# data[].attributes.headline
Building a Literacy Culture: Fostering Trust Through Beliefs and Commitments

# data[].attributes.subject
Building a Literacy Culture: Fostering Trust Through Beliefs and Commitments

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
In the midst of my third year in my "new" school, I feel fortunate that I can reflect on my past experiences as a building principal in one elementary while leading a literacy initiative right now in my current building.

We started at Mineral Point by delving into the foundations of literacy instruction: the reading-writing connection. We are moving forward, feeling more comfortable with our pace and expectations regarding what to try and apply in our classrooms. Some might want to move forward more quickly than others, which seems common in schools.

This is a challenge as a building principal/literacy leader: What is the right pace in which to move an entire school toward a culture where every student is expected to become an independent reader and writer?

Answer: there is no right way. Many pathways can get you to the same destination. Yet it starts with trust, defined by Dr. Anthony Muhammad as "feeling confident in another person's ability to follow through on a commitment." People feel safer in these types of conditions to innovate.

To move toward a literacy culture as a whole faculty, trust has to be cultivated. Trust is founded on various elements of which many are tacit and hard to see. Two concrete ways to build trust is through examination of a school's beliefs and an agreed-upon set of professional commitments. Beliefs and commitments are commonly-held agreements about what we think and how we act. They are the foundation on which a culture sits upon when ensuring that all students are successful readers and writers. Beliefs and commitments are rudders that guide our work toward our goals.

I've written about examining literacy beliefs before; you can read about two recent experiences here and here. Regarding collective commitments, you can find this culture-building activity in Learning by Doing: A Handbook for Professional Learning Communities at Work (Solution Tree, 2016). I also shared about our school's collective commitments on my school blog.

School leaders need to be able to determine when a school is struggling with its culture, such as when teachers are feeling too much stress while implementing new practices. I rely on our instructional leadership team members plus other staff to help discern how faculty is feeling about our work. I am not a mind reader. We have to rely on others' perceptions regarding professional learning. This dialogue can be improved when we have concrete statements about what we believe and how we will conduct ourselves in accordance with these beliefs. They are words we live by.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Building a Literacy Culture: Fostering Trust Through Beliefs and Commitments

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In the midst of my third year in my "new" school, I feel fortunate that I can reflect on my past experiences as a building principal in one elementary while leading a literacy initiative right now in my current building. We started at Mineral Point by delving into the foundations of literacy instruction: the reading-writing connection.

# data[].attributes.headline
Environment Citzenship and Responsibilities of Citizens

# data[].attributes.subject
Environment Citzenship and Responsibilities of Citizens

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Authors' & illustrators' classroom roles

Because their talents are so diverse, WiSP authors and illustrators offer a variety of presentations. Some prefer to give an established talk. Others are happy to devise a program suited to your specific needs. The author or illustrator is a guest in your classroom and depends on you to handle class management.

Authors and illustrators can:

read aloud from their work and discuss how the story or poem was written

conduct writing workshops at all levels, for different genres

discuss the publishing process

discuss history and culture

demonstrate how books are illustrated, and

speak about editing, effective writing, and a host of other topics.

Cost to the school

Please include a cheque for $75, made out to the Minister of Finance, with your application form. This fee is non-refundable once a visit has been approved. WiSP funds will subsidize the administration fees for providing the author or illustrator with a $250 honorarium and expenses (based on current Government of New Brunswick rates) where appropriate.

If possible, please choose an author or illustrator located in your home district.

How to arrange a visit

On your application form, please include the names of up to three authors or illustrators. If you need support, contact the WiSP coordinator (see below).

Schools are encouraged to choose an author or illustrator from those listed in the WiSP guide. Click here for a list of members. Once you have funding, contact the author or illustrator directly to arrange a visit. Following the visit, please fill out the school feedback form and send to the WiSP coordinator (address below).

Please note: Applications for WiSP funding close each year on November 30.

Ginny Hill
Coordinator: Writers in the Schools Program
184 Hennessey Road, Moncton, NB E1A 6B3
Tel: (506) 859-1903 Fax: (506) 859-4079

School's guidelines

Advance preparation, participation and follow-through are essential elements of a successful author or illustrator visit. The following guidelines will help schools make the most of their WiSP event.

Once a school receives notification that an application has been accepted, the designated school coordinator will contact the selected author or illustrator.

Students must be introduced to the author's or illustrator's work before the visit. When setting up the day, check where the author's book(s) may be purchased, visit the school or public library, or search online for information. When students have a chance to become familiar with the author or illustrator in advance, the visit generates an air of excitement.

Before the big day, check with the author or illustrator about:

what equipment they need to support the presentation (e.g., sound system, extra chairs and tables, whiteboard or chalkboard)

preferred minimum and maximum number of students

venue description

schedule of presentations

length of each session

grade-level audience at each session, and

suggested focus for the presentations to ensure they align with grade-level curricular outcomes (e.g., research required to write historical fiction, prewriting strategies the author uses, inspiration or techniques used for illustrations).

Day of the visit

Ensure that the author or illustrator has received information such as where to park upon arrival and which entrance to use. If the visit is to span a lunch hour, provide information on meals available at the school.

Arrange for student greeters to meet and welcome the author or illustrator at the door. These students can help to carry presentation materials, provide directions to the office for sign in, and make the guest feel at home in the school.

When the author or illustrator signs in, he or she should receive a visitor's tag and a name tag.

The teacher who organizes the visit will provide the author or illustrator with a schedule for the day, and ensure that the visitor receives adequate nutrition and lunch breaks.

Teachers are required to remain at the presentation and be responsible for ensuring appropriate student conduct. The teacher can facilitate or guide a question period. He or she will also continue discussions about the presentation content after the session is over. This helps to ensure that the benefits of the visit last long after the event has ended.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
For Schools @ Writers' Federation of New Brunswick

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Because their talents are so diverse, WiSP authors and illustrators offer a variety of presentations. Some prefer to give an established talk. Others are happy to devise a program suited to your specific needs. The author or illustrator is a guest in your classroom and depends on you to handle class management.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
What I Was Reading:
In The Women's National Team Taught Canada How to Be a Soccer Country, Harley Rustad, whose sister played for Canada from 1999-2008, analyzes the impact of the women's national team on Canadian soccer fandom.

This paragraph is about Canada's reaction to the team's gold-medal win at the Summer Olympic Games in Tokyo:

Canada won gold. In soccer. I cried. I watched Sinclair-who was nineteen during that breakout 2002 tournament-celebrate nearly two decades later with an Olympic gold medal. I wasn't alone. While more than 4.4 million Canadians watched at home on the CBC, no fans were in the stadium that night in Tokyo, that second summer of the COVID-19 pandemic. Some might have seen that victory as anticlimactic: to win gold without a crowd watching and screaming. But, in a way, it was perfect: the exuberance and exaltations of the team weren't muffled by the screams of a jubilant horde. We screamed at home, we cried at home. They screamed on the field, they cried on the field-and we heard it all.
What Moves I Notice the Author Making: Possibilities for Writers:

Notice and name other interesting craft moves in this passage.

Watch for interesting sentences varieties and structures in texts they are reading.

Identify other paragraph organization and structure techniques they find in their reading.

Find places in their reading where the writer uses repetition for effect.

Revise a draft in their writer's notebook by incorporating some of the craft moves you notice in this excerpt.

Use this as a model for experimenting with rhythm and flow in a paragraph.

