Celebrate Picture Book Month

Just sharing a post from my middle school book blog: 

Celebrating Picture Book Month in the Middle

"I have always believed that literature begins in the cradle -- the poems we say to the babies, the stories

we tell them -- prepare them to become part of the great human storytelling community. We humans are

the only creatures in the known universe who make and remake our world with story."

- Jane Yolen from her Picture Book Month essay

Dianne de Las Casas is hosting a Picture Book Month site for the month of November, so I thought I'd concentrate on some of my favorite Picture Books that we use at the Middle School. We may have a different intent in bringing them into the classroom, but I think that it works because it continues to connect us to the "great human storytelling community."

Summary: Vashti is a frustrated artist who is ready to give up in her art class when her teacher challenges her to just make a dot, then sign it. When her teacher honors Vashti's efforts and helps her to see her work from a different perspective, Vashti is inspired to push herself and with practice and confidence, her dots do become great pieces of art. At the end when she meets a young, frustrated artist Vashti is able to turn around and become a mentor for this young child.

What it looks like in the Middle:

I love to start the year off with this book, read it aloud, then ask my students why I read it. What does this story have to do with this class and what I expect from you?

That's usually all I need to ask. Some of what the students get from the book about the coming year:

• Just do it (in this case, since it's English, just write)
• When you write it, put your name on it, own it
• Don't edit yourself ahead of time
• Work will be honored and published
• Push yourself to do better
• Mentor others

What are your go-to picture books and what do you do with them at your level?

Key Elements of a Fabulous Continuity

Our October 22 continuity event was a major hit with 12 participants representing 4 years of Summer Institutes (not bad considering we're 5 years old). We changed the location to UH Hilo but we still had one teacher from Waimea and one teacher from Kona attending. Yeah!

What made this continuity so successful?
The elements of a successful continuity. . .
1. Variety = Two teacher consultants sharing demo lessons from different grade levels and with very different teaching styles. It's not that hard with the "taskmaster" present to keep the day flowing.

Lynn Nagata brought us into her elementary classroom and took us through a poetry writing workshop with "happy memory poems".  Since she does this every year, she was also able to let us see her student anthologies.

Tamara wanted to try theatre of the absurd with her middle school students and she really challenged our thinking. We didn't think we could do it, but we were all able to write our 20 line monologues for our own Theatre of the Absurd in 20 minutes. Along the way, all of us, including Tamara, went on a journey of discovery by talking pedagogy and practice, parameters and assessment possibilities.

2. Joy = Writing and Sharing - we wrote together, we learned together, we shared together, we laughed together, we rejuvenated each other.

3.  Food  - duh. What's a Writing Project event without food. Sorry, no pics, I was busy eating.

Three elements to a successful continuity - Variety, Joy, Food. I hope all your professional development opportunities have the same elements for success.

Aloha, "The Taskmaster"

The next continuity session is scheduled for January 7 in Kona (tentatively at Kealakehe elementary). 

Why I Write: To Awaken the Spirit in the Downtrodden

 Twin brothers Al Mills and Nnamdi Chukwuocha use poetry and social action "to awaken the spirit of awareness buried deep within the souls of the downtrodden." Their poem, "Why I Write," aims to teach children about the importance of self-expression and how it can help them through their struggles and challenges.

Watch the Twin Poets in action—teaching and reciting.

The poem "Why I Write" isn't just a poem for Al Millis and Nnamdi Chukwuocha; it's their story of devotion to art and community and speaks to their goal of helping children grow up in the face of poverty and violence in the tough Riverside neighborhood of Wilmington, Delaware.

This NWP series of essays on "Why I Write" is so inspiring! We're going to start our day this Saturday on this exact prompt, so come ready to write.

-Cathy

October 20: National Day on Writing

To celebrate this year's National Day on Writing (Thursday, October 20), the New York Times National Learning Network, the National Writing Project and  Figment is accepting student work on the question "Why Do You Write?"


