The Death Defying Pepper Roux

I've just finished The Death Defying Pepper Roux by Geraldine McCaughrean (said Ma-cork-run, according to her website) and LOVED it !

It is published by Oxford University Press, the National Library has it to borrow, and the paperback is due in September.

For the best introduction to the book, listen here to the author talk about it...
http://fds.oup.com/www0.oup.com/pepperroux/media.html

and there is plenty more to explore on her website about it, her "book of the moment", including reviews, activities and downloadable poster http://www.geraldinemccaughrean.co.uk/bkm.htm

Here is a wonderful review of it by Frank Cottrell Boyce in The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/mar/27/death-defying-pepper-roux-geraldine-mccaughrean
in which he finishes, "The publisher's blurb compares Pepper Roux to the movie Amélie, largely because they're both set in France. This is like comparing the siege of Stalingrad to the Eurovision song contest because they both involve Russians and Germans. Pepper Roux is much funnier, much more stylish and much more profound. If you want to compare it to something else you could try Borges or Garcia Márquez."

If you don' t know this clever, entertaining, prolific, varied author, check out some of her books - Stop the Train, Pack of Lies, and The Kite Rider are some of my favourites...

The Death Defying Pepper Roux would make a great read-aloud for intermediate / junior secondary level, as would many of Geraldine McCaughrean's other books, thanks to her talent for telling a lively story with imagination and depth.

For people looking for class novels a la Louis Sachar's Holes, this could fit the bill, though I have to say that I have real reservations about whole class sets of novels from my own experience as a school student - and a reader - when I found them excruciating.

See also Donalyn Miller's posts on the subject of whole-class novels in the archives of her Book Whisperer blog, along with suggestions for alternative strategies :

One size does not fit all (Parts 1 and 2 - January 2008)
http://blogs.edweek.org/teachers/book_whisperer/2008/01/
"My seventeen year-old-daughter is what we call here in Texas, “a long, tall drink of water." I, on the other hand, have a full-figured glass that has overflowed. When shopping, we laugh when we see clothes sporting tags that claim “one size fits all” remarking, “Not us!”
Stretch this t-shirt over the ubiquitous practice in reading classrooms of teaching whole-class novels, and you can see that it doesn't fit most readers..."

School assigned reading - great article

Do read this great article by Steven Wolk, about the reading that schools assign - and what they don't assign...
It includes lots of up-to-date suggestions of reading material across the curriculum to engage students with reading...

What Should Students Read? By Steven Wolk
in Phi Delta Kappan, April 2010 (Vol. 91, No7, p. 8-16).
http://www.kappanmagazine.org/content/91/7/local/complete-issue.pdf
Note this article is no longer available online for non-members, but is available through EPIC.

When looking at what students are required to read in school in 2010, it might as well be 1960. We need visionary educators who see bold purposes for school and who understand that what students read in school has profound, lifelong effects, both good and bad.

Try this link :
Is your reading list a little outdated?

Skerricks & Book Whisperer blogs, and class novel sets...

Bridget Schaumann mentioned the Skerricks blog on the list serv this morning and though I've visited it before, now I can highlight and share it on my blog !

It is produced by Ruth Buchanan, a Teacher Librarian in Australia, and she says that "a blog is a great way to share the stuff my flypaper mind finds amid the internet jungle". It has won awards including the SLAV (School Library Association of Victoria) Bright Ideas award as the most nominated Australian school library blog 2009 - and the Zombie Chickens award - visit her blog to find out what that is about...

It is a great place to explore and browse, you are bound to find something interesting and inspiring - and if you want to really roam, check out the links to blogs that she follows... Here is the link http://skerricks.blogspot.com and I've added it to the list of blogs on the right.

The post that Bridget was highlighting was about a New York Times article about a teacher who lets students choose their own reading :
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/30/books/30reading.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1
"The approach Ms. McNeill uses, in which students choose their own books, discuss them individually with their teacher and one another, and keep detailed journals about their reading, is part of a movement to revolutionize the way literature is taught in America’s schools. While there is no clear consensus among English teachers, variations on the approach, known as reading workshop, are catching on. "

Donalyn Miller, a Texan teacher known as "the Book Whisperer", has done a great post on her blog too (also linked on the right) about the perils, the torture, of class novels - here is the link - http://blogs.edweek.org/teachers/book_whisperer/2008/01/

"One Size Does Not Fit All
My seventeen year-old-daughter is what we call here in Texas, “a long, tall drink of water." I, on the other hand, have a full-figured glass that has overflowed. When shopping, we laugh when we see clothes sporting tags that claim “one size fits all” remarking, “Not us!” Stretch this t-shirt over the ubiquitous practice in reading classrooms of teaching whole-class novels, and you can see that it doesn't fit most readers..."

and her latest post picks up on the NY Times article mentioned above - here is what she has to say on it "... the New York Times [has] announced that The Future of Reading is "reading workshop". Describing one teacher’s journey to implement reading workshop with her middle school students, the article explores the messy challenges and smalls triumphs of a classroom environment where children choose the books they read. It bewilders me that reading workshop, first introduced to practicing teachers in works like In the Middle by Nancie Atwell (written in 1987), is still seen as groundbreaking or newsworthy. I continually wonder how activities like reading one book as a class, dissecting classics, and presenting book reports become entrenched in reading classrooms for generations while ideas like allowing student choices, reading contemporary literature, and writing authentic reading responses fail to gain a foothold in many English classes..."

I've bought a copy of Donalyn Miller's book published this year - The Book Whisperer: Awakening the Inner Reader in Every Child (9780470372272). In it she describes how she is so successful at getting her students reading - simply put, it is by being a powerful reading role model herself, knowing the literature, providing easy, plentiful access to a range of books, expecting every child to be a reader, and responding in a lively way to the students' reading responses...