Children’s Literacy and Reading News Roundup – 5 October
This week Jen Robinson is hosting our children’s literacy and reading news round-up. The roundups are brought to you by Jen Robinson’s Book Page and Scrub-a-Dub-Tub, a Reading Tub blog. Jen and I collected plenty of content for you about literacy and reading-related events; literacy/reading programs and research; 21st century literacies; and grants, sponsorships and donations.
One of the things that I thought was particularly cool is that Hawaii won First Book’s What Book Got You Hooked campaign. The 50th state, celebrating 50 years of statehood this year, wins 50,000 books .
As many of you know, I love-love-love historical fiction. I think these books weave incredible stories about people, events, places, and ideas. This morning I found Trevor Cairney’s (Literacy, Families and Learning) post Making History Come Alive with Literature: The Importance of Historical Fiction. Not only does he have a great list of why historical fiction is valuable, but he has some tips on selecting “good historical fiction” AND he has a personal story with a book review.
This morning Cathy Puett Miller (the Literacy Ambassador) offers empathy and suggestions for parents struggling to find time to read with their children. In addition to explaining why it’s important and what the components of reading are, Cathy also offers ideas. Her idea of breaking reading time into smaller increments follows the “some is better than none” principle.
Jen has a new installment of her series Literacy Lights @ Booklights. This is her periodic column that replaces our old “Raising Readers” section. It is chock full of great stuff! I’m about two-thirds of the way through Donalyn Miller’s fantastic book. Although Jen’s thoughts focus on the Education World Wireside Chat, I think her observations apply to the book as well: ” I think that parents can benefit from reading Donalyn’s thoughts on learning to read, boys and reading, and the importance of kids reading every day.”
Stop by a Chair, A Fireplace and a Tea Cozy to read Liz B’s nice post about afternoons with Jen Robinson. It is the latest in what looks like a new series she about the folks who are (IMHO) the foundation of the Kidlitosphere. Kelly Herold and Poetry Friday and Anastasia Suen and Nonfiction Monday are two recent posts.
Last but not least, be sure to check out that nice cool widget (see right). Give us a little slick and we step up our game. We have been taking advantage of Del.ic.ious and providing a little more content to feed the widget during the week. I have a new domain set up for the feeds, I just haven’t got it working yet. So in the meantime, the daily link list will still be here.
Dawn Morris hosting today’s Nonfiction Monday roundup at Mom’s Inspire Learning. She’s kicking off the week talking about money! Head to the Roundup link and you can read Parts 1 and 2 of her All About Money series.
This is a test to see if the comments are working.
From Jen Robinson: “This post is a roundup in and of itself, Terry. I love the bit about 50, 50, 50000 for Hawaii. That’s great! And thanks for highlighting Liz’s post – that was a very nice surprise to start the week. I’ll have to check out Cathy’s new post, too. I’m a big believer in “some is better than none.”
You’ve once again provided so many great links here. I’m especially interested in the post “Making History Come Alive with Literature.” High quality children’s literature, especially historical fiction, wins hands down over a textbook any day.
Thank you for the update, and for the shout out about nonfiction Monday and my posts about money!