What I was reading:
Be a Good Ancestor by Leona Prince and Gabrielle Prince; illustrated by Carla Joseph

"Rooted in Indigenous teachings, this stunning picture book encourages readers of all ages to consider the ways in which they live in connection to the world around them and to think deeply about their behaviors." (Goodreads)

Available on SORA
What Moves I Notice the Author Making:
Here is an example from the text:

Be a good Ancestor with your neighbours Neighbours become friends Friends become communities Communities become nations Nations become allies

Possibilities for Writers:

What I was Reading: The Lathe of Heaven by Ursula K. LeGuin
"In a future world racked by violence and environmental catastrophes, George Orr wakes up one day to discover that his dreams have the ability to alter reality. He seeks help from Dr. William Haber, a psychiatrist who immediately grasps the power George wields. Soon George must preserve reality itself as Dr. Haber becomes adept at manipulating George's dreams for his own purposes.
The Lathe of Heaven is an eerily prescient novel from award-winning author Ursula K. Le Guin that masterfully addresses the dangers of power and humanity's self-destructiveness, questioning the nature of reality itself. It is a classic of the science fiction genre." - https://www.ursulakleguin.com/the-lathe-of-heaven

The novel starts with the following three paragraphs:

Current-borne, wave-flung, tugged hugely by the whole might of ocean, the jellyfish drifts in the tidal abyss. The light shines through it, and the dark enters it. Borne, flung, tugged from anywhere to anywhere, for in the deep sea there is no compass but nearer and farther, higher and lower, the jellyfish hangs and sways; pulses move slight and quick within it, as the vast diurnal pulses beat in the moon-driven sea. Hanging, swaying, pulsing, the most vulnerable and insubstantial creature, it has for its defense the violence and power of the whole ocean, to which it has entrusted its being, its going, and its will.

But here rise the stubborn continents. The shelves of gravel and the cliffs of rock break from water baldly into air, that dry, terrible outer space of radiance and instability, where there is no support for life. And now, now the currents mislead and the waves betray, breaking their endless circle, to leap up in loud foam against rock and air, breaking...

What will the creature made all of sea-drift do on the dry sand of daylight; what will the mind do, each morning, waking?

What Moves I Notice the Author Making:

The use of metaphor (the jellyfish) to set up the premise of the novel. I have to admit that this was a bit jarring when I read on and realized that the book was about a dystopian future society. However, I kept thinking of the jellyfish as I was reading - so it was a very effective lead.

The use of hyphens - current-borne, wave-flung (see our conventions inquiry on compound modifiers for more mentor texts to study)

The vocabulary in these paragraphs could be studied for days. (diurnal, radiance, insubstantial, for example)

Repetition - the use of borne, flung, tugged in both the first and second sentences. The use of hang, sway, pulse in two sentences as well. And the repetition happens in the sentence immediately following, not later on.

The first paragraph is describing the jellyfish, the second paragraph is describing the obstacles and the third is questioning if the jellyfish will be able to cope with such change.

The second sentence in the first paragraph has a semi-colon. It is a wonderful sentence to look at carefully.

The last paragraph is one sentence, in the form of a question. It includes a semi-colon that joins two sentences.

The sentence lengths are varied.

The second paragraph ends with an ellipse.

Possibilities for Writers:

What I Was Reading:
I have been slowly reading through One Long River of Song: Notes on Wonder by Brian Doyle. This compilation of some of the best of Doyle's writing, celebrates the wonder we can find in everyday moments when we stop, look, and listen. I'm trying to read only a few essays at a time and follow Doyle's lead by using them as an invitation to look for the wonder (and the possibilities for writing) in my own surroundings.

"The Old Typewriter in the Basement" is one of my favorites from this collection. Written as a response to a question about how he became a writer, Doyle celebrates the impact of his father's writing career on his own.
What Moves I Notice the Writer Making: Possibilities for Writers:

Margin Notes © All Rights Reserved
Design by Carla Izumi Bamford
Powered by Wordpress

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
What I Was Reading: In The Women's National Team Taught Canada How to Be a Soccer Country, Harley Rustad, whose sister played for Canada from 1999-2008, analyzes the impact of the women's national team on Canadian soccer fandom. This paragraph is about Canada's reaction to the team's gold-medal win at the Summer Olympic Games in Tokyo: Canada won gold.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
In Kelly Gallagher's high school classroom in Anaheim, California, students are not only learning to comprehend difficult novels and texts, they are developing the skills and behaviors of lifelong readers. Drawing from his books Reading Reasons and Deeper Reading, Kelly's video brings effective reading strategies to life. Presenting examples of both small- and whole-group discussions, Building Adolescent Readers demonstrates how to engage students with a variety of texts, teaching them what it means to be a good reader.

Program 1: The Six Building Blocks
Before we teach students how to read better, we need to help them understand why they should be readers. Kelly outlines his six blocks for motivating students to read more-both recreationally and academically. He models specific classroom lessons that help students to internalize the value of reading.

Program 2: First Draft Reading
Adolescent readers often adopt one of two universal strategies when they are confronted with difficult text: they either quit or dutifully continue, even though they do not understand what they are reading. In this program Kelly models a number of useful strategies to help students not only monitor their comprehension, but to also fix their comprehension when it begins to falter.

Program 3: Second Draft Reading
Revisiting a text helps students uncover its deeper layers of meaning. Kelly demonstrates numerous strategies that help students move past an "I read it once; I'm done" mentality and into richer second draft reading. He also discusses the importance assessment plays in planning an effective reading lesson.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In Kelly Gallagher's high school classroom in Anaheim, California, students are not only learning to comprehend difficult novels and texts, they are developing the skills and behaviors of lifelong readers. Drawing from his books Reading Reasons and Deeper Reading, Kelly's video brings effective reading strategies to life.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
It's an old-fashioned mortice key, dull silver. He keeps it on his keychain next to the keys to his apartment and his Toyota Camry. The mortice key opens his old house in Rwanda, a place he left behind three years ago. But even that wasn't his real house; his real house he abandoned suddenly, fearing for his life, twenty-one years ago.

Roger fled the Democratic Republic of Congo (then Zaire) in 1996, running from militia massacres against ethnic Tutsi like himself. Once he crossed the border into Rwanda, he lived in Gihembe refugee camp, where more than fifteen thousand Congolese refugees lived on a hundred acres. Roger spent his adolescence in a home that was not his home: a claustrophobic hillside clotted with red-mud walls and tin roofs. In his home country, Roger knew to lock his doors against the militias, who went door to door looking for Tutsi. In the camp, he protected his family's few possessions with lock and key.

In 2014, Roger walked off the plane and onto the famous sea-green carpet at Portland International Airport. In his pocket was the key to his house in Gihembe. Roger is a soft-spoken man with a brilliant, surprising smile. When he describes his reason for bringing the key, he breaks into that shy smile. "I kept it so when I get in this big house in US, I can remember how I lived," he says. "I brought it to remind me of how I used to unlock my small house in the camp."

Now he lives with his wife and children in an apartment in Gresham. He has a solid door that locks, couches, an oven, and a job at a laundromat. But he carries the old silver key with him anyway, a reminder of where he came from and what he left behind.
Solange Niyo nsaba carried a basket, her wedding cloth, and a photograph.
Like her husband, Roger, Solange spent her teenage years as a refugee in Rwanda. She married him in 2005, at age twenty-two. That was her ninth year in the camp. For their wedding, she received a brightly colored kitenge cloth from her relatives to make the traditional wrap dress reserved for mothers. The bright oranges and blues stood out in the muddy campgrounds.

Her first child was born in Gihembe refugee camp. It was a tough place to live as a young woman, but an even tougher place to be a mother. Meals were maize and beans handed out monthly by aid organizations, with not enough protein to keep children healthy. Because of poor nutrition and sanitation, disease was common. To get water, the women filled big plastic jugs from a tap, but only at allotted times.

Solange endured it: even a decade after leaving Congo, it still wasn't safe to go back, she says. And the militias back home had taken their cattle, the tangible wealth of a Tutsi family, so they had nothing to return to.

Solange calls her basket agatete. Balanced on the folds of kitenge cloth wrapped around her head, it carried extra food to her children. When someone was sick with malaria, it carried medicine. She wasn't sure if America would have proper agatete; hers is bright blue, flexible plastic, strong enough to withstand a toddler's grasp or the weight of groceries. Just in case, she brought it with her on the plane. She still uses it for shopping at the Mexican grocery store around the corner from her apartment.
Listen to Solange talk about her experience. Ammar Abo Nidr carried a calculator and a photograph of his nieces.
When Solange came to Oregon in 2014, she left behind her entire family: her mother, two sisters, and two brothers. They are still in Gihembe, awaiting visas, and she misses them deeply. However, her Oregon family continues to grow: Solange's youngest daughter, Blessing, was the first of the family to be born in the United States.

It was the night before Eid al-Adha, the celebration of Abraham's sacrifice to God, a time when families and neighbors get together to feast. Ammar was walking through his hometown of Baghdad to meet up with a friend. He had endured the war, graduated college, and was finally working in his dream job as a telecommunications engineer, traveling the country to set up cell towers.

