I wrote up a review of Troy Hicks and Jeremy Hyler’s new book at MiddleWeb: Create Compose Connect (Reading, Writing, and Learning with Digital Tools). I find the book useful in a lot of ways, particularly as it shows ways to enhance learning with technology with some specific projects.
Peace (in the review),
Kevin
It really is true: there’s nothing new here. Not with Twitter. Not with Facebook. Not with blogging. Not with any of the social media that we keep saying has “upended” traditional media. In this fascinating look at social media over the past 2,000 years, Tom Standage digs deep into our historical roots to show how the flow of information along social lines has been one constant thread through various phases of civilization.
Writing On the Wall is a fascinating read (and I heard about it from a book review column a friend of mine does at the Boston Globe, where her focus was books about social networking), starting off with Cicero in Rome, asking friends and allies to make sure they sent news of politics and government via notes, complete with comments, delivered by friends, and then moves into the use of pamphlets and scrolls and the printing press and more communication systems from the past that eerily echo the present.
In fact, Standage argues that the media empires that are now starting to fade (ie, newspapers) are the anomaly of history — in that the power to curate information and spread it out fell into the hands of a relative few (ie, publishers and editors and reporters) — and that if you look before and after that blip in time, you can see how prevalent the impact of widespread information is by “the people.”
And all of the same arguments back when Plato was railing against written text (as inferior to oral tradition), and when the Church was railing against Martin Luther and the Reformation Movement, and when the elites in the Arab world were worried about coffeehouse gatherings, and when the King of England was railing against Thomas Paine, and … well, it goes on and on, this railing against the power to publish being put into “the wrong hands” and what information might do to us. Sure, some of what gets published in any space is lies, distortions and more, but when the flow if open and moving, a reader has a better chance of judging veracity and weighing the impact of information, and good will prevail.
Right?
Standage writes:
“…social media is not going away. It has been around for centuries. Today, blogs are the new pamphets. Microblogs and online social networks are the new coffeehouses. Media sharing sites are the new commonplace books. They are all shared, social platforms that enable ideas to travel from one person to another, rippling through networks of people connected by social bonds, rather than having to squeeze through the privileged bottleneck of broadcast media. The rebirth of social media in the Internet age represents a profound shift — and a return, in many respects, to the way things used to be.” (page 250)
Peace (on the wall),
Kevin
PS — here is a talk that Standage gave to Google about social media:
The only time I went hunting for real, I was a teenager with a friend on his family’s farmlands. We each had shotguns and we were looking for deer. At some point, a flock of geese flew over us and I raised the gun, pulled the trigger and took a life from the air. It was a perfect shot (right through the neck) but I remember the feeling of dread, and the tiring hour spent trying to find the bird (we had no dog), and then the realization that “Since I shot it, I need to eat it” as we brought the goose back to his house, where his mom helped me dress it and cook it. The meat was gamey and I hated every bite. I never went hunting again.
I was remembering this story as I read the novel There Will Be Bears by Ryan Gebhart, in which the protagonist, Tyler, is coming of age and is determined to join his aging grandfather on an Elk Hunt in the Grand Tetons. Tyler’s life is a muddle, with his family’s finances causing stress and difficulties, and his best friend is his grandfather, Gene. But, his grandfather is ill with kidney failure, and as the day of the hunting trip nears, his grandfather is shipped to a nursing home.
The two decide to break out of the nursing home and go on the elk hunt anyway, against the wishes of Tyler’s parents and the doctors. Oh, and there is a grizzly bear with a mean streak roaming the elk hunting grounds, and Tyler’s fears and trepidations grow even as he refuses to give up on his rite of passage in his family. The story pushes towards a climatic moment in which the elk are hunted, the bear appears and Tyler realizes some important thing about life.
There Will Be Bears is a solid tale, told well, with the reader burrowed down into the confused head of a teenage boy. This book doesn’t take a stand on hunting, and in fact, keeps an emotional balance, thanks to the strong character of the grandfather (who turns out to have a story of two of his own, including his status as grandfather).
Peace (in the hunt),
Kevin
(This is part of the Slice of Life with Two Writing Teachers. We write about small moments on Tuesdays. You come, too. Write with us.)
Since January, I’ve been reading the same book, page by page, with the aim of finishing it up at the end of January. That’s right. One page a day, for the entire year. It’s so unlike me — the one who cranks through reading and writing — but The Reader’s Book of Days by Tom Nissley is designed this way, as each page is a calendar day filled with news and information about the literary world that has taken place on that single day.
I love how each page is like a message in a bottle, and I can’t help but imagine the painstaking research that went into this book by Nissley. There’s very little in terms of boring events, and his own writing style in crafting the vignettes on the page (typically, about five or six small stories) is engaging, light-hearted and enlightening on a variety of levels.
How A Reader’s Book of Days Was Made from WW Norton on Vimeo.
