From the Books

From the Books - An Exciting Experience

2005-11-22T05:22:00.000-08:00

On a bright, warm, sunny almost perfect Carolina Coast November day I left my media center at Broad Creek and headed toward Morehead City and the community College. There I had the opportunity to hear a panel of children's authors speak. This was one of the opening sessions for the first Crystal Coast Book Festival. One of those authors would soon be heading out with me to spend the rest of the day at my school.

Candy Dahl author of Emily and the Civil Warriors was our guest author. We had set up lunch with her and our language arts teachers. That was most enjoyable and I don't know who had more fun. Then it was time to speak to two eighth grade classes of students who had read the book. Mrs. Dahl had very generously sent us a class set of her books. We have added several copies to our collection and there are many still floating around the building being read. These students are also in the process of writing their own books for fourth graders. Their topics deal with some aspect of North Carolina history fact or fiction or a little of both. As Mrs. Dahl's book is written for upper elementary students there couldn't have been a better match.

Questions abounded after the students heard how long it took Mrs. Dahl to write her book. She
gave them good tips as well. I think it was an afternoon that we all will remember for a long time. She them met with a very small class of students who each had a set of questions for her. They brought up some interesting questions about publishing your own books, artist and costs.

For those students who wished to purchase a book copies were for sale and Mrs. Dahl wrote a special note on each one. A day filled with memories for both students and teachers. A real live author is what so many of the children said. Our bulldog pride was ever present as we gave Mrs. Dahl a few momentous to carry with her as a memory of her day here.

For me the day did not end there. It continued as a great evening with the Children's authors and that will be another time

From the books 2

2005-10-18T15:33:00.000-07:00

From that very first workshop where we created our blogs I have not been back to write and update. Life here is busy, sometimes busier than others.

One thing I do want to write about is the "We the People" grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities. I applied for this grant one day last year and was notified in the summer that I had won. What I won was a collection of 15 books on the theme of "Freedom". The purpose of this grant is to encourage our young people to read and understand great literature via themes in American History. Many of these books remind us how precious freedom truly is.
Living here in the middle of several military bases with many of our students effected with parents who are on active duty as I write this makes this a very real idea. Even since I arrived here four years ago I have been much more aware of how valuable our freedom is.
If you are interested in this program you can go to www.wethepeople.gov/Bookshelf to apply for the progam for your school for next year or to read the titles offered this year.

From the Books

2005-09-22T07:25:00.000-07:00

In this blog I want to talk about books(all types). However I want to start with middle school literature. But I also want to always have a great reads section going. I hope to put up some good sites and reviews that are the current "hot" reads in my media center. Let me know what they are in your media center. Our school also has a teacher reading group and I want to feature those reads as well. Suggestions are always welcome.