A car pulled up alongside him on the street. A man rolled down the window and began asking about unfamiliar names. The back door cracked open. Ammar sensed something wrong; he pushed the door closed and ran. Bullets ricocheted off the buildings, narrowly missing him.

He hid out with relatives, and as soon as a visa was ready, fled to Jordan. He asked his mother to pack him a few things, including his scientific calculator: "The calculator was part of me. I used it almost every day in my job," he says.

Ammar worked retail in a Jordanian cell phone shop while he endured the intensive two-to-three-year screening process necessary to come to the United States as a refugee. Then one day he received a call from his sister: his older brother had been shot four times at the door of his house. Distraught, helpless, Ammar tried to return to his family in Iraq, but his parents threatened never to speak to him again if he did: they had already lost one son and would not risk losing another.
Hear Ammar talk about his experience. Chhabi Koirala carried stamps.
When he finally arrived in the United States in 2016, Ammar brought with him a photograph of his deceased brother's three children. He has never met the youngest, who was born after he left Iraq. He talks to his nieces twice a week on Skype, feeling a responsibility to be both "an uncle and a father" from afar. And he still has his calculator, a Casio FX-991ES Plus, which he hopes to use someday as an engineer here in Oregon.

He loved stamps. He collected them in books and was always on the lookout for interesting postage. In the summer of 1991, he was working in Thimphu, the capital city of Bhutan. His brother, who worked at the post office, invited him to come take a look at some new arrivals. Chhabi had just picked up a few new stamps when a neighbor from his home village told him his parents had fled across the border. The police would be looking for him, the neighbor warned. He needed to leave now.

In the late 1980s, the Himalayan nation of Bhutan adopted policies aimed at creating a distinct national identity. The new policies targeted minority religion, language, and culture, and led to demonstrations by ethnic Nepalis and other minority groups. The government responded with arrests, torture, and the expulsion of Nepali communities.

Chhabi left immediately. Fearing arrest, he didn't have time to go home; he had only the money in his wallet and the six new stamps in his pocket. He was settled at Beldangi camp in Nepal, among tens of thousands of other ethnic Nepali refugees. He was given a small hut made of thatch and bamboo with mud floors. He ate rice and lentils. There was no electricity, no running water. He stayed there for eighteen years.

Chhabi wanted to go back home, and he paid close attention to the negotiations between Bhutan and Nepal, which would not allow the refugees to integrate into larger society. But as the decades passed, he got married and started a family. Raising kids without milk, eggs, medicine, or job opportunities, he began to make compromises. They would not wait out the endless negotiations. They would apply to come to America.
Hear Chhabi talk about his experience
Chhabi's family came to Portland in 2008. The only things he still has from his home country are the six stamps and a single ngultrum, a Bhutanese dollar. He says the stamps remind him of his childhood in Bhutan: "I started there. I have my friends there. I am from Bhutan."

Caitlin Dwyer lives in Portland. She writes about education, identity, and boundary-crossing.

Kim Oanh Nguyen is an award-winning photographer based in Portland. She has worked for the Internews Network, USAID, and other publications.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
It's an old-fashioned mortice key, dull silver. He keeps it on his keychain next to the keys to his apartment and his Toyota Camry. The mortice key opens his old house in Rwanda, a place he left behind three years ago.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Standing at a refugee stop in the Austrian town of Nickelsdorf, near the Hungarian border, 17-year-old Ahmad explains that he no longer owns much of anything. After fleeing their home in Deir ez-Zor, Syria, Ahmad and his family hope to end up "in Germany, Finland, Sweden" - whichever country will take them in. As Ahmad recounts how his family had to abandon all of their belongings - carrying only small packs of clothing with them - he unwraps a chocolate wafer handed out by Austrian volunteers. And though he has next to nothing, Ahmad breaks the chocolate in two and politely offers me half.

This small, but remarkable act of sharing was something photographer James Mollison and I would come to witness over and over as we interviewed refugees on a recent trip to Austria. Though everyone we met had an urgent need - for a hot meal, for a working phone signal, for information - many were more than willing to share what little they did have, whether it was their time or their stories.

One by one, refugees agreed to stop and have their portraits taken by James, in a makeshift studio he had assembled in a tent, alongside discarded wool blankets and ruined articles of clothing. We heard story after story of smugglers shepherding desperate refugees into tiny, ramshackle dinghies and then forcing them to throw their only bags overboard, in order to prevent the boats from sinking. "We did it to save our lives," says Marie, a 32-year-old woman who had traveled from the Democratic Republic of Congo. As a result, many were left without papers or passports. Yet, amazingly, many people were willing to hand over, for a few instants, their last remaining possessions - a beloved watch; vials of insulin - so that James could photograph them.

Some people we met were even eager to show us what they carried: cell phones or digital cameras with photos of loved ones who they had been separated from during the journey. These devices, and the photos on them, held their greatest hopes of being reunited with a missing mother, a lost son or a wife, two-months pregnant and nowhere to be found.

Of course, there were also several people who were initially mystified by our assignment. Why did James want photographs of old clothing or an ordinary phone charger? But once he explained that we wanted to capture what they thought was worth holding on to throughout the grueling and often dangerous route into Europe, people got it and recounted in even greater detail the stories behind their objects. And even if they still didn't quite understand our interest, many refugees would still hand over their bags with a smile, before they went on their way, onto the next leg of their journey.
James Mollison is a commercial and documentary photographer based in Venice, Italy. Caroline Smith, who edited this photo essay, is a special projects editor at TIME. Megan Gibson is a writer for TIME based in London. Follow her on Twitter @MeganJGibson.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
See the Objects Refugees Carry on Their Journey to Europe

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Standing at a refugee stop in the Austrian town of Nickelsdorf, near the Hungarian border, 17-year-old Ahmad explains that he no longer owns much of anything. After fleeing their home in Deir ez-Zor, Syria, Ahmad and his family hope to end up "in Germany, Finland, Sweden" - whichever country will take them in.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The question of why we read and what books actually do for us is as old as the written word itself, and as attractive. Galileo saw reading as a way of having superhuman powers. For Kafka, books were "the axe for the frozen sea within us"; Carl Sagan held them as "proof that humans are capable of working magic"; James Baldwin found in them a way to change one's destiny; for Polish Nobel laureate Wis&lstrok;awa Szymborska, they stood as our ultimate frontier of freedom.

But one of the finest, most dimensional inquiries into the significance of books and the role of reading in human life comes from Neil Gaiman in a beautiful piece titled "Why Our Future Depends on Libraries, Reading and Daydreaming."

Originally delivered as a lecture for The Reading Agency, an English charity devoted to giving kids from all backgrounds an equal chance at the good life by fostering an early love of reading, the speech was later included in The View from the Cheap Seats: Selected Nonfiction (public library) - the terrific compendium that gave us Gaiman on the power of cautionary questions.

Gaiman considers how the act of reading changes us, "what it's good for":

Once in New York, I listened to a talk about the building of private prisons - a huge growth industry in America. The prison industry needs to plan its future growth - how many cells are they going to need? How many prisoners are there going to be, fifteen years from now? And they found they could predict it very easily, using a pretty simple algorithm, based about asking what percentage of ten- and eleven-year-olds couldn't read. And certainly couldn't read for pleasure.

Echoing Madeleine L'Engle's spirited 1983 lecture on creativity, censorship, and the duty of children's books, Gaiman considers how otherwise well-intentioned adults might thwart the seed of that life-enlarging and sometimes even life-saving passion for reading. In a passage of particular urgency for parents and educators, he writes:

I don't think there is such a thing as a bad book for children. Every now and again it becomes fashionable among some adults to point at a subset of children's books, a genre, perhaps, or an author, and to declare them bad books, books that children should be stopped from reading. I've seen it happen over and over; Enid Blyton was declared a bad author, so was R. L. Stine, so were dozens of others. Comics have been decried as fostering illiteracy.

It's tosh. It's snobbery and it's foolishness.

There are no bad authors for children, that children like and want to read and seek out, because every child is different. They can find the stories they need to, and they bring themselves to stories. A hackneyed, worn-out idea isn't hackneyed and worn out to someone encountering it for the first time. You don't discourage children from reading because you feel they are reading the wrong thing. Fiction you do not like is the gateway drug to other books you may prefer them to read. And not everyone has the same taste as you.

