Reading to combat racism

As I see our nation struggling with issues of race and cries for justice, I feel like -- no, I know -- my words are inadequate.   I rely on books -- especially children's books -- to help me talk about hard topics and to gain empathy for people whose experiences are different than mine.  Today, I would like to share some books that may also help you and your family.  I want to state to begin with that this is NOT meant to be an exhaustive list.  If such a list were even possible, I would not be the one qualified to compile it.   These are simply books that I have read and recommend.  I will also recommend other places to find helpful lists.

A book that makes me smile as I see how we can be helpers in our communities:

Last Stop on Market Street, by Matt de la Peña

I love the beautiful way diversity is celebrated in this book.  If you haven't seen the children's theater reading of this book that I linked in Google Classroom last week, you can watch it here.

A book that leaves students breathless every time I read it:

Each Kindness, by Jacqueline Woodson

Told from the point of view of a girl who realizes too late that she has missed her opportunity to do the right thing.  A great book for kids to talk about why it is important to be the one to stand up for what is right.  

A book that shows us how children joined in during the Civil Rights Movement:

Let the Children March, by Monica Clark-Robinson

This fictionalized account of the Children's Crusade in Birmingham, Alabama in 1963 could introduce an opportunity to learn about the history of civil rights in our country.   

Another book that tells a piece of the Civil Rights history -- right here in North Carolina:

Freedom on the Menu: The Greensboro Sit-ins, by Carole Boston Weatherford

If you want to celebrate the strength of some of the important names (some you know, probably some you should but do not know yet) throughout black history:

The Undefeated, by Kwame Alexander 

If you are looking for books for older children:

Other Words for Home, by Jasmine Warga

The Parker Inheritance, by Varian Johnson

One Crazy Summer, by Rita Williams-Garcia

Front Desk, by Kelly Yang

Brown Girl Dreaming, by Jacqueline Woodson

There are so many, many more that I could recommend.  Reading is a powerful way to get a glimpse of the world through other's perspectives.   It is important that our children see reflections of themselves in the books they read.  It is also important that they see children who are different from them.  Make a point to help your child do both.  If you are seeking more resources, here are a few places to start:

https://socialjusticebooks.org/

https://www.commonsensemedia.org/lists/books-about-racism-and-social-justice

http://blogs.slj.com/afuse8production/2020/06/02/antiracist-resources-and-reads-lists-for-all-ages/

Help for your daily schedule

As a parent and a teacher, I turn to Common Sense Media quite often for reliable information.  If my son is begging for a new app or video game or if I am deciding if a movie is appropriate for his age, Common Sense Media is my go-to place!   As an educator, I also use Common Sense Media's  lessons to teach digital citizenship and online safety.

This week, Common Sense Media has shared useful Distance Learning Plans for parents of young children (Grades K-2).   Honestly, I think these can easily be adapted for older elementary students, too.   I think I'm going to adapt one for my 14-year-old!

I was hooked when I saw the first slide of the Kindergarten plan.   The first slide invites your child to name his/her school!   What fun!  I would have never thought of adding that fun touch to this school at home.  It's a nice way to give your child ownership and a feeling of control -- something we all need in this situation where so much is unknown. 

Another slide gives a place to vocalize your school rules.   And since these are all Google Slides, you can make your own copy and adjust them as needed for your family!  

They suggest a school-day schedule that looks completely reasonable for doing school at home.  The links to online tools are all active links to click and go right to the sites.   As I said, each slide can be edited to fit your family, and there are even places built in to add the resources you need to add -- like the Stough Media Website or the one-stop-shop link that Stough parents will receive today in the Principal's weekly message.  

Whether you are the parent of a Kindergartener or a Fifth-grader (or, like me, an Eighth-grader!), you can gain something from checking out these plans.   Even if they are not exactly the plan for your family to get through the coming weeks, they give good things to consider and a great place to start! 

Children's Authors and Illustrators are GREAT!

Children's authors and illustrators are doing what they can to help us all through this time of social distancing.   Today I want to share some of the great things they are doing. 

I have to start with a Stough favorite author/illustrator -- Mo Willems.  Our kids LOVE his Elephant and Piggie books, Pigeon books, Knuffle Bunny books and even more!  Mo is hosting lunch doodles from his studio every day at 1 pm.  You can find them at this link.   You can also find his past episodes on YouTube.


Oliver Jeffers is also hosting a daily Stay at Home Storytime.   He is Live on Instagram at 2 pm Eastern each day.   His videos are posted here.

