Language Arts

• Content-area conversations : how to plan discussion-based lessons for diverse language learners by Douglas Fisher, Nancy Frey, and Carol Rothenberg (ASCD, 2008, 176 p, $_____, ISBN: 9781416607373)

  Fisher and colleagues are concerned with techniques that can be used in the classroom to engage ELL students in discussion with everyone. Their techniques are based on research and cover making the environment conducive to discussion, how to stimulate discussion, what to do if there is too much discussion, and how to assess the results of discussion. It occurs to us that when teacher librarians co-teach with classroom teachers, this should be one of the topics: how, when working in the learning commons engage every learner in productive discussion as they encounter text and multimedia. There is also the matter of investigative discussions in professional learning communities that are experimenting with various techniques to increase the participation of ELL students. Highly recommended for booth groups who are creating their own repertoir of what works.

   

• Involving parents in their children's reading development-a guide for teachers by Bruce Johnson (Treasure Bay, 2008, 108 p. and CD, $_____, ISBN: 9781601152008

  Johnson has years of experience at all school levels in involving parents in their child’s reading. He has assembled in this book and accompanying CD hundreds of ideas with handouts and letters to parents ready to print out or modify on the CD. The book’s value is in the variety of ideas that can be considered for your own outreach to parents. What works? What doesn’t? Most of the activities will appeal to parents who have the time to be involved in their children’s and teen’s reading lives and that is an audience to reach first. Teacher librarians and classroom teachers plus reading specialists will want to develop their own repertoire of techniques that work with the parents of their school – first with the parents who want to be involved and then reaching out to the caregivers who lack both time, skill, or seeming disinterest. This book is recommended along with a variety of other titles from which an idea bank can be created. We need another author who has worked successfully in an inner-city school successfully to record the best ideas that they have found successful.

• Books and beyond : the Greenwood encyclopedia of new American reading, edited by Kenneth Womack (Greensood Press, 2008, 4 vol., $_____, ISBN: 9780313337420)

  Womack has brought together dozens of authors to write both historical and critical articles about the development of various recent genres in literature. In almost 15 pages of text, here are a sampling of the topics covered in the four volumes: African American literature, Arab American literature, Arturian literature, Asian American literature, autobiography and memoir, Beat poetry, chick lit, Christian fiction, comic books, cyberpunk, ecopoetry, erotic literature, Native American literature, space opera and many others both familiar and unique. The essays concentrate on a critical rather than introductory stance and provide both essays discussing various books and authors but also provide bibliographies of extended readings. These signed essays are not for beginners but try to take a more scholarly approach and look at the genre as a whole. Thus, the set is for larger libraries, perhaps for advanced literature students in high school but beyond in collections of serious critical works. The multicultural approach is very welcome and seems to have been written by persons who are very familiar with the literature itself rather than persons researching the literature as an assignment. Thus, for the very large high school library and above, where scholarly critical information is needed, this set is recommended.

• More tools for teaching content literacy, by Janet Allen (Stehouse, 2008, flip chart, $_____, ISBN: 9781571107718) Flip charts are created to condense teaching or learning ideas quickly on either one or two facing pages. Allen, the widely known reading expert provides both explanation flip chart pages but also reproducible worksheets that provide techniques to build understanding as students read.  Among the techniques include: knowledge chat, point-of-view guide, double- and triple-entry journals, PQ4R, Writing to Learn, and reasoning guide. Such guides or teaching tips for reading can be combined with the Koeschlin/Zwaan Building Info Smarts from the same publisher to stimulate ideas for attacking various problems that collaborators are trying to solve. As such, they can stimulate creativity. Thus, we recommend such professional tools to  be on a handy shelf where teachers and teacher librarians plan. It is essential to have a bag of tested teaching and learning tricks as the basis of a stimulating collaboration.

•  Library Research with Emergent Readers: Meeting Standards Through Collaboration by Christa Harker and Dorette Putonti (Linworth, 2008, 112 p., $39.95, ISBN: 1586832883) One of the first Library skills books based on the new AASL standards we have seen, these simple activities have both data gathering and thinking involved. Can be used in library time, but we prefer using them in a co-teaching stance with the classroom teacher. Worth an inspection for K-1 children.

• Learning Through Writing: Authentic Writing Activities for the Content Areas: Grade 4 by Kathleen Kopp. (Maupin House, 2008, 141 p., $_____, ISBN: 1934338311) Part of a series, the examination of the approach is valuable, however, writing prompts and ideas not integrated with topical units is the same as teaching isolated information literacy skills. Not recommended.