They want to hear all the diverse answers in the form of a poem, a short story, a play, a personal essay. . they want it all.


Submissions are going on from September 28 through October 29. 

Want other ways to get involved in the National Day on Writing?
Check out the NCTE site for more tips and ideas for you and for your students. The easiest thing to do is to write, but you can also involve your students, involve your staff, involve your families, involve your community. Invite an author. Tweet. Comment. 

Write


Write


Write (not just on one day, but every day)

Happy Teacher Appreciation Day

Every day is a day of thanksgiving, but if no one has spoken your name in kindness, offered a lending hand, given you a free smile or a warm embrace today, then know that today we speak your name, we honor your strength, we marvel at your stamina and we acknowledge the hard work you put into every day, not for any monetary gain, but for the intangible rewards of being a teacher.

Happy Teacher Appreciation Day to our Dear Friends, Colleagues, Heroes

It's Not Too Late to Invite a Friend

Aloha e nā kumu,

This is just a reminder that besides the 15 gung ho education warriors that are slated to come to the first (and perhaps last) Lehua Writing Project Spring Literacy Conference, there is still time for you to come join us AND even invite a friend to come along. The conference is this Saturday (see the previous post) and I'll even include the invitation link for your convenience.

Invitation link

True, we are all busy. We have obligations. We have commitments. It's far. The guest author, Dr. Kimo Armitage, and I are flying in and out from Honolulu. We know about far.  So why is it important?

We must continue to seek out professional development in order to "regain our educational standing in the world." Linda Darling Hammond wrote an article in the Washington Post from the first ever International Summit on Teaching held in New York and she says that the United States has been "pursuing an approach to teaching  almost diametrically opposed to that pursued by the highest-achieving nations."

Going to a conference or a workshop to learn how to better implement the prescribed "literacy program" mandated by your school is NOT professional development. Let's name it for what it is. That kind of training is further colonization and oppression of the students who we claim to love. We as educators are being disrobed of our intellect, our curiosity, our critical thoughts until we stand naked and raw.

Let us not teach with complacency, but as Paulo Friere says, let us teach with "rage and love, without which there is no hope." (Pedagogy of Hope) Choose professional development that will give you the ammunition you need to never back down when you feel that policies and practices are not in the best interest of your students (past, present and future). Some relevant mana'o from the article for us:

The first ever International Summit on Teaching, convened last week in New York City...was, perhaps, the first time that the growing de-professionalization of teaching in America was recognized as out of step with the strategies pursued by the world's educational leaders.

How poignant for Americans to listen to this account while nearly every successful program developed to support teachers' learning in the United States is proposed for termination by the Obama administration or the Congress: Among these ... the National Writing Project and the Striving Readers programs that have supported professional development for the teaching of reading and writing all across the country.

Jeannine and I hope you can make it to the conference. We will need to discuss our next steps this weekend, as well as probably try to work with Hawaii Writing Project on Oahu. We know we can offer a summer institute and this spring conference. What comes next is just our passion for good teaching, our commitment to improving literacy, and our aloha for the teachers who help na pua o Hawai'i, our greatest asset. 

Me ka ha'aha'a,
Cathy

Bill Severs NWP Federal Funding

On March 2, President Obama signed a bill to keep the government running until March 18. The bill cuts about $4 billion in spending from the FY 2011 budget, eliminating a number of education programs, including the National Writing Project, Reading is Fundamental, the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards, and Teach for America.

These cuts, which jeopardize the work of the NWP—the nation's leading effort to improve writing and learning—impact NWP’s federal funding beginning October 1, 2011.

For the latest information on the budget, and other programs affected, visit Education Week's blog.

The National Writing Project is not giving up and according to NWP President Sharon Washington, we are able to continue funding until the summer, so our summer institutes will not be affected.

If you are interested in tangible ways to help, NWP Works! is a ning set up with information, the latest news and ways to get involved and stay involved.