Jarrett J. Krosoczka (known for his Lunch Lady series, Jedi Academy and more!) is hosting a Draw Every Day lesson at 2pm.  Lessons build on each other, so you will want to start with the first one!   You can find info here!

There are so many more that I'll share later.  If you want to see more now, check out this article from School Library Journal.  These are great ones to start!

Great Daily Activities

One of the really exciting things I've seen over the past week has been the effort from many different people and organizations to provide structure and happiness to families during this strange and stressful time.   I know there are plenty of lists out there, but I thought I would put some of my favorites into one spot for our Stough families. 

Today, I'll focus on a couple of resources that have been around for quite a while and are great structured times for kids (and adults) to wonder together. 

Wonderopolis

Wonderopolis has been a favorite of mine for several years. Each day, the site explores a different "Wonder of the day."   The wonders have been inspired by questions sent in by kids. Text, videos and pictures help provide answers to the "wonders."   Immersive reader is built into the site, so even students who are not fluent readers can access the information.   I could spend hours learning on this site.   ...But it's intended for kids!   Click here to visit this fun site!

Discovery Education Daily DE

I wrote the other day about the awesome resources we have from Discovery Education.  Discovery is working hard right now to fill in gaps for teachers, parents and students.   For parents, they have created a plan for each week (so far, they have released 2 weeks... they will continue these).  Each week's plan features a "grade-band appropriate learning activity for every day of the week."   They seem to offer a variety of curriculum-relevant activities each week.   The activities are meaningful and simple for parents to do.   There are plans provided for K-2, 3-5, 6-8, and even 9-12!   Click here to go to this fabulous resource! 

Take some time to explore these two opportunities to wonder and learn with your child(ren).   You'll be glad you did!   Then, tomorrow, come back here.   I'll share where you can find some amazing authors and illustrators who are giving their time and talents to spend time online reading and drawing with kids every day.

Wake County Library gives you great access!

                 

Way back in June, I wrote about one of my favorite online reading resources:  NC Kids Digital Library. (You can find that post here.)   My Wake County Public Library card (and PIN) gives me access to all of the ebooks available from Wake County Libraries and the many fantastic books available from the NC Kids Digital Library.   It is even more convenient to use those 2 resources within the Libby app.   I can search for books in either library and check them out and read them using that one app once I have entered my library card information. 

If you do not have a library card, you are not out of luck!  The Wake County Library is offering a temporary card and PIN on their website.   Click here to request yours!

Some of the books I have read from NC Kids Digital Library since we have been out of school:

Bob by Wendy Mass and Rebecca Stead:   This would be a great family read-aloud.   Chapters alternate between Bob's point of view (Bob is an unusual creature!) and Livy's point of view (Livy is an 11-year-old girl visiting her Grandmother in Australia.  A fun, heartwarming story!

All the Answers by Kate Messner:  A fun book for 4th and 5th graders.  Ava, who always studies but never knows the answers when she takes a test, quickly finds a pencil to take to school on the day of her math test.  She soon learns that this pencil has some sort of special magic to it!  Is knowing all the answers the best thing?






Other Words for Home by Jasmine Warga:   Wow!  What a wonderful book!   Jude's whole world is in a seaside town in Syria.   As violence moves closer and closer to her town, she and her mother move to America to live with her uncle.  She misses her father and brother who have stayed behind while she and her mother begin to call America home.   This book would be a wonderful selection for a mature 5th grade reader.





I would love to see what your families are reading! 

Check Out Discovery Education

One of the most amazing resources Wake County Schools subscribes to for our students is Discovery Education.   Discovery Education offers content in almost every subject area for every grade level.   For elementary students, parents can find all those "classic" Reading Rainbow episodes that we remember fondly.   Kids enjoy finding episodes of Sid the Science Kid, Magic School Bus or watching videos from the Discovery Channel. 

Some things that are not as obvious as the videos that are worth searching for include audiobooks.  Fans of the Goosebumps series will be happy to find that there is a "Goosebumps" channel with audiobooks and videos.   Other audiobooks include Call of the Wild, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, Treasure Island, and other children's classics your family may enjoy. 

You will see that most of the WCPSS Remote Learning Resources for Elementary School recommend resources from Discovery Education.   To access this incredible resource, students log in to their Wake ID portal.   If you need any help getting your student logged in, please email me at agalvan@wcpss.net.  I will respond as quickly as I can. 

EPIC! Access at Home!

These last few days have been strange, to say the least, but I have been amazed at the many resources flooding in to educators for students to use at home.  Many companies are being quite generous with their resources.   If I sent it all out at once, it would be overwhelming, so I'm going to highlight one resource that our students and their families can use at home per day here on my blog.    I'm starting today with the one that has been consuming my life for the past 2 days -- EPIC!