• Summer reading renaissance : an interactive exhibits approach, by Rita Solton (Libraries Unlimited, 2008, 249 p., $_____, ISBN: 9781591585725) A totally different approach to summer reading programs that melds museum-like learning centers around family reading. Unique and worth a look for both the public librarian and the teacher librarian.

• A Picture Book Primer: Understanding and Using Picture Books by Denise I. Matulka (Libraries Unlimited, 2008, 307 p., $_____, ISBN: 9781591584414)This book is not a bibliography; rather, and excellent history/state-of-the-art, use of picture books in literacy efforts and with various ages written by an expert. Recommended.

• Booktalking bonanza : ten ready-to-use multimedia sessions for the busy librarian by Betsy Diamant-Cohen and Selma K. Levi (ALA, 2008, 240 p. $40.00, ISBN: 9780838909652) Two experts use a multimedia approach to liven up interest in titles for children and young adults. A fresh approach.

• Seize the story : a handbook for teens who like to write by Victoria Hanley (Cottonwood Press, 2008, 225p. $15.95,ISBN: 9781877673818_
  As a teacher librarian, is you are collaborating on the teaching of writing using good literature as a basis of analysis, then this is the book to stimulate what all writers know: You learn to write by reading and noting what good writers do.

• Purposeful writing assessment : using multiple-choice practice to inform writing instruction by Susan Koehler (Maupin House, 2008, 150p. $_____ ISBN: 1934338184

  Do we really teach fake writing in schools and test the results with multiple choice tests? I’m rolling my eyes now because I suspect that this is the case in the dying world of No Child Left Behind. We are presented here with practice tests for kids. They are given a sample of student work and then they answer multiple choice tests about that writing. So, it’s the perfect book to teach to the test if that is the kind of nonsense the test has. So what does this have to do with teacher librarians? Krashen has taught us that kids learn to write by reading. Why? Because they can use great writing as a springboard for their own work If I were a teacher librarian collaborating with  language arts teachers, I would recommend the substitution of great writing passages for the students to analyze. There are enough multiple choice tests here to see a pattern or better yet, take past sample tests from your own state and use those as models to construct and talk with kids. It’s great to stimulate discussion about good writing and practice writing using an author’s technique. In social networking, kids write more than ever before. They may write in code, but they can learn, with a bit of coaching, to make their writing more fun and interesting by modeling the great writers. Take them into the world of Web 2.0 where they can write and write and write and share and share and get better and become another Christopher Paolini. I hope fake writing disappears, and if you buy this book, get its suggestions, then recycle it quickly.

• Synchronizing success : a practical guide to creating a comprehensive literacy framework by Maren Koepf (Stenhouse, 2008, 174 p. $_____. ISBN: 9781571107435)

  Koeph, who is a district reading literacy specialist in the Orange Schools of Ohio, details an extensive organizational system for literacy at the Moreland Elementary School in her district. She details an organizational system for literacy in the early grades, extensive professional development, coordinated assessment, and intervention by the literacy coach into the classroom. It is obvious that progress has been made at this school and Koeph is generalizing that success and system in an attempt to systematize and improve other schools. We applaud such intense efforts to raise reading skill. However in thespirit of Krashen, we can’t help wonder how many children would claim they love to read in addition to learning how. The lack of mention of a school library, a teacher librarian, plentiful stacks of what kids really want to read, lead us to question the system now in place across the nation that makes progress in reading skill but leaves us empty when thinking about a literate nation of lifelong readers who are not just able but willing to tackle any major idea in any format in order to build deep understanding and joy. How many teacher librarians across North America are in schools with strong reading skill programs and when bragging about reading progress is made as widely as this one are left out with the message writ large: Libraries are not essential components in the reading program? It is a major red flag and call to action.

• Catch a falling reader, 2nd ed. by Connie R. Hebert (Corwin Press, 2008, 143p. $_____, ISBN: 9781412956055)

  As a literacy team in the elementary school, the challenge of helping struggling readers is constantly a topic of discussion. What can we do? What can we do? Herbert, a well-known speaker provides a volume of 40 recommended ideas in three categories: motivating readers, strategies to build skills, and ideas for adults reflecting on what’s happening.  If I were a librarian meeting with the literacy team, I’d purchase two copies of this book, cut it apart into the40 idea 3-4 page ideas and distribute one or several to the team. Then, we’d have a short read pair share activity to see if we could discover ideas that we have tried but could refine, ideas we need to test, and strategies we need to employ as we reflect on our work. We recommend such books because they contain brief pithy ideas that can be implemented immediately. It’s like going to a profession conference presentation but doing it at home.