Well-meaning adults can easily destroy a child's love of reading: stop them reading what they enjoy, or give them worthy-but-dull books that you like, the twenty- first-century equivalents of Victorian "improving" literature. You'll wind up with a generation convinced that reading is uncool and, worse, unpleasant.

Gaiman then turns to the second key function of literature - its unparalleled ability to foster empathy. In a sentiment that calls to mind Rebecca Solnit's inspired assertion that "a book is a heart that beats in the chest of another," he writes:

When you watch TV or see a film, you are looking at things happening to other people. Prose fiction is something you build up from twenty-six letters and a handful of punctuation marks, and you, and you alone, using your imagination, create a world, and people it and look out through other eyes. You get to feel things, visit places and worlds you would never otherwise know. You learn that everyone else out there is a me, as well. You're being someone else, and when you return to your own world, you're going to be slightly changed.

Empathy is a tool for building people into groups, for allowing us to function as more than self-obsessed individuals.

In a sentiment reminiscent of Ursula K. Le Guin's electrifying case for how imaginative storytelling expands our scope of the possible, Gaiman points to a third essential function of fiction in human life - its ability to introduce us to different versions of the world by envisioning alternate possibilities for the way things are:

Fiction can show you a different world. It can take you somewhere you've never been. Once you've visited other worlds, like those who ate fairy fruit, you can never be entirely content with the world that you grew up in. And discontent is a good thing: people can modify and improve their worlds, leave them better, leave them different, if they're discontented.

But perhaps the surest way to foil a budding love of reading is to cut off access to books altogether, and there is no greater hedge against that hazard than the library - that sacred place Thoreau once extolled as a glorious "wilderness of books." ( "When a library is open, no matter its size or shape," Bill Moyers wrote in his foreword to a recent photographic love letter to libraries, "democracy is open, too.") Gaiman recounts the formative role of the library in his own life:

I was lucky. I had an excellent local library growing up. I had the kind of parents who could be persuaded to drop me off in the library on their way to work in my summer holidays, and the kind of librarians who did not mind a small, unaccompanied boy heading back into the children's library every morning and working his way through the card catalogue, looking for books with ghosts or magic or rockets in them, looking for vampires or detectives or witches or wonders. And when I had finished reading the children's library I began on the adult books.

Gaiman was fortunate that the librarians tasked with nurturing his love of reading were the kind who inspire poems and not the kind who tried to bar pioneering astronaut Ronald McNair from his childhood library. With an affectionate eye to the librarians of his youth, Gaiman reflects:

They were good librarians. They liked books and they liked the books being read. They taught me how to order books from other libraries on interlibrary loans. They had no snobbery about anything I read. They just seemed to like that there was this wide-eyed little boy who loved to read, and they would talk to me about the books I was reading, they would find me other books in a series, they would help. They treated me as another reader - nothing less, nothing more - which meant they treated me with respect. I was not used to being treated with respect as an eight-year-old.

Libraries are about Freedom. Freedom to read, freedom of ideas, freedom of communication. They are about education (which is not a process that finishes the day we leave school or university), about entertainment, about making safe spaces, and about access to information.

Writing nearly a century after Hermann Hesse's magnificent manifesto for why the book will never lose its magic no matter how technology evolves, Gaiman borrows a prefect metaphor to substantiate his belief that books will endure in and perhaps past the age of screens:

As Douglas Adams once pointed out to me, over twenty years before the Kindle showed up, a physical book is like a shark. Sharks are old: there were sharks in the ocean before the dinosaurs. And the reason there are still sharks around is that sharks are better at being sharks than anything else is. Physical books are tough, hard to destroy, bath resistant, solar operated, feel good in your hand: they are good at being books, and there will always be a place for them.

But Gaiman takes care not to confuse the medium with the message - it is reading that counts, and its rewards are medium-agnostic. He writes:

We need libraries. We need books. We need literate citizens.

I do not care - I do not believe it matters - whether these books are paper or digital, whether you are reading on a scroll or scrolling on a screen. The content is the important thing.

But a book is also the content, and that's important.

Books are the way that we communicate with the dead. The way that we learn lessons from those who are no longer with us, that humanity has built on itself, progressed, made knowledge incremental rather than something that has to be relearned, over and over. There are tales that are older than most countries, tales that have long outlasted the cultures and the buildings in which they were first told.

These tales have survived on the shoulders of people who have done their part to transmit them forward - something Gaiman examined in his excellent lecture on how stories last. He considers what it would take to uphold our own responsibilities to the future - as readers, as writers, as citizens, and as members of the storytelling species:

I believe we have an obligation to read for pleasure, in private and in public places. If we read for pleasure, if others see us reading, then we learn, we exercise our imaginations. We show others that reading is a good thing.

We have an obligation to support libraries. To use libraries, to encourage others to use libraries, to protest the closure of libraries. If you do not value libraries then you do not value information or culture or wisdom. You are silencing the voices of the past and you are damaging the future.

We have an obligation to read aloud to our children. To read them things they enjoy. To read to them stories we are already tired of. To do the voices, to make it interesting, and not to stop reading to them just because they learn to read to themselves. We have an obligation to use reading-aloud time as bonding time, as time when no phones are being checked, when the distractions of the world are put aside.

We have an obligation to use the language. To push ourselves: to find out what words mean and how to deploy them, to communicate clearly, to say what we mean. We must not attempt to freeze language, or to pretend it is a dead thing that must be revered, but we should use it as a living thing, that flows, that borrows words, that allows meanings and pronunciations to change with time.

We writers - and especially writers for children, but all writers - have an obligation to our readers: it's the obligation to write true things, especially important when we are creating tales of people who do not exist in places that never were - to understand that truth is not in what happens but in what it tells us about who we are. Fiction is the lie that tells the truth, after all. We have an obligation not to bore our readers, but to make them need to turn the pages. One of the best cures for a reluctant reader, after all, is a tale they cannot stop themselves from reading. And while we must tell our readers true things and give them weapons and give them armor and pass on whatever wisdom we have gleaned from our short stay on this green world, we have an obligation not to preach, not to lecture, not to force predigested morals and messages down our readers' throats like adult birds feeding their babies pre-masticated maggots; and we have an obligation never, ever, under any circumstances, to write anything for children to read that we would not want to read ourselves.

We have an obligation to understand and to acknowledge that as writers for children we are doing important work, because if we mess it up and write dull books that turn children away from reading and from books, we've lessened our own future and diminished theirs.

Writing more than two centuries after William Blake's searing defense of the imagination, Gaiman points to the same supreme human faculty as our greatest obligation:

We all - adults and children, writers and readers - have an obligation to daydream. We have an obligation to imagine. It is easy to pretend that nobody can change anything, that we are in a world in which society is huge and the individual is less than nothing: an atom in a wall, a grain of rice in a rice field. But the truth is, individuals change their world over and over, individuals make the future, and they do it by imagining that things can be different.

[...]

Just look around this room... Everything you can see, including the walls, was, at some point, imagined. Someone decided it might be easier to sit on a chair than on the ground and imagined the chair. Someone had to imagine a way that I could talk to you in London right now without us all getting rained on. This room and the things in it, and all the other things in this building, in this city, exist because, over and over and over, people imagined things. They daydreamed, they pondered, they made things that didn't quite work, they described things that didn't yet exist to people who laughed at them.

And then, in time, they succeeded. Political movements, personal movements, all begin with people imagining another way of existing.

Gaiman's final obligation is of especially resonant relevance today:

We have an obligation to tell our politicians what we want, to vote against politicians of whatever party who do not understand the value of reading in creating worthwhile citizens, who do not want to act to preserve and protect knowledge and encourage literacy. This is not a matter of party politics. This is a matter of common humanity.

Complement this particular portion of the wholly magnificent The View from the Cheap Seats with Hermann Hesse on the three types of readers, Ursula K. Le Guin on the sacredness of public libraries, and Virginia Woolf on how to read a book, then revisit Gaiman on creative courage, his eight rules of writing, and his philosophical dream, animated.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Neil Gaiman on Why We Read and What Books Do for the Human Experience

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The question of why we read and what books actually do for us is as old as the written word itself, and as attractive. Galileo saw reading as a way of having superhuman powers.

