Digital Participation Project

For my Digital Participation Project, I explored both Pinterest and Goodreads.  I am obsessed with Pinterest in every way, and I had been exposed to Goodreads before, so I decided these were the best avenues for me to put time into.  I enjoyed both, but definitely preferred one to the other. 

Goodreads has proven to be something I really enjoy using.  I love being able to keep track of the books I have read, ones that are my favorite, and ones that I want to read.  I also love that I can "like" favorite quotes on Goodreads as well.  I also love that Goodreads recommends books for its users through user ratings.  I would love to eventually make a "bookshelf" on Goodreads for books that I think would be great for my students to use for pleasure reading books.  I am still working on figuring out the details of Goodreads, like the recommendations.  I haven't read a lot of them, and I'm not sure if I'll ever write one, but I do plan to explore the feature more.  I could also see myself getting my students to use Goodreads to track their reading progress.  It would give them a place to mark what they like and don't like and explore different genres.  I really think Goodreads is an incredible resource, and I plan to continue to use it for as long as possible! Here is the link to my profile:

http://www.goodreads.com/user/show/4629107-madison

I also utilized Pinterest for my DPP.  I do love Pinterest for things like DIY projects and ideas, but I wasn't really sold on the idea of using it for teaching ideas until pretty late into my project.  I felt like I really had to search and look for pins that applied to what I was looking for.  I eventually found some Pinterest pages made by Scholastic and Random House Publishing.  These were really helpful.  I didn't pin a lot from them, but I did read them and look at a lot of the pins on the boards.  Below is a link to my Pinterest board:

http://pinterest.com/madisonbunch/a-good-book-is-your-best-friend/

Out of my Mind

I fell in love with this book as soon as I read the first chapter.  I mean seriously, how can you not love Melody instantly? She is adorable, loving, kind, intelligent.  And gosh, I feel sorry for her! But not in a way like when people say, "Oh bless her heart," but more like because I know she has SO much to offer and contribute to the world, but is restricted by a stupid disease.  I think middle school students will also fall in love with the story and its characters.  I also think that the author addresses issues that are common in schools and that are not always comfortable.  These issues, like bullying and special needs students, absolutely need to be addressed.  I think it also helps when these kinds of issues are not pushed onto kids through lecturing, but through the medium of a novel or something similar.  I also love that Melody is extremely intelligent despite her physical disability.  Most kids do not realize that one is not dependent upon the other in certain cases.  How often do we just assume that someone who may have physical disabilities is not as smart as one who does not? This story is a great example of a counterexample.  I have the same opinion of this book in a lot of ways as I did about Wonder.  It would not hurt for every middle school student to read it.  I really think it could revolutionize the way students treat each other.  I would definitely recommend Out of my Mind to individual students as well as possibly use it for a whole class.  

Text Complexity and Book Leveling

     I found the article "Text Complexity: Is This Book at Grade Level?" interesting mainly because of the author's stance on Lexile level.  We just talked about Lexile level in our other LLED class last week and I have definitely heard of it before.  I knew previously to reading this that CCSS put an emphasis on Lexile levels as well. With all this previous knowledge, I found it interesting that the author said that the Lexile level was the least important aspect to consider.  Honestly, it made me think about what I would consider most important when choosing books for my students.  
     The article on text complexity was also enlightening.  I think as educators, we need to make sure we are preparing students for literacy success in college and in the workplace...if we're not, what exactly are we doing? Through reading this article, I discovered that there are many factors that affect the complexity of a text.  As teachers, we need to be very aware of all of these aspects to make sure that the texts we are providing for students, whether fictional or informational, are a good medium of hard enough, but comprehendible. 