March Continuity: Blues Rift Writing with Tamara Wong Morrison

You're invited!
If you haven't been able to make our other two continuity sessions (with Risa Carles and Shawna Fischer), there's still one more before the spring conference. Join us on Saturday, March 5 at NHERC from 9-12. *Major apologies to Shawna for misidentifying her in an earlier post.

Poet, teacher and writing project alum Tamara Laulani Morrison will be doing a demonstration lesson on composing in-character BLUES RIFTS. See how she helped her students to writea blues rift as the characters in their novels (Of Mice and Men and To Kill a Mockingbird).

Hele mai. Come. You deserve to read, write, share, laugh, be energized, be rewarded, be inspired.

Ho'omakaukau? Ready?
Look out for an evite from Jeannine or just email me at caikeda@ksbe.edu.

Hope to see you there!

Write! Publish! Dance for Joy!

To celebrate the second National Day on Writing this October 20th, why not publish your piece of writing in our own local gallery Na Leo o Hawaii (the voices of Hawaii). We are especially looking for place-based pieces that celebrate life on the Big Island or your own one hānau (sands of birth).

How? Go to our gallery (linked for you here) and on the bottom of the page is a button to contribute your own writing. If you've already submitted a piece, aʻole pilikia (no worries), the gallery can now take two pieces per person.

What are you waiting for? It's time to "let's dance. . .let's shout. . . SHOUT. . .,"and shake those fingers over the keyboard and get writing!  (OK, that's not how the song goes, but you know what I mean).

Writers- teachers - lovers of the Big Island, there are 26 days to submit your pieces to the local gallery Na Leo o Hawaii

http://galleryofwriting.org/galleries/88467

Gallery Title: Na Leo o Hawaii - Voices of the Big Island

Gallery Description: This gallery will highlight the voices of the Big Island of Hawaii - from our kupuna (elders) to our keiki (children) - from the fishing village of Milolii to the town of Hawi. This gallery is about living on the Big Island.

If you'd like an easy tutorial to submitting your work, please watch the how-to video below:

How to submit your writing

Na Leo O Hawaii Now Accepting Submissions

In celebration of the October 20, 2009 National Day on Writing, and with the help of NCTE (National Council for Teachers of English), we now have our own local online gallery that is a part of the larger National Gallery. Na Leo o Hawaii, the voices of Hawaii, is for all of us who live on the Big Island. Please help me to get the word out to your colleagues, your students, your kupuna, and please submit your own piece. We are looking for any kind of writing about growing up or living on the Big Island - from eating ice shave at Kawate's, camping at Spencer Beach Park, shoveling snow into your pickup truck from Mauna Kea and making "ice men" in your front yard, or spending New Year's at grandma's house with all the cousins. More information and a flyer will come out when school starts, but the site is up and ready for your own submissions, as well as your family's submissions.

Instructions:

• Go to http://galleryofwriting.org/galleries/88467
• Create a login
  
• Add personal information and your piece
  
• If your children or grandchildren are submitting and they are under 13, a parent will need to help them sign up with your email
  
• The NCTE will send an email back to you with an online permission form
• Once the permission form is submitted, you will get an email back when your child's piece can be submitted (it's a fast process)

Thanks for passing on the word.
If you have other questions, please contact me.

Mahalo,
Cathy
Curator, Na Leo o Hawaii local gallery
cathyi@hawaii.edu

Summer Institute Orientation 5/23/09

Ten of us, all women, made our way upcountry to Kalōpā, Hāmākua to meet, greet, write, share, and take in the serenity of the park. It was also a time to orient ourselves to the shared journey of summer institute, as well as a time to think about our inquiry topic and vision for our classroom. All the women came with strengths, talents, a willingness to write and a desire to improve their teaching, so thank you! We are looking forward to a transformative summer experience.

Principals are Writers Too!

Lehua Writing Project is grateful for Art Souza, west Hawaii superintendent, for allowing Merle Yoshida and I to present a mini writing project workshop with his principals and SRSs (school renewal specialists).