I’m sharing this book out because reading it is like a cousin to Slice of Life, where small portraits of writers and books and characters and intrigue from the literary world inhabit each day. It’s a wonderful book, and one that I use as a sort of nightly appetizer before digging into a novel or non-fiction book that is the main read. A Reader’s Book of Days settles me in, bringing me into the spirit of the book.
What more can you ask for?
Peace (in the book of books),
Kevin
You know that feeling you get when a beloved series ends and you can’t quite believe the story is over? That the literary hang-over I am feeling this morning after finishing a read-aloud of Wildwood Imperium (the third book in the Wildwood Chronicles) with my son yesterday. Sure, author Colin Meloy left a few hints that another book might be possible (as any good author would do) but for the most part, the loose ends of this engaging story about the Impassable Wilderness on the outskirts of Portland, where all sorts of strange magic happens and the most unlikely of children becomes the bravest heroes of all.
Oh, Wildwood, we will miss you.
Wildwood Imperium is the third book in the series and is not for the feint of heart. It has multiple storylines, and a rich vocabulary, and a style all of its own, with engaging characters and a treacherous villain (whose actions will surprise you), and the threads that come together to tie up the story are heartfelt and resonate with a respect for the environmental world and the unseen stories in our lives.
If the Wildwood Chronicles does not become a movie some day, it would be a shame. Unless the movie sucked, then it would be a shame. But my son and I both agree that the series, if done right, could be a powerful storytelling experience. Meanwhile, I have two students who eagerly read the first two books this fall and who are waiting, hoping, that I will lend them this third one. Of course, I will. Of course.
Peace (in the woods),
Kevin
Some events in history do unfold rapidly, and a new graphic novel imprint from Capstone Press seeks to use that as a the theme of a series of graphic novels under the banner of “24 Hour History.” It’s an effective structure for a book like D-Day, where so much happened in such a short amount of time, but which impacted the way World War II played out.
This graphic historical narrative, D-Day, is suited for middle and high school readers (although, interestingly, the Capstone site suggests an elementary grade level – I don’t agree, given the vocabulary and content here). Less a novel than a history lesson, the book begins with an introduction to World War II and then quickly moves into the planning and launching of Allied Forces into France as a move to turn the tide of the war and push Germany back through deception and overwhelming force.
The artwork is nothing to write home about here (ie. rather bland and boring), but with the use of maps, timelines and geographic narrative devices (telling the story of each landing point) along with a few personal stories (which could have been stretched out a bit more, I think), D-Day is an effective piece of graphic non-fiction story that could easily be part of a classroom World War II collection. The writer even gives us some perspectives from both sides of the confrontation, although it is clear the Allies are the heroes here. The stories do not mince words about mistakes that were made and sacrifices given by soldiers in the name of war and liberation.
The use of the 24 hour time frame allows the narrative to move at a rapid pace, as the reader shifts from landing point to landing point, with a clock face read-out on the corner of the frames. It is also helpful that the back of the book has short biographies of some of the main leaders on both sides of the battle, as well as a handy list of additional resources about World War II.
Peace (in the landing),
Kevin
Such a sweet book. The Memory Bank is a delightful story that begins with a hint of Roald Dahl (terrible parents, neglected kids) and veers into more Roald Dahl (a factory of dreams and memories, an innocent child will lead the way to understanding) and none of those echoes of Dahl is a bad thing, in my book (if I were to write it).
The story revolves around the wonderfully named Hope Scroggins, whose little sister has been left behind by their parents. Hope has been told to forget her sister, Honey, but she can’t, and thus begins an adventure into the factory where dreams and memories are held and documented, even as a band of outlaws is trying to upset the whole enterprise with juvenile shenanigans (like jamming one of the machines with lollipops).
There’s a gentle flow to The Memory Bank and it is jam-packed with wonderful illustrations, including whole sections (reminiscent of Brian Selznick’s work) where the narrative is told entirely in wordless images, one flowing after another until a new chapter of writing begins. It’s very effective.
The Memory Bank will remind you about what’s important in life, with a little adventure thrown in for good measure.
Peace (in the memories),
Kevin
Let me disclose a few things:
All that said, I highly recommend a read of this important collection around teaching and learning.
Teaching in the Connected Learning Classroom is in many ways a classic National Writing Project production through and through: Teachers sharing their classroom experiences (successes and trials) through the lens of inquiry and writing, all viewed through the overarching frame of Connected Learning principles. What are those principles? These ideas emerged from extensive research done by Mimi Ito and others on the ways that young people are learning in this digital age, and center on a few main concepts (better seen in this infographic).
Connected learning is:
Watch this video:
Which is all good and everything but what does that mean for the classroom teacher (like me)? Editor Antero Garcia and the fabulous writers and curators here try to answer that question by focusing the lens on classrooms with stories from teachers grouped around those themes, with curation editors framing those specific stories in the light of inquiry.