# data[].attributes.body
by Lester Laminack

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Teacher Talk: Lester Laminack Reads Saturdays and Teacakes | Scholastic

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Lester Laminack shows kids how to explore a text more deeply by reading aloud his own picture book, Saturdays and Teacakes.

# data[].attributes.headline
Off to Class: Incredible and Unusual Schools around the World

# data[].attributes.subject
Off to Class: Incredible and Unusual Schools around the World

# data[].attributes.headline
Picture books to Inspire Word Detectives

# data[].attributes.subject
Picture books to Inspire Word Detectives

# data[].attributes.body
George Ella Lyons

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
100 Mentor Texts to Jumpstart Your Students' Thinking and Writing

In The Quickwrite Handbook, master teacher Linda Rief shares 100 compelling mentor texts and shows how to use each one as a powerful tool for sparking successful writing.

"Quickwrites-writing to find writing-are a powerful teaching tool that help students find ideas, discover their voices, and build their confidence as they discover they have important things to say."

Helping students put words on a page can be hard enough. "I don't have anything to write about!" they say. And when writing does happen, how do you help them develop these ideas into more effective pieces?

A powerful tool to jumpstart writing

In The Quickwrite Handbook, master teacher Linda Rief shares 100 compelling mentor texts and shows how to use each one as a powerful tool for sparking successful writing. Each mentor text includes "Try this" suggestions for inviting students to get started. You'll also find "Interludes" woven throughout: examples of quickwrites that students crafted into more fully developed pieces.

These mentor texts are curated in four categories:

Seeing Inward: How do students view themselves?

Leaning Outward: What do students consider when they step outside of themselves?

Beyond Self: What do students notice and wonder about the world at large?

Looking Back: How does reflection help students grow into more articulate, thoughtful citizens of the world?

Quickwrites go beyond writing prompts

The pages of this book champion Linda's wise words: "Quickwrites-writing to find writing-are a powerful teaching tool that help students find ideas, discover their voices, and build their confidence as they discover they have important things to say."
Quickwrites are more than a set of formulaic prompts. They are opportunities for students to use another writer's words to stimulate their thinking and-through writing themselves-to discover a voice they didn't know they had.

(click any section below to continue reading)

Reviews

"This book will move your writing, your student writers, and your teaching to new places."

-Sara K. Ahmed, author of Being the Change and coauthor of Upstanders
"Linda Rief models the essential moves a teacher must make to increase engagement and joy in writing in The Quickwrite Handbook. You simply must have this book."
-Penny Kittle, English teacher, coauthor of 180 Days and author of Book Love
"In this valuable resource, Linda Rief shares the models from literature that inspire her students and exactly how she uses them. The mentor texts in this book are jumping-off places. They build vision for what strong writing looks and feels and tastes like. They provide the necessary scaffolding that will allow young writers to outgrow themselves and create something they (and we) can be proud of."
-Ralph Fletcher, author of Joy Write and coauthor of Writing Workshop
"Linda offers each of us a clear and concise guide to understanding why quickwrites work and how to give them power in our daily practice."
-Lester Laminack, coauthor of Writers ARE Readers and Bullying Hurts

Related PD Services

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In The Quickwrite Handbook, master teacher Linda Rief shares 100 compelling mentor texts and shows how to use each one as a powerful tool for sparking

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
We've been welcoming student writers to our site for years, inviting them to post thoughts to our daily prompts, analyze multimedia compositions in our live-moderated forums, and submit formal work to our many annual contests.

But there has long been a missing piece. Though we've provided plenty of places to practice, we've only occasionally published resources to help teach young people how to write.

This school year, we're making up for that gap with a new series called Mentor Texts.

If the term is new to you, here is how the National Writing Project defines it:

Mentor texts are pieces of literature that you - both teacher and student - can return to and reread for many different purposes. They are texts to be studied and imitated ... Mentor texts help students to take risks and be different writers tomorrow than they are today. It helps them to try out new strategies and formats. They should be [texts] that students can relate to and can even read independently or with some support.

And of course, a mentor text doesn't have to be in the form of a book - a mentor text might be a poem, a newspaper article, song lyrics, comic strips, manuals, essays, almost anything.

Thanks to the 1,000-plus fresh articles published every week on NYTimes.com, we're in no danger of running out of possible material. In fact, the hardest part of creating this series may be choosing from among too many good options.

In general, though, each edition in the series will ...

Spotlight an excellent piece of writing published in The New York Times, whether on the front page or from sections like Opinion, Arts, Science, Sports, Business, Food, Travel or Style.

Try to demystify for students the effective craft moves writers make, then provide exercises that invite them to try those same moves in their own work.

Show students how the writing genres they study in school can be used in real-world contexts.

You can find the whole series in this column, beginning with several intended to support narrative writing. We've created these - on telling short, memorable stories; using details to show rather than tell; crafting a narrative arc; and more - to accompany the first unit of our yearlong Writing Curriculum, which will culminate in a Personal Narrative Essay Contest for students. Over the course of the school year, we'll also be creating Mentor Text editions to support argumentative, informational and analytic writing, among other genres.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
We've been welcoming student writers to our site for years, inviting them to post thoughts to our daily prompts, analyze multimedia compositions in our live-moderated forums, and submit formal work to our many annual contests. But there has long been a missing piece.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Special Offer: Save 30% off our list price automatically when you buy 15 or more.

Part One
Ch. 1: Increasing Engagement Through Choice of Genre
Ch 2: Choice of Genre Through Craft and Process Studies
Ch. 3: Teaching in Craft and Process Studies

Part Two: The Units
Ch. 4: Launching Writing Workshop: Fostering Self-Direction
Ch. 5: Reading Like a Writer
Ch. 6: Using Strategies to Find Topics
Ch. 7: Finding and Developing Independent Writing Projects
Ch. 8: Launching the Use of a Writer's Notebook
Ch. 9: Independent Genre Study
Ch. 10: Planning
Ch. 11: How to Have Better Peer Conferences
Ch. 12: Revision
Ch. 13: Genre Overview
Ch. 14: Illustration Study
Ch. 15: Using Illustrations and Text to Create Meaning in the Upper Grades
Ch. 16: How to Make Paragraphing Decisions
Ch 17: General Craft Study
Ch. 18: Using Punctuation as a Crafting Tool
Ch. 19: Using Text Structures as Crafting Tools
Ch. 20: Author Study

"How do you ensure that children become engaged enthusiastic writers? Read Matt Glover's book Craft and Process Studies. Delightful to read and highly practical, it shows us how to teach writing so that children become and continue to be engaged while expanding their writing repertoire. It is the antidote to orthodoxy in the writers' workshop. Thoroughly illustrated with concrete examples and videos, it offers multiple versions of units as flexible frameworks inviting us to innovate responsively and purposefully."-Peter Johnston

"After reading Craft and Process Studies, teachers will walk away with a thousand ideas to help them 'genre bust.' That's my term! Matt's argument that students need significant periods of time to write outside of conventional genres is strong, rational, and compelling."-Ellin Oliver Keene

"In Craft and Process Studies, master teacher Matt Glover recovers a key, maybe the key, principle of writing instruction-choice. Too often, students are marched through genre units, often presented as distinct types, with little opportunity to write about what matters most to them. Genre becomes not a resource, but a constraint. A means becomes an end. Matt retains the idea of a units of study, focusing on processes and issues of craft that can apply to whatever genre the student might choose. In the best tradition of mentor texts, these units build insights inductively, by a careful study of what authors actually do. What's more-we get to see Matt in action, conducting conferences and mini lessons in over forty video clips."-Thomas Newkirk

"Matt has long been a passionate advocate for student choice, and in this book he shows teachers how to put choice at the center of all their planning and decision making. What a gift to be able to learn from Matt's years of experience doing this work in so many different classrooms. There's no question you will think so much more expansively about the teaching of writing after reading this book. If you've ever felt like your students were boxed-in by the narrow confines of genre study after genre study, you'll find so many possibilities for breaking out of that box and supporting student writers with smart, bold studies that lift the level of their work in genres they have chosen for themselves."-Katie Wood Ray

"Matt Glover's Craft and Process Studies is my new favorite book on the teaching of writing! Not only does Matt make a compelling-and essential-argument for including units of study in our writing curriculums that give students the opportunity to choose the genres in which they write, but he also shows us how to do this by detailing seventeen beautifully realized units of study on process and craft." -Carl Anderson

"Writing is a content area, and Matt's generous, joyous, crystal-clear, and thoughtful compendium of all things worth teaching about craft and process in addition to genres, will help teachers build a compelling and robust year of learning for young writers. Stunningly, if students could be in classrooms that follow his map for how such units could go, I believe that genre knowledge would take care of itself! After you read and underline every other sentence, as I did, you will want to meet with your colleagues immediately to begin planning your next writing study."-Katherine Bomer

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Special Offer: Save 30% off our list price automatically when you buy 15 or more. Part One Ch. 1: Increasing Engagement Through Choice of Genre Ch 2: Choice of Genre Through Craft and Process Studies Ch. 3: Teaching in Craft and Process Studies Part Two: The Units Ch.