We had a great time yesterday at NHERC as the principals participated in our memory box exercises, talked, wrote, laughed, ate, shared, wrote more, responded and reflected. We also were able to push again for investing in teachers, and the ways that Lehua Writing Project can help with the state's new literacy initiative.

The principals are also willing to model for their teachers by submitting their first draft writing that we did yesterday. We'll get it up soon. They felt that if they want their teachers to take this kind of risk, they need to lead. Ho'omaika'i!

In addition, the 4 complexes were able to get together and start talking about their vision of an excellent writer, not just for their school, but for K-12.

Please mahalo your principals for being so open and enthusiastic participants.

Unlucky Arithmetic for Teachers: 13 ways to raise a nonwriter

(This is a post from my blog Mana'o for Educators that I thought I'd share here) - Cathy

Did you have a journal? Were you a writer as a child? Did you lose that passion when you grew up? How long has it been since you, as an adult, have written for yourself -- not because you had to, or it was expected of you, or you were grading papers, but for the pure joy of writing?

Cathy Song, Hawaii's own "poet laureate" started writing at a young age. She says, "our family travels started my writing. I guess I was around nine years old when I decided I wanted to be the family chronicler." My own journey started with a Holly Hobie journal given to me when I was seven as a way for me to fill in the empty spaces left from my parents' divorce. My mother gave me a journal every year for the next 30 years.

Are we nurturing that passion for writing in our students? Or are we killing that passion with our focus on writing for testing, formulaic writing, and the unhealthy balance of reading first?

Choice Literacy, working off the text "Unlucky Arithmetic: Thirteen Ways to Raise a Nonreader" by Dean Schneider and Robin Smith came up with a list for teachers on sure fire ways that we, as teachers, can effectively kill the passion for writing in our students. Just some mana'o to think about.

Unlucky Arithmetic for Teachers: Thirteen Ways to Raise a Non-Writer

(from Choice Literacy.com)

1. Tell children that writers write at desks, not under them and most certainly not on the carpet.
2. Correct all misspellings, including letters spelled backwards; Howe kaan wee reed mistaaks? Puuulease.
3. Squash the talk. Writing is for learning vocabulary and sentence structure. Talk is time away from thinking about their writing.
4. Absolutely, positively no writing-in-the-style-of another author. Children have to find their own voice.
5. Don't encourage drawing in writer's notebooks. They're for writing, obviously. If you allow drawing though, ignore the scribbles. There's no story there. Promise.
6. Once kids learn how to spell, throw out the markers and crayons. Only use pencil. That way, mistakes can be erased.
7. There is a time for reading and a time for writing. By no means mix the two. It can get confusing.
8. Limit writing on the computer. Serious writing only happens on the page.
9. Under no circumstances talk about the relationship between art and language in picture books. It's right there; they can figure it out, surely.
10. Lined paper is for writing, unlined paper is for drawing. Get it right. If you don't, who will?
11. Children are writers-in-waiting; you already know how to write so you don't need to keep a writer's notebook, they do.
12. Make sure children revise and edit on days set aside for revision and editing. There is a writerly plan - stick to it.
13. Avoid showing children your own writing (if you do it); they're more interested in published writing, not yours. Come on.

Want other ways to nurture the passion for writing in your students? Join us for the Lehua Writing Project summer institute. Send an email to Jeannine Hirtle (hirtle@hawaii.edu) or me, Cathy Ikeda (cathyi@hawaii.edu). Be nurtured, be validated, be a writer, grow writers.

We Got It!

Lehua Writing Project is now officially its own site and we are offering our first SI this summer!
When: June 15 - July 2, 2009
Where: North Hawaii Educational Research Center (NHERC) in Honoka'a
Application deadline: March 2, 2009

Check this site for our flyers and and please pass them along to your colleagues.

Happy New Year and Mālama Pono,
Jeannine Hirtle and Cathy Ikeda