“I believe connected learning principles can provide a vocabulary for teachers to reclaim agency over what and how we best meet the individual needs of students in our classroom,” Garcia writes in the introduction. “With learners as the focus, teachers can rely on connected learning as a way to pull back the curtain on how learning happens in schools and agitate the possibilities of classrooms today.”
And so as educator Christopher Working shares how his third graders took blogging to new levels, and how their writing flourished as a result, other teachers (such as Chuck Jurich, Gail Desler, and Danielle Filipiak) explore the dynamics of multimedia production and global audiences and collaboration for student work that goes above and beyond expectation.
“… I was able to see firsthand how centering production afforded opportunities for students to construct affirming identities, make authentic connections to classroom texts, and develop new and specialized technical skill sets,” writes Filipiak, of projects undertaken by her students that merged media and culture together for a social justice message.
Still others are pushing boundaries, even if they are still grounded in literacy. Jason Sellers has his elementary students creating interactive fiction games and stories, mixing in the overarching lessons of programming with the lessons of writing stories. “The unforgiving nature of programming languages was a frustrating but valuable experience for some students, ” Sellars admits. “Small mistakes in a line of code often would render their games unplayable” and yet, lead to revision and iterative design.
One of the more fascinating projects here is the Interactive ‘Zine project, and Christian McKay’s insights into the merging writing, publication and fabrication/maker techniques to create bound collection of writing that has electronic elements built right into the design (with Makey Makey circuit boards and Scratch programming systems). “The Interactive ‘Zine provides opportunities for learners to consciously engage in the creation of their artifact for a public audience, ” writes McKay. “The public entity is developed through the written word that the students share — at a minimum, within the classroom, and more broadly, through public sharing of their Scratch projects at the Scratch website.”
There’s more, much more, that I could share here, but I think you’d be best to get your own copy. And you won’t need to pilfer it from the table off an unsuspecting friend, as I did. Teaching in the Connected Learning Classroom is a free PDF and a relatively cheap ebook for Kindle right now. It is published through the Digital Media and Learning Hub.
Oh, did I mention that just about every article here has a link to a media resource at the National Writing Project’s Digital Is site? That alone is worth the free price of admission. Links are embedded right into the ebook itself, allowing you to see student samples and teacher resources and more, so what are you waiting for? Get connecting.
Peace (in the book),
Kevin
(This is part of the Slice of Life Challenge with Two Writing Teachers. We write about small moments each and every day for March. You come, too. Write with us.)
There’s something special to starting a new book. Yesterday, I began to read two new books that have been on my radar for some time. On one hand, I love stacks of unread books. They represent so much potential. On the other hand, seeing a stack of book to be read makes me antsy, and I risk losing the “moment” of being “in” the book I am reading in order to rush to get to the book next up on my list.
Does that happen to you?
Anyway, the first new book I began reading yesterday is a read-aloud with my nine-year-old son (a common theme of my Slices of Life – if you remember, my very first Slice of Life six years ago was reading The Lorax to my older boys, who were much younger then). Wildwood Imperium, by Colin Meloy (he, of The Decemberists fame), is the third book in the Wildwood Chronicles. We read the first two books and have been waiting for some time for the third. That’s a whole other feeling, right? Waiting for the writer to get to work and get the story out (I’m talking to you, George R.R. Martin).
So, when Wildwood Imperium arrived earlier this week, and sat on the kitchen counter, my son and I were both thumbing our way through the pages, checking out the glorious illustrations by Meloy’s wife, Carson Ellis, and getting ready to dive in. Of course, neither of us can recall all the details of the last book, so I keep stopping and we keep asking each other, do you remember the shape shifting fox? the bear with hooks as claws? the plan to find the automaton boy prince? the magical tree?
There is tricky vocabulary in here (no surprise if you know Meloy as a songwriter) but I like that, and I like that my son has new words floating in his head as the story unfolds.
The other book I picked up as a solo read is The Heart of Everything That Is: The Untold Story of Red Cloud, American Legend — a non-fiction book about the masterful leader of the Sioux Indians who oversaw a huge swath of America and even defeated the U. S. Army at one point (I believe), only to have the tide of injustice sweep him under the rug of history. Those who win write the history books, right? I know I never read about Red Cloud in my social studies classes. Now, I am learning.
While non-fiction, the book has beautiful writing, very evocative of the landscape and characters and the time of expansion and turmoil in our country, and I am only a chapter deep but already wishing I had a few hours to sit with the pages, reading.
What are you reading?
Peace (in the words on the page as stories in the mind),
Kevin
My latest blog post over at Middleweb is a consideration of danah boyd’s It’s Complicated book, which is a must-read for parents and teachers. In my post, I consider a few take-away ideas from boyd’s research and observations of teenagers and social media.
Peace (in understanding today’s kids),
Kevin