# data[].attributes.body
Authors talk about their craft.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Students can learn about an author's craft by studying a stack of texts. An author's process can feel hidden since it isn't spelled out on the page. On this site I've collected links to video clips of authors talking about their process. These clips can be used as a part of any writing workshop unit of study, but they will be particularly helpful in supporting certain process studies. You'll find clips here related to five units: Finding Ideas, Using a Writer's Notebook, Planning, Peer Conferring and Revision. You'll notice that some of the clips can be used in more than one unit. For example, in the clip of Will Hillenbrand in the Peer Conferring section, he mentions how he finds ideas and uses his notebook as well as who he talks to about his writing.

I'll be adding links periodically- some already available online, and some from interviews I'm conducting, so check back often. Find me on Twitter @mattglover123 for updates. I've started with these units but hope to expand to include links related to additional units.

You can help add to the collection as well. If you know of a link/clip that could be added to this site, click on the link on the right under Want To Help. Also, if you are having an author or illustrator visit your school and would be willing to interview them and share the video (with their permission of course), click on the link on the right for possible interview questions. You might even have students interview the author (see the Nicola Davies clips.)

This site was sparked by my interest in the role of choice in increasing student engagement. My hope is that these clips help your students strengthen their identities as authors.

Matt
This website was created by Matt Glover with the support of Erik Wallace. You can see the services Erik provides

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Students can learn about an author's craft by studying a stack of texts. An author's process can feel hidden since it isn't spelled out on the page. On this site I've collected links to video clips of authors talking about their process. These clips can be used as a part of any writing workshop unit [...]

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
1. A Classroom Where Mentors Matter

2. Developing a Mentor Text Habit of Mind

3. Moving from Mentor Texts to Writing Lessons

4. Introducing Students to Mentor Texts

5. Mentors Show Students How to Play

6. Mentors Show Students How to Plan

7. Mentors Show Students How to Draft and Revise

8. Mentors Show Students How to Go Public

9. Mentors Show Students How to Be Independent

This book was written to help you understand the potential that writing with mentors has for your students.

We've organized it into nine chapters that mimic the scaffolded instruction we use to support writers in our own classrooms, beginning with the teacher. As you look at the contents, you'll see that Chapter 1 offers a new way of thinking about mentor texts and the central role they can play in writing instruction. In Chapter 2, we explore what it means to be a teacher who puts her full faith in professional writers and leverages this faith as far as it can go in the classroom. We take you to our most trusted sources for finding mentor texts-sources that never tire and never feel old, sources we promise will excite both you and your students. Finally, we share our criteria for selecting the best mentor texts these sources have to offer.

In Chapter 3, we move into the classroom, offering a practical explanation of how a teacher might move from this trust in professional writers and discovery of rich texts to planning for instruction. In Chapters 4 through 8, we walk you through our work with students and mentors from the first day of school to the last-from the early stages of inspiration to the final moments of publication. We share lessons that demonstrate the enormous potential of mentors at every stage of the writing process.

Finally, we close with a chapter that explains why we teach with mentors at all, because it's the influence of writers that will endure long after our students have left our classrooms. With the help of mentors, we cultivate independence in our writers and help them build lasting writing lives.

You'll notice that chapters are punctuated with brief invitations (A Way In) to engage in the work your students will be doing or to think about your classroom and how the approach we're describing might work for you and your students. For these invitations, we suggest you reserve some space in your writer's notebook or find a small, separate notebook for the jotting and thinking you'll do over the course of this book.

Other chapters will engage you in some observational work: You'll listen as we "teach aloud," offering a window into our thinking as we search for, curate, and plan with mentor texts or talk to students about how to seek help and inspiration from the work of professional writers. And then you'll listen some more to the voices that really matter: the students'. You'll watch some of our students collect thinking, plan, play, draft, start over, write some more-with mentors at their side every step of the way. These students represent a wide variety of ability levels, from the most emerging writers to students who have always wanted to grow up to become writers, but they all have one thing in common: The quality of their writing has been markedly improved by the influence of mentor texts.

Although we've written this book with upper middle to high school-aged students in mind, the mentor text approach to writing instruction is relevant to a wide range of writers at all grade levels. In fact, mentor text instruction has traditionally occurred in the primary grades, well-documented in books like Katie Wood Ray's Study Driven, Ralph Fletcher's What a Writer Needs, and Ruth Culham's The Writing Thief. And while the texts we refer to are geared toward a more mature audience, the philosophy and organizational tools, as well as the ways of talking to students about mentors, are timeless and ageless. We have always taught by the mantra "Good teaching is good teaching," and we use elementary school materials all the time and adapt them for high school.

"Great teachers have an unstoppable drive to figure things out. We imagine that our classrooms might be places where, as Rebekah and Allison say, "the craft of writing is truly studied, not assigned, and we study it together," but we need mentors to show us how. You have two here in your hands. I am certain Don [Graves] would have celebrated these wise, kind, and fearless advocates for young writers. This book vibrates with joy and possibility."--Penny Kittle, from the Foreword

Writing With Mentors is one of the best books I've read on harnessing the power of mentor texts to spur authentic student writing. By helping students to recognize the "writing that is beneath all writing," Allison Marchetti and Rebekah O'Dell provide a bank of rich, vibrant reading experiences that immerse young writers into deep study of both technique and genre. This book made me a better writing teacher, and it will make you a better writing teacher, too.-Kelly Gallagher, author of Write Like This

Wow! Writing with Mentors has transformed the way I think about using exemplar pieces. Instead of a writing instruction add-on, Allison and Rebekah show how mentor texts can-no, should- live as the heart-and-soul of a powerful writing classroom. Their vivid portraits of kids at work, sage advice, and plenty of tools, make it all feel possible. This book will mentor my teaching with texts for years to come.-Christopher Lehman, coauthor of Falling in Love With Close Reading

For decades, writing teachers have been encouraged to use mentor texts with their students as a way to introduce the elements of author's craft, examine structure, and revel in the joy of language. Allison Marchetti and Rebekah O'Dell have updated this advice for our modern age, providing dozens of mentor texts that teachers can use right away. More importantly, they also show us how to harness the power of the Internet to follow authors on Twitter, read the latest commentaries and news via RSS, and listen to podcast reviews of books, films, and music. No longer do we need to find mentor texts only on our book shelves; Marchetti and O'Dell show us many ways to write with the mentors that are part of our-and our students'-daily lives. -Troy Hicks, author of Crafting Digital Writing

Marchetti and O'Dell have woven together a gift for secondary teachers: A book plump with easy-to-access mentor texts, framed in the principles of writing workshop. Useful and extremely current. -Jeff Anderson, author of 10 Things Every Writer Needs to Know and Mechanically Inclined

With a pen in one hand to take notes and my Smart phone in the other to scan the QR codes of the numerous mentor texts, I finished the book with an incredible amount of ideas to implement in my classroom and a list of mentor texts to use with my high school students. Writing with Mentors is a long-awaited book that illuminates the power of using mentor texts and gives teachers the tools to move their students to places in their writing beyond where they ever thought they could go.

