Teach Like Your Hair's on Fire

This is another book that's been on my list for a long time, and I figured the summer before I myself am teaching like my hair is on fire might be a good time to actually read it. Although the author of this particular teacher memoir is an elementary teacher - and teaches at a school where homeroom teacher is also P.E. teacher, music teacher, and art teacher - and therefore teaches about six more subjects than I will, there was a lot that I learned from this book. To be completely honest, several chapters were skipped in the interest of relevance to me. One or two other chapters were skipped because the methods and activities he spends considerable amounts of time developing with his students are way more involved than I will be able to manage during my first five years of teaching at least. What was left, though, were excellent nuggets of advice and classroom management techniques that I will definitely think about and use when approaching the start of my classroom. He clearly shows the love he has for his job as he shares stories of students past and present, but also reveals valid and refreshing frustration with administration and policy that doesn't advocate for the best use of time or efforts as far as the students are concerned. I really enjoyed reading this book and will definitely reference several of the chapters and passages once the school year starts.

Maus I: A Survivor's Tale

Like many of the books on my list, I've been waiting to read this book for a long time. After hearing about it in a class a couple of years ago, I put it on said list - and then soon after bought it - but haven't had an opportunity to read it until now. Also, I have so many books on this list that it's hard to choose sometimes. But all of that said, I knew I would love this book and I was not disappointed. Not only am I excited to add a graphic novel to my library, but I always appreciate a new perspective on World War II and on the Holocaust specifically. Maus I: A Survivor's Tale offers both of these. Gritty and painfully honest, Art Spiegelman's account of his father's experiences in Europe as a Jew during World War II and the rise of the Nazi Party takes place alongside Spiegelman's present-day relationship with his father. Both story lines captivate and endear the reader; you can't help but read for fear of what will happen to war-era Vladek but also for curiosity of what the next interaction between Art and current Vladek will look like. You sympathize with the characters - both in the past and in the present - and you become increasingly more horrified as the Nazis gain more control. One of the most interesting elements of this particular graphic novel, though, is the way Spiegelman chose to draw each of the characters. Jews are depicted as mice while the Germans/Nazis appear as cats. The image of these animals, who are timeless enemies, pitted as enemies in this real life piece of history will stick with struggling readers in an unforgettable way. I highly recommend this book for teachers of Language Arts and History who are trying to communicate the Holocaust from a unique perspective and a reader-friendly format. Stay tuned for my review of the sequel.

Smile

I finally got the opportunity to dive into my very first graphic novel this weekend. After hearing lots and seeing the interest that kids have in them as a genre, I've been pretty interested in trying them out for a while but hadn't really made the time. A kid in one of my classes read this one last week and loved it; he would bring it to me every day and tell me what was happening and show me all the bloody pictures that he thought were awesome. He had my interest level pretty high, but then when the Book Fair came and I saw it there, I figured it was probably fate and I should get it. Despite the fact that it's about 215 pages long, I managed to read this entire book on Saturday night in about an hour and a half or so (yes, I know that it's a graphic novel written for pre-teens and I am a grown adult, but let me savor this accomplishment). I am officially a fan of graphic novels, and of this one in particular. It's an autobiography, which is pretty cool, and follows the author through her middle school years as she battles the normal issues and turmoils of those ages while also dealing with repeated and prolonged dental surgeries that come as a result of an accident that happens towards the beginning of the book. Middle schoolers should find this book really interesting because A.) it's a graphic novel, and they're pretty much all about them these days, B.) it's got a lot of blood and graphic dental trauma (makes it much more interesting and cool for boys who typically wouldn't choose a story about a girl), and C.) it's a true story that describes someone's real life struggles and issues and horrors that came with being in middle school. There's something very comforting about reading about other people discovering that their friends are cruel and switching crushes from day to day and realizing their crush doesn't know they exist and dealing with the trauma of awkward phases that inevitably happen in middle school. All of that is extremely relevant to kids this age, and this book provides a realistic and comforting view of all of it. I highly recommend this one.

Teach With Your Heart

Simply put: this book is awesome. I feel like it goes without saying - or it should, anyway - that I'm a huge fan of the movie Freedom Writers, and am also therefore a huge fan of the book, The Freedom Writers' Diary - which I should probably add on here... - but I hadn't gotten a chance to read this one, Erin's memoirs, until this fall. That's partially because I didn't even know that it existed until this summer. But I bought it and started reading it at the beginning of fall, when I also started my student teaching semester, and it was a great choice. In those first couple of weeks before I took over the classroom and it was a little bit more laidback, I ate this book up. It's so good and so inspiring and so...interesting. I loved reading about everything she did and every struggle she had - and finding that I was having many of the same - and every extra effort she went through to go above and beyond for her students in order to help them learn. I think this is where I would like to soapbox a little bit and say that it's been extremely frustrating to be around some teachers who grumble and complain and talk about their students in ways that no parent or administrator should ever overhear, and this book is a refreshing change of pace, showing that caring about your students is possible. And maintaining that spirit even if you happen to get a job where you're surrounded by people who don't share your spunk is possible. And working a little bit - or a lot - more than the typical teacher so that your struggling students who have nothing going for them is worth it. Because, let's be serious, there are a whole lot of teachers who don't even put the minimum amount of effort or heart into it. So yes, this book is awesome. And yes, I highly recommend it. And yes, I believe that the things that she accomplishes in her career are possible if you actually try to make it happen. It's amazing how much students respond to you when they know you genuinely care about them.

Boy

Boy, Roald Dahl's autobiography focusing on his childhood, is a humorous story that describes many isolated events and stories from his memories that are eerily similar to the stories that have become the plots of his novels. People who are huge fans of Dahl's work - like me - will enjoy this book and find the ways his life inspired so many of his plots amusing...but I honestly wasn't as swept away by this one as I was anticipating. My expectations may have been too high because of my love for his other books, but I just didn't find it to be at the same level as his novels. I did, though, still enjoy this one, and think it would be an excellent choice for a middle school student, especially if you are assigning or teaching a unit on autobiographies or nonfiction. Regardless of my slight disappointment, this is still a good book and would be interesting and engaging for middle school students, especially rambunctious and adventurous boys.