october 2013 library times

7/27/2019 October 2013 Library Times

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knowledge among students

making it difficult to make

meaning from texts that

they read. The author

argues that students should

be reading things that will

“catch them up.” Things

like newspapers, magazines,

web articles, etc… that will

give them the background

knowledge to understand

the longer, complex works

that they are reading.

Is this the answer? I don’t know

for certain, but it is definitely

food for thought.

You can find old issues of the newsletter here.

Boy, that’s a million dollar ques-

tion. If I could answer it, my life

would be so much easier, and I

could sell the answer to every

school and parent in the nation.

Unfortunately, I don’t have an

easy answer to the question, and

I don’t think anyone else does

either. However, I have been

intrigued by Kelly Gallagher’s

ideas that he puts forward in his

book Readicide: How Schools Are

Killing Reading and What You Can

Do About It.

The shorthand version of his

argument is that there are 3

main problems with reading in

schools:

1. There are not enough inter-

esting materials for students

to read.

2. Schools are removing nov-

els and long, challenging

works from the curriculum.

3. Students are not reading

enough.

To fix these problems he recom-mends the following:

1. Become an advocate for

lots of books to be available

to students. Not just

books, but magazines, news-

papers, journals, etc… We

can afford materials if we

set reading as a priority.

2. The research suggests a

strong link between reading

novels for school and the

amount of time spent read-ing at home. If you assign it;

they will read.

3. This last one leads to a

serious lack of background

The Woman Who Lost Her Soul byBob Shacochis

Good golly this

is a long book.

I’ve been at it

for over a

month and still

have 100 pages

left. It’s about

the daughter of

a diplomat who

is nominally involved in CIA cov-

ert operations, and she is contin-

ually morphing into differentpersonas for a variety

of missions in Haiti,

Bosnia, etc… The

story tries to cover

nearly every aspect of

covert war that the

U.S. has been in-

volved in for about

the last 50 years from

Afghanistan to Haiti.

Difficult and intense

but brilliant in places.

Middlesex by Jeffrey EugenidesThere was a time when I

went out of my way to avoid

this book. It just sounded

too gimmicky for me, and it

would be if it were written by

a less capable writer than

Eugenides. It is about a her-

maphrodite born to Greek

immigrants living in Detroit.

It spans three generations of

the family and is wonderfully writ-

ten.

What Makes a Reader?T O P 1 0 B O O K S

F O R S T U D E N T S

I N O C T O B E R

1. The Amber Spy-

glass by Philip Pull-

man

2. Earthquake Ter-

ror by Peg Kehret

3. Cat Burglar on

the Prowl by Peg

Kehret

4. The Lost Hero by

Rick Riordan

5. Pretty Little Liars

by Sara Shepard

6. Catching Fire by

Suzanne Collins

7. Diary of a Wimpy

Kid: Cabin Fever by

Jeff Kinney

8. Don’t Look Behind

You by Lois Duncan

9. The Maze of

Bones by Rick

Riordan

10. The Name of

This Book is Secret

by Pseudonymous

Bosch

What I’m Reading Now

W M S L I B R A R YW M S L I B R A R YW M S L I B R A R YW M S L I B R A R Y WMS Library TimesO C T O B E R 2 0 1 3V O L U M E 3 , I S S U E 2

http://

westfieldmiddlepolicies.blogspot.com



P A G E 2

“You raise

your voice

when you

should

reinforce your

argument.”-Samuel

Johnson

Events-October/November

Professional ResourcesReign of Error by

Diane Ravitch

Ravitch makes

the case forpublic schools in

her newest

book. She

claims that initi-

ative like No Child Left Behind

and Race to the Top are merely

veiled attempts to dismantle pub-

lic schools and privatize them for

monetary gain. Meanwhile, public

school dropout rates are the low-

est they have ever been

while graduation

rates and test scores

are the highest that

they’ve ever been.

She chips away at

the argument that

public schools are

failing by providing a

massive amount of

research to the contrary.

For the Good of Mankind?

This is one of several

books I’ve ordered this fall.

This one is written for

young folks, but

I think it could

be useful in

classroom dis-

cussions of eth-

ics especially

medical ethics.

The book is the

history of human

experimentation that exists

in a gray zone of ethics.

The results are sometimes

beneficial but at what cost?

W M S L I B R A R Y T I M E S

October 31 is Halloween

Read about witches and other spooky things for Hal-

loween. Call Number 133.4

Veteran’s Day is November 11

Read the stories of soldiers to honor them this Vet-

eran’s Day.



Curriculum Connection

P A G E 3V O L U M E 3 , I S S U E 2

Here are some things coming soon

or available now in the library that

you may find useful for your class.Social Studies

The Mental Floss History of the World

From the editors of the magazine

this is an irreverent romp through

history.

Math

The Math Curse

You probably already know about

this entertaining children’s picture

book, but for math-phobics it is still

a fantastic introduction to simple

mathematical thinking.

Related Arts

How Music Works

This is written by the former Talk-

ing Heads front-man David Byrne

and explores the relationship be-

tween culture and individual crea-

tivity in creating music.

Science

How to Make a Universe With 92

Ingredients

Want to make a universe? All you

need are the 92 ingredients found

in the periodic table of the ele-

ments. Might require some stirring.

Language Arts

The Snark Handbook: Clichés Edition

According to Stephen Fry, “It is a

cliché that most clichés are true,

but then like most clichés that

cliché is untrue.” What fun!

Lifehacker

Lifehacker is a website devoted to sharing hacks to make life a little

easier to live. They have things from the very low-tech like how to

stick to a budget to the very high tech of installing software on an

Android phone to prevent malware.

Fark

Be careful when recommending this site to your friends, a slip of the

tongue could prove embarrassing. This is a news aggregator of weird,

funny, and sometimes just plain stupid headlines from around the In-

ternet.

Technobrarian

Judy’s Junction

“Do not read, as

children do, to

amuse yourself, or like the ambitious,

for the purpose of

instruction. No,

read in order to

live.”

-Gustave Flaubert

Several years ago I was

involved in a study of the book, The Five

Languages of Love. The

author, Gary Chapman

argues that emotionally

people need to receive

love as well as give

love. He defines the

five languages of love

as : Physical Touch, Acts of Service, Quality

Time, Words of Affirmation, and Gifts. There

are several quizzes

available online thatyou can take in order

to learn which type of

love you prefer to

receive.

Chapman states that

in relationship to

others, you should

chose the love lan-

guage that others wish to receive rather than

the love language that you prefer for yourself.

He also addresses the idea that the love you

prefer to receive is not always the love youlike to give. For instance I prefer to receive

Words of Affirmation but I often show my

love with Gifts. Chapman thinks we should

tailor the kind of love we give to the person

on the receiving end.

This book helped me better understand my

family members and coworkers and has

helped me to try to be more specific in the

ways that I show others love and apprecia-

tion.

october 2013 library times

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