. A new teacher joined our team part way through this unit. She wanted to have a piece of writing to gauge her class's needs. So, as part of the novel study, we built in personal account writing. I devel...

The Impossible Knife of Memory by Laurie Halse Anderson It might be safe to say that I inhaled this book and its incredibly crafted story, breathing out the smoke of words I digested and chewed over, coating my classroom in metaphors both grotesque and moving. This novel was the first of the Book a Month Challenge myself and my PLN established on Twitter, and I enjoyed this novel both as a reader and as a teacher. My learners noticed my reading it around the corridors; parents stopped me in the car park to ask what I was reading and to make sure I didn't walk into anything. An intriguing and moving novel about an intense father-daughter relationship of trauma and heartache, Amazon describes it as "Laurie Halse Anderson at her finest: compelling, surprising, and impossible to put down" - I guess I cannot disagree. I have taken and used many passages to teach figurative language as the writing demonstrates metaphor and personification in a complex yet access...

I am currently planning an inquiry based unit asking learners to think about the future of fiction. Where fiction is going is of great interest to me. I own a few Kindles, though personally, have not fully integrated myself into this realm. I love the fact I can have a book in seconds - but, I still go out and buy the 'real' version of any I read and love on my Kindle. I do not think you can beat the feel and smell and sound of a brand new book. Geek that I am, nothing excites me more than an hour or so to wander around  Kinokunyia  (Singapore hosts the largest store outside of Japan), or my  lastest  arrival from Amazon, of a stack of books to explore and lose myself in. Throughout my  MEd ., I have been focusing on where reading and writing might be going for learners growing up in a digital age. I wrote an essay about  Kindles , exploring whether they may re-engage learners who read less and less. I also wrote an essay entitled The  ...

Doll Bones by Holly Black Definitely for Middle School readers, this a book about friendship and adventure - with very creepy overtones. Poppy, Zach and Alice are best friends, and invent magical, fantastical adventures. In their constructed world, the Queen resides over the lands, a precious porcelain antique. Locked safely away in the cabinet, the friends feel safe to give her powers to rule the kingdoms - but once they take her out, her powers seem real. A twisted tale underscores the history of this doll; a father, a master craftsman used his dead daughter's corpse to create the doll. Her hair is woven from the remains of the girl's own, the limbs are made from bone china ground out of the little girl's skeleton, and her stuffing is a bag full of her ashes... The friends are visited by her ghost in their dreams, where she demands to be laid to rest once and for all - or promises a deadly curse upon them all.

Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe  by Benjamin Alire Saenz This is a story of friendship, growing-up, loyalty and love. It is a joy and a pleasure and I read with a lump in my throat and tears in my eyes. Two Hispanic boys more dissimilar than alike, form a bond stronger than friendship, the kind that can teach a lesson to us all. Whilst written for Young Adults, this is a book that is worth reading by adults too - the role we play in shaping the lives of our children is laid bare and resonates across generations. It forced me to want to be more honest and open, to support and not judge - particularly when my children get to trickier teenage times ahead. I would recommend this to anyone struggling with the courage to be themselves, or anyone who wonders just whose rules we are living our life by. If you like this, you will love: Will Grayson, Will Grayson by John Green and David Levithan Every Day by D...

I have an obsession with books - as you may see from my posts: Must Reads for 2014 Books - 2014 Book-a-month Challenge 2014 I recently read an interesting post on Donalyn Miller's ( @donalynbooks )  The Book Whisperer blog entitled, ' What the Kardashians taught me about reading ' by Christopher Lehman ( @iChrisLehman ). In it, Lehman suggests that we should learn from this family's technique of marketing themselves and, as educators, "brand ourselves as readers just as carefully so our students have that vision to aspire to". Readers in my classroom library I think am along the way to doing so: I read to share, I have created a library in my classroom of books I have personally read for my learners to borrow, they start every lesson with silent reading, they read for homework and keep a reading journal to document it, they write about their reading regularly. My  Book-a-Month Challenge 2014  shows how some Twitter friends and I have started...

As my recent book reviews testify, I have been reading a lot over this winter break . I recently read Fangirl  at the same time Starr, a Twitter friend ( @mssackstein ) so we could talk about it, and have engaged in lots of conversations about books. This led, as things do, to a few of us deciding that we would like to conduct a virtual book club together over Twitter. As we thrashed out the idea, and tried to come up with a definitive list of titles we all wanted to read, we decided the easiest way, was to go with new releases. We have decided on the following list (January is a cheat as we started too late) - and invite anyone who wants to, to join us. Please also, make suggestions too - we stick mainly with YA Fiction but are open to lots of suggestions and ideas. Just drop us a line on Twitter #bookamonth @MrsHollyEnglish @mssackstein @carriegelson @SuticThinkTank