EPIC is a subscription book (and video) streaming service for kids.  EPIC boasts that it has "35,000 high-quality fiction and nonfiction books for kids 12 and under."   Like Netflix, it uses a sort of artificial intelligence to "learn" what a student may enjoy and recommend other books or videos that may interest the student.   EPIC always allows schools and teachers to use their service for free, so we have really enjoyed using it at school.   Right now, EPIC is offering free access for students to use at home until the end of the school year (June 30, 2020).   EPIC works well on a variety of devices.   If you are a Stough parent and have not requested (and received) access to your child's EPIC account and would like access, please fill in this simple form.   I will send you an invitation for signing up!

Here's a short video showing a few of the things I love in EPIC!

July #bookaday wrap-up

Why does July always pass by so quickly?!   After a trip to the library, I continued reading some of the books that are nominated for this year's NC Children's Book Award.   The Rooster Who Would Not Be Quiet is on the picture book list.   I decided to listen to the audio book (it's on EPIC!) because Carmen Agra Deedy narrates it herself.   Anyone who has heard her telling of her book Martina the Beautiful Cockroach knows that she is an amazing storyteller.  (If you haven't heard it, what are you waiting for?   It's the best!)   I am looking forward to reading this book with my classes and bringing her marvelous voice back into our library.    I had also checked out Little Leaders: Bold Women in Black History.  This one is on the NC Junior Book Award list.  This is an really nice collection of rather simplified biographical sketches.  It gives just enough of each woman's story to make a reader want to seek out more information.  The illustrations are ... well... sweet.  And I mean that in the nicest of ways.   Our girls will be drawn to this book.

After reading Little Leaders, I had to read its sister book Little Dreamers: Visionary Women Around the World.  Oh, this one was good, too!  The one page/ one illustration format for each woman was the same as in Little Leaders.  The women were from all over the world -- going back for centuries. 

I've also started reading the books I will use when our students join in once again for the Global Read Aloud.  This year, the picture book Global Read Aloud is centered around an author study of Yuyi Morales.  I had read her book Dreamers earlier this summer, so I picked up Viva Frida on my most recent library visit.  As I read through this artistically bilingual book, I had a feeling I had met Frida before.   Ah, I had!  This is a tribute to Frida Kahlo, an artist I had read about in Little Dreamers.  Well, I needed to learn more, so I found another biography in the library about her:  Frida Kahlo and her Animalitos.  I think our students are going to enjoy learning about her and her art.

I read a couple of other books by Yuyi Morales.   Nino Wrestles the World is one we already have in our library.  It has been popular.  Students will be excited to see that it is one we will read for the Global Read Aloud.  I also read Rudas: Nino's Horrendous Hermanitas.  This one is not on the scheduled reading list, but I'm pretty sure it'll be another popular one when we add it.

July was the month of our family vacation.   Our destination this year was San Francisco, so I found some ebooks on our NC WiseOwl ebook collection about San Francisco and the Golden Gate Bridge.   I finished up The Season of Styx Malone while we were traveling. 

Two of my favorite books I read this month are Alma and How She Got Her Name and The Remember Balloons.   Oh, these books!   If I start writing about my love for these books, I'll go on for pages.  Maybe another day.   Just read them.   They're so good.

And the rest of the books I read this month:

It has been a good month of #bookaday reading!   Looking for more reading days in August. 

Catching up with #bookaday! June 22-July 2

I have some catching-up to do on my #bookaday posts!  Since my last post, I have been reading, so I'll catch you up on what I've done.

First, I've been reading (or re-reading) the books that are nominated for this year's NC Children's Book Award.  My K-3 classes will read these sometime during the year before next March so the students can vote for their favorite.  I try to read these books and connect with the Positivity Project character strengths as we learn about them.  So far, I've read the following:

• The Very Impatient Caterpillar (Burach) -- Most of my classes read this in the spring before I knew it would be on this year's list.  We loved it, so I can't wait to re-visit it. The obvious tie-in here is with self-control, but it could also work with curiosity.  
• Potato Pants (Keller) -- What another fun book! This one will tie in with courage/bravery, forgiveness and some other character strengths that we learn about.
• Mixed: A Colorful Story (Chung) -- A great tie in with art, of course, but also a good book to talk about open-mindedness.
• Because (Willems) -- Okay, it is no secret that Mo Willems is one of my heroes!  What a beautiful book this one is.   I'll probably tie it to gratitude, but it could also work with the broader connection/purpose theme. 
• Misunderstood Shark: Starring Shark! (Dyckman) -- Oops! I just realized that the wrong one is in the picture.  (I read that one, too!)  I enjoyed Misunderstood Shark: Starring Shark!  I think our students will enjoy the facts they learn and will want to learn more about sharks after reading this book.  
• Can I Be Your Dog? (Cummings) -- What a sweet book!  This may be a good one when we learn about love, kindness, or even perseverance.  
• The Crayon Man (Biebow) -- (not pictured) -- This one tells the story of Edwin Binney and the process he went through to invent Crayola crayons.  

