knitting librarian

Saturday we had some much needed rain which meant some fairly deep puddles in the road in front of the house. AJ absolutely loves to be outside, and this day was no exception. He probably only jumped in the water for 5 minutes before he realized he was soaked and needed to come inside and strip to the diaper and get some warm, dry clothes on.

In retrospect, I wish that John and I had dug out our Tevas and played with him. There’s nothing like the pure joy of a kid who’s allowed to play in the mud puddles. Something to do the next time. I promise I will. (Of course, photographs of that are highly unlikely!)

If you’re one of my Flickr buddies, you can see some of the others in this “April Showers” series. For now, I’ll try to keep my kiddo relatively safe by not showing his face on the public page. If you want to become one of my Flickr friends, drop me a note and I’ll send you an invite.

Today, Haley brought in her book Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson. [This blog is now blocked by Bess. The family had no idea what they were doing to their poor dog when they named their filter after her. She’s even more cussed at than our dog!]

Haley’s the one who asked that I get Anderson to sign her book when I go to PSLA. Suzanne, one of my colleagues, graciously agreed to take the book for Haley. I never saw someone so excited! I asked her if she knew what she wanted written and she just kind of stood there looking agog. We ended up just putting a postit note on the cover with the correct spelling of her name. I hope that Ms. Anderson has time to write more than her name, as this will mean so much to Haley.

Haley told me she got the video of Speak over the Easter break and she said she’s probably watched it twenty times already. I can’t wait for her to get the book back and see what happens!

Well, it’s been quite some time since I’ve posted. I have been busy with classes and testing at school and AJ is always keeping us busy at home.

In March, the library was shut down for a week so that when people came in late they could come to the library to test rather than interrupting their assigned testing groups. It worked out well. Since all of the grades were testing, we weren’t keeping kids out who needed to be there. I was open for an hour a day for students to come in for book exchange, AR tests and the like.

This month, I’ve been trying to figure out what professional development I can arrange for myself. My request to attend our state library conference was rejected for several reasons: my principal rejected the request because he was fighting with the finance office for an additional book/AR quiz purchase for the library and there are already three librarians in the district attending PSLA. I guess I will be permitted to attend next year. (I hope!) I’m really disappointed because there is no better library conference around. PSLA is always a great way to recharge and rejuvenate the professional soul. One of my students wanted me to get Laurie Halse Anderson’s signature for her, I’m hoping one of the other librarians will get it for her since I can’t go.

On the up side, my book order was approved and so was the quiz order—it’s already here, just waiting for the books to arrive!

I have some notes from professional reading that I need to type and enter in but that will have to be something I do later this week. I dated the readings, so I’ll probably date them for when I actually did the reading/notes.

We’re still having a rough time personally, but John’s been great and I don’t know what I would do without him. Thanks hon!

In the last two weeks I’ve read a few books Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes. It was recommended by my friend Cari and I promised her that I’d try to read it too. I hadn’t read it before because I knew (somehow, not sure how) that it was “sad” and I wasn’t up for it. Even so, it was an interesting premise and story. I enjoyed it.

Small Steps by Louis Sachar. This is one I bought for school and wanted to read before I placed it in the library. This book focuses on one of the characters from Holes and his life after leaving the prison camp setting of Holes. Armpit is trying to live a good life and stay out of trouble. Of course, if there wasn’t trouble, there’d be no conflict, and that would make for a very boring book. Loved it!

TTFN [Ta Ta For Now] by Lauren Myracle. This sequel to TTYL is another novel in instant messages. It’s amazing that a story can be told without narrative to describe setting, but Myracle pulls it off. If you haven’t read TTYL, you’ll miss parts of the story, but the book was a good read none-the-less.

Last night I started a first novel by Ronald Cree called Desert Blood 10pm/8c about a kid who is adopted at the age of 14 by 26-year-old television/movie star Nick Hernandez. I only read the first chapter, so I don’t really know much about it yet, but it looks to be a good one. (Yeah, another one for school!)

Educational Leadership. Apr. 2006: 14-19.

Wormelli recommends five means to differentiate instruction:
Teach to developmental needs; Treat academic struggle as strength; Provide multiple pathways to standards; Give formative feedback; and Be unconventional.

1. Teach to developmental needs. At this age, students need : – competence and achievement, self-definition, creative, physical, social interaction with adults/peers, structure and limits, meaningful participation in family, school, and community

2. Treat academic struggle as strength – be willing to ask difficult questions that you (yourself) don’t know the answer to and modle the process of finding the answer, explore and examine things over time, allow students to struggle through a problem so that they feel a sense of achievement and learn tenacity

3. Provide multiple pathways to standards – show students different examples and strategies (i.e. multiple ways to take notes) then help them decide when to use each format. Do a 15 minute global lesson and then have students work in groups at their ability/readiness level OR anchor an activity with a mini-lessons on basics or advanced material – Allow students to determine the best way for them to demonstrate their mastery, whether it be a test, essay, powerpoint, poster, website, interview, etc. – Allow them to redo assesments until they master content. If they need to know this, then they need to do the work until they can show they know it. If they don’t (need to know it), then why are they wasting precious time learning it?

4. Give formative feedback – compare what they are doing now with where they were at the beginning of the year—show them their growth so they feel a sense of achievement, focus on one or two areas so feedback can be absorbed and used in the future – 321 exit cards to demonstrate student learning (three differences, two facts, one reason)

5. Be unconventional – give answers and have students tell how you arrived at that answer, ask them to conduct an intelligent conversation without verbs (i.e. Tarzan), create videos for younger students teaching concepts on their level, literary magazine to place in local establishments, meeting of the minds debate