Messenger

     For this week, I read Messenger by Lois Lowry and started Son, also by Lois Lowry.  These are the 3rd and 4th novels in The Giver Series, preceded by The Giver and Gathering Blue.  Let me just start by saying that The Giver is possibly my favorite book ever.  I read it for the first time in 5th grade, and I was immediately obsessed.  Of course, Lois Lowry never disappoints and Messenger was right up there with The Giver for me.  
     I love the style with which Lowry writes and the themes and symbols she comes up with for her stories.  These novels are great ones to use when introducing the ideas of themes and symbols to middle school students.  I feel like Lowry pretty explicitly states her themes and symbols, but she allows room for the reader to dive deeper into what's behind the story.  I also love how Lowry foreshadows, but not too much which just hooks me even more as a reader and causes me to read her books in one setting.  For middle schoolers, this foreshadowing will keep them interested and wanting to read which is exactly what we want for our students.  
     The aspect of Messenger that I loved the most was the underlying current of the story.  For me, as a Christian, this underlying current was the story of sacrifice very similar to that of Jesus.  The main character in Messenger, Matty, is equipped with a special gift where he can heal things through touch.  This gift in general reminded me of Jesus...I feel as if a lot of the gifts in her novels (seeing beyond) are reminiscent of the powers of Jesus.  Throughout the story, Village, where Matty lives, and Forest, through which Matty travels carrying messages, become "sick" and filled with people who have become bad instead of good.  Ultimately, Matty has to heal the land, which heals Forest and Village, in order for everything to return to good.  This action kills Matty, giving himself up as a sacrifice for the greater good of the world.  I think these kinds of connections can easily be made in a middle school classroom.  Some students with a religious background may see it this way. Some students may get different messages from the novel, like that what we do today greatly affects our future.  Whatever way students interpret the work is perfectly fine because ultimately, the most important message is what each individual finds in it for themselves.  

The Random House Book of Fairy Tales

I chose this book because it was just one big book of all the greatest fairy tales! Almost all of the stories in the book have been adapted into movies, mainly Disney movies.  I did not even know that several of the stories, like "Puss in Boots," were actual fairy tales instead of just solely Disney movies.  I really enjoyed looking over all the stories in the book as they were all a little different than other versions I had heard before.  Reading this book made me think a lot about how much traditional stories change as they are passed down and recorded by different people or through different genres.  I think it is always a great idea to look at various versions or genres of a story in the classroom and compare and contrast them. I would definitely use this book to do so in a classroom as well as use it as a great example of traditional literature.  There are illustrations that go along with each story that are rather old looking and nothing super special, but I think that adds to the "oldness" and history of the stories which works perfectly in this case!

Traditional Literature Picture Books

The Nutcracker

This book was a great representation of the ballet, The Nutcracker.  I enjoyed both the story, which was on point with the ballet, as well as the colorful illustrations which were also very reminiscent of the play.  I think this would be a great book to read to a class during Christmas and could also be used for comparison and contrast if studying plays, ballets, musicals, etc.  

CinderEdna

Cinder Edna was quite an interesting book and not at all what I was expecting.  The idea behind the book was to compare the princess attributes of Cinderella's story with a "Cinderella" story that wasn't so girly, frilly, and perfect....the not-so-girly fairy tale perhaps.  The notion the author had was good, but I'm just not so sure it was carried out the best way possible.  The plot was a little confusing at times and sometimes the illustrations didn't match what was going on in the story at that part.  It did have a lot of humor, especially in little words and phrases hidden in the illustrations, that middle school students would definitely find funny. I'm just not sure that the plot is super easy to understand all the time.  I definitely got slightly confused, so I think younger students could as well.  All in all though, I liked the idea behind changing up the fairy tale and think it would be great to read a book like this and then get your students to do a writing project based off changing around a fairy tale.  

Beauty and the Beast

I have only ever seen the Disney adaptation of Beauty and the Beast and the musical at the Fox Theater.  This book was definitely very different than either of those versions.  It was more like a folk tale or old-timey fairy tale than the more modern versions I've been exposed to. Differences like these would be interesting to explore in the classroom so that students can see how important it is to see how stories evolve throughout time.  I think it is also important to study differences between different versions to see if the aspects that are changed about the stories might be misrepresenting a culture, a problem this week's article addressed. 

Proceed with Caution: Using Native American Folktales in the Classroom

I like that the author points out how important traditional literature and the accuracy in which it is taught and portrayed is to a culture.  If we as educators don't get this right, students will have very flawed views of various cultures.  The author points out several things that she finds to be not culturally accurate about her Indian tribe from a popular book.  It is very important that we find literature for students that is "approved" by the culture it represents so that students are learning accurate information even in fictional stories.  This is of course another way to fight against the American Indian stereotypes that are so very prevalent in the US today.  I think the guidelines given in the article are very practical and are attributes that I will consider when choosing folklore for my classroom.  I'm very glad we were able to read this article because it has definitely opened my eyes to how educators need to view traditional literature.