I've read some other books, too, since my last post:

• Misunderstood Shark: Friends Don't Eat Friends (Dyckman):  Honestly, I like this one better than the first! There are some great facts in here that I didn't know, and it's quite funny.  
• Saving Fiona (Maynard):  This one is a nonfiction book from the NC Junior Book Award list.  
• Narwhal: Unicorn of the Sea (Clanton):  This one has been really popular in our library this year, so I had to give it a try for myself.  
• The Secret Life of Squirrels: Back to School (Rose):  My 13-year-old son made me read this one.  He picked it up while we were in the library and read it because... well... squirrels.  The pictures are great.  I especially appreciated them after reading the information at the end of the book explaining how she takes the photos.  

I think that's 11 books for 11 days!   And just like that, I'm all caught up on my #bookaday challenge!

The Undefeated #bookaday

Choosing this book was a no-brainer.  I will read anything that Kwame Alexander writes.  (In fact, I hope to read more of his books this summer!)  And Kadir Nelson's illustrations are always amazing.  What a powerful team!  And the word I'm left with after reading this book is, indeed, "powerful."  This book celebrates strength. The strength of each person is captured beautifully in each illustration.  What is amazing is how both the author and illustrator capture that strength of African Americans through history to the present and then give hope for the future. 

Dreamers #bookaday

My #bookaday book today is Dreamers by Yuyi Morales.   What a beautiful book!   This the the author's own story of coming to America.  Of course, it pulled at my heartstrings because of the home she found in the library and the delight she found in children's picture books.  Yuyi Morales shares a more detailed account of her story at the end of the book and even a list of the books that inspired (and continue to inspire) her.   I read it digitally.  (Thanks, NC Kids Digital Library!)   But this is one I want to hold in my hands and spend more time in the illustrations. 

Front Desk #bookaday

Today I finished reading Kelly Yang's Front Desk.  I am amazed at all the wonderful stories I have read in the last few years from the perspective of immigrants.  This is another good one.  Mia and her family have come to America from China.  She becomes best friend to Lupe whose family has immigrated from Mexico.  What I love, though, is what Kelly Yang says in her Author's Note about this book: "this book is about what happens when you include, when, despite all your suffering and your heartache, you still wake up every morning and look out at the world with fresh, curious eyes." 

#bookaday and NC Kids Digital Library

Today I read Shark Lady by Jess Keating and illustrated by Marta Álvarez Miguéns for my #bookaday challenge.  I loved the beautiful illustrations in this book.   I also love my source for this book.   The NC Kids Digital Library is a fantastic source for reading material.   With your public library card, you can check out up to 5 ebooks at a time.   I can send most books to my Kindle app (or to my son's Kindle).  Some picture books, like this one, must be read in a browser.   I also love to download audiobooks from the NC Kids Digital Library for our family to listen to on car trips.  If you haven't used this great FREE resource, check it out!

#BookADay for the summer

This summer, I am challenging myself to join in on Donalyn Miller's Summer #Bookaday challenge.   This challenge is all about using the summer months for "revitalizing our reading lives."   Donalyn Miller's guidelines for this challenge can be found on the post linked in this paragraph.   The following guidelines are my own goals:

• My reading begins today (June 17) because it is the first weekday that I've not been at school.  (Yeah for summer!) and continues through August 19.
• I plan to read a book for every day of the summer.   Per Donalyn's challenge, it may be an average, so some days I may read more than one picture book to balance out the days where I'm reading a book that takes me several days to read.  
• I may not post every day, but I plan to list every book I read.  

So today I read my first book for this challenge:  Cool Crocheting for Kids by Alex Kuskowski.  I found it on Epic!  I chose this book because I really do want to learn how to crochet!   It must be a pretty good book because here is the progress I've made so far!

I'll be honest and admit that this is my second attempt.   My first one started out good, but kept getting smaller and smaller, so I had to try again.   Now I need to figure out how to make one of the projects in the book!   I'll need to do some re-reading for sure!