-Laura LaVallee, English teacher, Portsmouth High School and NH Teacher of the Year finalist

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
1. A Classroom Where Mentors Matter 2. Developing a Mentor Text Habit of Mind 3. Moving from Mentor Texts to Writing Lessons 4. Introducing Students to Mentor Texts 5. Mentors Show Students How to Play 6. Mentors Show Students How to Plan 7. Mentors Show Students How to Draft and Revise 8.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
It's been said that good writers borrow but great writers steal. Writing thieves read widely, dive deeply into texts, and steal bits and pieces from great texts as models for their own writing. Ruth Culham admits to being a writing thief-and she wants you and your students to become writing thieves, too.

You can create a quote by adding products to your cart and selecting Quote in checkout.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
It's been said that good writers borrow but great writers steal. Writing thieves read widely, dive deeply into texts, and steal bits and pieces from great texts as models for their own writing.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
'Wilfrid Gordon McDonald Partridge' read by Bradley Whitford

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
What in the World? / Le Monde en Marche is a photocopiable current events resource, published in English and French, for Canadian students in grades 5 through 7 (Level 1) and grades 8 through 10 (Level 2).

# data[].attributes.body
(free until June 30)

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Bees are the world's best pollinators. They pollinate a third of our food, and three quarters of our fruit and seeds.

But North American honeybees are in trouble. Why? Their hives are getting wiped out by varroa mites.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Currents4Kids | Online Interactive Current Events for Grades 3 and up

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
A 21st century teaching and learning tool that opens students' eyes to the world.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Photo credit: Maximillian Re-Sugiura By Sari Beth Rosenberg I am not sure if other teachers felt the same way, but at the beginning of Week 6, I found myself getting into a rhythm with my new, albeit strange, online school ...

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Photo credit: Maximillian Re-Sugiura By Sari Beth Rosenberg I am not sure if other teachers felt the same way, but at the beginning of Week 6, I found myself getting into a rhythm with my new, albeit strange, online school ...

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Teachers' #1 Choice for Current, On-Level Nonfiction

Over 6 million students read Scholastic News every week! See why so many teachers rely on this exceptional magazine to engage their students, build nonfiction-reading skills, and increase content-area knowledge.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Teach current events in your elementary classroom, grades 1-6.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
DOGO News - Kids news articles! Kids current events; plus kids news on science, sports, and more!

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
DOGO News has fun articles for kids on current events, science, sports, and more! There are also lots of stories, pictures, videos, games and the DOGO news map for kids! Add your comments, read reviews of cool websites, and more!

# data[].attributes.body
Wonderopolis

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
From a young age, I always loved reading. Libraries were revered in my home and I took to them immediately. Some kids don't though, and I've met many a parent at the library who felt frustrated that their little one(s) were slow to come to the joys of books. Here are some of the best children's books about books that I've found - ones that incorporate the magic of storytelling, the community connection of libraries and even reluctant readers themselves. These warm my little bookworm heart, and I recommend them for book lovers of all ages. Now, once you've got them reading, here are some suggestions for awesome picture books for toddlers and kindergarteners.

Boy meets book, boy and book become inseparable, book gets lost. Will the boy find it?

Lyric McKerrigan is very brave and clever secret librarian. When Dr. Glockenspiel escapes from the "Depository for the Criminally Naughty" with a nefarious plan to destroy the books of the world, she goes on a pun-filled mission to stop him. Vera Brosgol's art is bright and full of personality, and the comic layout makes it especially pop. A super fun read for kids and adults who love books.

This book-hater can tell you a lot about how he won't read. Not even if you hold him upside down or over a pool of sharks. Buuuut...eventually, if you read to him, maybe he can be convinced.

By signing up you agree to our terms of use

A gorgeous book that has a wonderful story that will delight any book lover. Just read it, you won't regret it.

This tells the story of the beginning of Harlem's National Memorial African Bookstore, a spot that would become a center of black culture and a home to activists. The illustrations are gorgeous and this book won a much-deserved Coretta Scott King award.

Henry loves books. Not reading them, exactly, but eating them. He gets smarter and smarter from these paper-y meals, until one day all the jumbled up information in his tummy makes him feel sick. Henry realizes that maybe the slightly slower process of reading books might be better in the long term.

A little boy who loves reading keeps getting interrupted by spoiler-spilling animals. A surreal, clever book with great art by Isabel Roxas.

Peter Mark Roget was a shy child who found comfort in making lists of information. This non-fiction book tells of how Roget eventually created the original thesaurus.

Red Knit Cap Girl and her friends find a hollow tree in the middle of the forest. She decides to keep a book in it to create a reading nook, and then her animal friends bring gifts that turn the space into an even more wonderful space. A lovely, beautifully illustrated story about how books can bring a community together.

Lola at the Library by Anna McQuinn and Rosalind Beardshaw

Every Tuesday, Lola and her mom go to the library for new books and a storytime - a very exciting event that she always wakes up early for.

Another story about a reluctant reader. Meena won't read, despite her parents filling their house with books, until one day she knocks over a big pile and unleashes all their stories.

Again! by Emily Gravett

Night after night, cute baby dragon Cedric has his mom read him the same book. She changes the story slightly each time, until finally falling asleep. A relatable, funny book for parents.

This gorgeous book tells the story of a little girl discovering a traveling library (that rests on the backs of two burros) in her small village. Based on the real story of Luis Soriano, a real librarian who traveled rural Columbia to bring books to people.

Bunny's Book Club by Annie Silvestro and Tatjana Mai-Wyss

A cute, sweet story about a book-lovin' bunny who gets library cards for all his animal friends. Features a rad librarian as well.

I really recommend these children's books about books for any age of book lover. They are comforting, wonderful books that will remind you why reading is such an important part of our lives. Do you have some favourites? I'd love to hear about them in the comments.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Read To Me: 14 Best Children's Books About Books

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
From a young age, I always loved reading. Libraries were revered in my home and I took to them immediately. Some kids don't though, and I've met many a parent at the library who felt frustrated that their little one(s) were slow to come to the joys of books.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
All children's books are de facto celebrations of the joy of reading, right? Without words lovingly arranged in careful order on pages and pictures giving those delightful words life, books wouldn't exist. But some books zero in more finely, and with much more open-hearted feeling, on the pure joy of reading. The picture books gathered here are just the tip of the iceberg (or the edge of the bookshelf?) for parents who want to plant and nurture the love of reading in their children.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
8 Delightful Children's Books That Celebrate Reading | Brightly

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
All children's books are de facto celebrations of the joy of reading, right? Without words lovingly arranged in careful order on pages and pictures giving those delightful words life, books wouldn't exist. But some books zero in more finely, and with much more open-hearted feeling, on the pure joy of reading.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
There's something special about a book about reading. It's like reading a book in a book in a book ... literary inception, if you know what I mean. Here are 13 picture books about reading to read aloud or add to your classroom library and inspire students to keep reading.

This picture book about reading playfully and movingly illustrates the idea that the reader who discovers the love of reading finds, at the end, the beginning.

A little girl sails her raft across a sea of words, arriving at the house of a small boy and calling him away on an adventure.

What happens when a writer learns that he doesn't quite have as much control over his book as he thinks?

Every day, 9-year-old Yasmin borrows a book from Book Uncle, a retired teacher who has set up a free lending library next to her apartment building.

When a wonderful new book arrives at the library, at first it is loved by all, checked out constantly, and rarely spends a night on the library shelf. But over time it grows old and worn, and the children lose interest in its story.

In this book about reading, one animal asks another all about what a book is by asking if it can do things a computer can do.

7. The Whisper by Pamela Zagarenski

A little girl discovers that we each bring something different to the same story.

This book tells the story of how a book is written and illustrated. But be careful of tigers and pirates!

An everyday visit to the library becomes an unexpected adventure through the pages of classic children's book favorites!

Rocket meets a little yellow bird who decides to teach him to read.

Like many children, Henry loves books. But Henry doesn't like to read books, he likes to eat them!

From cave drawings to the invention of the printing press to our digital age, discover how a story has been told in many different ways over time.

Victor Dickens hates to read, and nothing can change his mind. Or can it? How about a parrot with a peg leg? Or a rabbit with black barn boots? This book about reading is great for reluctant readers.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
13 Picture Books About Reading to Inspire Young Readers and Writers - WeAreTeachers

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
There's something special about a book about reading. It's like reading a book in a book in a book ... literary inception, if you know what I mean. Here are 13 picture books about reading to read aloud or add to your classroom library and inspire students to keep reading.

# data[].attributes.headline
Books about the love of books and reading

# data[].attributes.subject
Books about the love of books and reading

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Our top picks of books for children and teens starring Mighty Girls who love to read!

For 50 years, the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization has celebrated International Literacy Day. On their Literacy Day web page UNESCO emphasizes why literacy is so important: it is "the foundation of all learning... a human right, a tool of personal empowerment and a means for social and human development."

To mark International Literacy Day, A Mighty Girl has put together a collection of our favorite books about reading, libraries, and literacy featuring Mighty Girl characters. These books celebrate the love of reading, the value that books bring to our lives, and the incredible joy and pride that comes with learning this critical skill - as well as the haven of all book lovers, the local library! Along with numerous recommendations for children and teens, we also highlight a number of books for parents offering tips and strategies to help foster your children's love of reading and information on how to support those children that might be struggling.

Book Lovers: Books, Libraries, and Literacy

Whether these Mighty Girls are just learning to read or are passing on their love of reading to others, each of these books celebrates the joy and connection to others that books can bring.

Raising A Reader: Parenting Books About Literacy

The best way for all of us to show our gratitude for the amazing gift of literacy is to help children develop facility with - and a love for - reading. These books for parents will give you tips and strategies to help make sure that reading will be a family legacy.

Whether your Mighty Girl is a toddler or a teen, spend some time together today and celebrate the amazing gift of literacy. Encourage them to share their love of reading and books with their peers, their community, and beyond. After all, with the help of Mighty kids around the world, hopefully someday illiteracy will be a thing of the past.

Additional Recommended Resources

For books about educational access, check out our blog Honoring Malala: Mighty Girl Books on Children's Fight for Education or our Educational Access section.

For more Parenting books to support readers, check out our Literacy / Book Clubs section.

If this blog has inspired you to read aloud to your Mighty Girl, check out our list of the Top Read Aloud Books Starring Mighty Girls. These great books can be read independently by older children as well - or, have her read aloud to you!

If you're interested in forming a book club, why not make it a Mighty Girl book club? Our book club page includes tips for setting up a club, reading lists for a variety of age groups, and an option to sign up for our ongoing book club newsletter.

When you're helping your Mighty Girl choose books, make sure you browse our full selection of Mighty Girl books. With categories and subcategories to help you find books on almost any theme, both fiction and non-fiction, you're sure to find some unexpected titles that your Mighty Girl will love.

And you can encourage reading and literacy through play as well as through books! In our Toy section we have a section of Reading / Literacy toys that focus on letter recognition, storytelling, and word play. Or, get your Mighty Girl writing her own stories by checking out the toys and journals in our Writing / Journaling section.

She can show off her love of reading by checking out our selection of Literary Themed clothing. This section includes a series of shirts from Out of Print, a company that makes T-shirts featuring vintage book covers which will donate one book per shirt purchased to a community in need.

And if your Mighty Girl wants to share her love of reading with the world, one great way to do it is by supporting the African Library Project. By sending her gently used books to a book drive, she can help the project start new libraries in communities in Africa. It's a great way for her to help kids everywhere end up with great books in their hands!

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
35 Mighty Girl Books Celebrating Reading, Libraries, and Literacy

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Our top picks of books for children and teens starring Mighty Girls who love to read! For 50 years, the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization has celebrated International Literacy Day. On their Literacy Day web page UNESCO emphasizes why literacy is so important: it is "the foundation of all learning...

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Reading Is Part of Who We Are | Game Changer!

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Kids who read independently are more likely to find reading important, enjoy reading and read more frequently.

A base of children of ages 6-17, some of whom having previously read independently at school, and some of whom not,were asked whether they agreed with a series of statements and questions about reading, with the results from each group differing from eachother significantly.

When asked whether they would say that it is extremely/very important to read books for fun, 77% of kids who have read independently at school agreed, whereas only 49% of kids who have not read independently agreed.

When asked whether they would say that they love/like reading books for fun, 75% of kids who have read independently at school agreed, whereas only 55% of kids who have not read independently agreed.

When asked whether they were frequent readers (reading 5-7 days a week), 43% of kids who have read independently at school agreed, whereas only 17% of kids who have not read independently agreed.

When asked whether they were currently reading a book for fun, 61% of kids who have read independently at school said that they were, whereas only 37% of kids who have not read independently said that they were.

When asked whether they choose to read in their free time, 70% of kids who have read independently at school agreed, whereas only 45% of kids who have not read independently agreed.

When asked whether they thought that books had inspired them to believe in themselves, 82% of kids who have read independently at school agreed, whereas only 66% of kids who have not read independently agreed.

On average, kids who read independently at school read 28 books in the last year, whereas kids who do not read independently at school only averaged 13 books read in the past year.

An open ended response from a Father of a 16-year-old boy from Ontario on the importance of reading: "Reading keeps his vocabulary fresh, and his imagination sharp."

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Kids who read independently are more likely to find reading important, enjoy reading and read more frequently. A base of children of ages 6-17, some of whom having previously read independently at school, and some of whom not,were asked whether they agreed with a series of statements and questions about reading, with the results from each group differing from eachother significantly.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Want to make a change in your workplace and grow together? Well, we want to help! This course is great for teams looking to empower their employees on their journey for purpose and value-driven action.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
All things Kelly Gallagher, including my books, my schedule, teacher resources and what's going on in my life as a teacher.

# data[].attributes.body
"Why Read"

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Frequenters of social media may have found a surprising level of comparison to recent political events and the world of Harry Potter; with fans using the series to process Donald Trump's shock win and strengthening protests against him through analogies within The Order of the Phoenix - specifically Voldemort's takeover of the Ministry of Magic and Dumbledore's Army.

It may seem like idle distraction from the truths of the situation but, in reality, the language being used here is of no coincidence; J.K. Rowling's fantasy series has become a key influencer amongst younger generations in helping to build empathy and battle negative attitudes and prejudices.

A 2014 study published by the Journal of Applied Social Psychology ( via Scientific American) found that reading the Harry Potter books helped to improve attitudes towards stigmatized groups, as storytelling has long proven to do so by providing examples of intergroup contact; specifically between "in-groups" - the social group one identifies with - and "out-groups", a group one doesn't identify with or perceives as threatening.

Download the new Independent Premium app

Sharing the full story, not just the headlines

Harry Potter, in particular, achieves this through Harry's continual contact and friendship with stigmatized groups, here represented by the "mudbloods": a group of half-muggle, half-wizard individuals who are scorned and persecuted by Lord Voldemort, who believes only in the legitimacy of "pureblood" wizards.

The study, led by Loris Vezzali of the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia in Italy, tested three sets of readers; the first focusing on 34 elementary school children, who were given a questionnaire to test their attitudes towards immigrants. The children were then divided into two groups that met once a week for six weeks to read and discuss passages from Harry Potter.

The first group focused on instances in the novels in which prejudice occurs, such as the scene in which Draco Malfoy calls Hermione a "filthy little mudblood"; the other group read passages unrelated to prejudice, such as the moment Harry buys his first wand.

After the six weeks had ended, the children were once more tested on their attitudes towards immigrants; those who had read the passages dealing with prejudice and identified with Harry Potter were found to have significantly improved in their attitudes towards out-groups, while those who read neutral passages saw no change.

Two follow-up studies were then conducted with similar results: reading Harry Potter was found both to improve attitudes towards homosexuality amongst Italian high school students and towards refugees amongst English university students.

Though Rowling's work offers a more direct link with forging identification between "in-groups" and "out-groups", it forms part of a larger understanding in how reading literary fiction can improve empathy and compassion amongst readers, as discovered by a study conducted in 2013 by.

With the upcoming sequel to Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them potentially exploring Dumbeldore's sexuality, there's a chance the future of the Harry Potter universe may go to foster amongst fans even greater understanding and compassion towards the LGBT community. At a time like this, it's certainly needed.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
How reading Harry Potter can reduce prejudice

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Frequenters of social media may have found a surprising level of comparison to recent political events and the world of Harry Potter; with fans using the series to process Donald Trump's shock win and strengthening protests against him through analogies within The Order of the Phoenix - specifically Voldemort's takeover of the Ministry of Magic and&