The Read-Aloud Handbook (7th Edition, publication date 2013)
Jim Trelease
ISBN: 9780143121602
Read February 4, 2014
Nonfiction; education, parenting.
Background info: This nifty volume is in two parts: the first is an educational/parenting treatise giving the then-current state of research into why reading is paramount, and especially why reading TO kids is so important. The second half is a listing of various titles that the author believes are suitable for being read aloud to kids, divided into categories like wordless books (yeah, I know) poetry, nonfiction, and various age-groups.
Each subsequent edition has recognized that there's no reason to purchase or read a new edition if nothing much has changed, so the author and publisher have done a decent job in the first half at updating the research, changing out the vignettes, and including the current state of affairs each time around. For the second half, the titles recommended are cycled through, with special attention paid to titles currently out of print or difficult to find (those being either removed from the listing entirely, or noted as such if they are thought too good to miss).
So, with all that in mind, let me say here that last spring I discovered this resource existed, and I went on a binge-read right before the Summer Reading Program, placing requests on each edition (yes, all 6 of them), and checking out the different recommended reads, and thoroughly enjoying the first half of each book (which were, although slightly different each round, almost literally a repeated paean to librarians and readers). The only one I couldn't get was this last edition, which our system couldn't borrow until it was a bit older. Well, it got a bit older, and it arrived today! Yay!
I haven't gone through the book recs yet, but I did take a while to read through the first half (and it has grown now into almost half) of this very-well-researched presentation of the current research into reading, the sorry state of our educational system (I want to move to Finland) and how parents and educators can individually contradict these bad influences by READING MORE!!!
My kind of book!
On a slightly more serious note, if you're interested in learning about what the deal is with received language, how kids learn vocabulary, and how to put your kid on the top of the scrap heap called life, read this edition of this book. The other editions are of course out of date, so I'd only recommend them if you are interested in seeing how the history and the research developed (which I was, and I thought was fascinating, but then I'm a nerd).
I'm sure that this record will be seeing the evidence of the other half of the book as soon as I get a chance to dig into the lists and learn of interesting titles I've missed.
Showing posts with label literature. Show all posts
Showing posts with label literature. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 5, 2014
Friday, July 5, 2013
Nemo: Heart of Ice, Alan Moore & Kevin O'Neill
Nemo: Heart of Ice
Alan Moore & Kevin O'Neill
ISBN: 978-0861661831
Graphic Novel
This was a weird one. I've flipped aimlessly through the previous League graphics, and enjoyed them enough as a diversion. Not a rabid fan. This tho, this was odd.
First off, we're not dealing with the "real" Captain Nemo from the book - it's his daughter Janni. Second, the entire story is a bizarre literary seek-and-find pastiche of just about every major figure and literary creation from the time and related genres they could cram in there.
A totally not exhaustive run-down because it's based on the ones I recognized offhand:
The villianess? HR Haggard's SHE-who-must-be-obeyed.
The henchman? Citizen Kane
The hired guns? Tom Swift (Swyfte here), Jack Wright and Frank Reade Jr (yes, the steam man was mentioned)
The locale? Lovecraft's Mountains of Madness
King Kong gets a shout-out in the epilogue. His Girl Friday (Hildy Johnson) is the author of that epilogue, by the bye.
So, ok, moving past the shout-outs and nudge-nudge-wink-wink "did you see what we did there" bits, what was it like?
It was odd. The overall story pits two strong-willed and psychopathic women with toadying henchmen against each other, and as far as I could tell, the idea was that Janni comes out on top for two reasons: because she's really only ambitious and ruthless, rather than sociopathic, and because she's willing to head out and get her hands dirty rather than sit in a bower and kill doves while your henchmen bumble about.
The plot seemed to be a little unsure of itself - the theft was the most obvious McGuffin I've seen recently, and the henchmen were made out to be as nasty and petty and racist and misogynistic as possible, which is odd to me, considering that Tom Swift at least is a fairly well-known and beloved character. Finally, the decision to head for the Antartic was a spur of the moment lark - "I can do whatever my dad can do" out of nowhere on Janni's part. None of that seems necessary to the central point of the story (or at least the focus based on page-count and really lush spreads and vistas): the journey/chase through Mountains of Madness. So - I'm a bit perplexed there. My best guess is that the oddities of plotting are either hooks from previous or to upcoming installments.
Verdict? Weird. However, I very much like the Mountains of Madness section, especially the "space and time" plateau - I would think that would be a difficult concept to render artistically, and it was clear and confusing at the same time (in a good way). I could see hitting this one up again for that, and for the epilogue, which was frankly hysterical.
Alan Moore & Kevin O'Neill
ISBN: 978-0861661831
Graphic Novel
This was a weird one. I've flipped aimlessly through the previous League graphics, and enjoyed them enough as a diversion. Not a rabid fan. This tho, this was odd.
First off, we're not dealing with the "real" Captain Nemo from the book - it's his daughter Janni. Second, the entire story is a bizarre literary seek-and-find pastiche of just about every major figure and literary creation from the time and related genres they could cram in there.
A totally not exhaustive run-down because it's based on the ones I recognized offhand:
The villianess? HR Haggard's SHE-who-must-be-obeyed.
The henchman? Citizen Kane
The hired guns? Tom Swift (Swyfte here), Jack Wright and Frank Reade Jr (yes, the steam man was mentioned)
The locale? Lovecraft's Mountains of Madness
King Kong gets a shout-out in the epilogue. His Girl Friday (Hildy Johnson) is the author of that epilogue, by the bye.
So, ok, moving past the shout-outs and nudge-nudge-wink-wink "did you see what we did there" bits, what was it like?
It was odd. The overall story pits two strong-willed and psychopathic women with toadying henchmen against each other, and as far as I could tell, the idea was that Janni comes out on top for two reasons: because she's really only ambitious and ruthless, rather than sociopathic, and because she's willing to head out and get her hands dirty rather than sit in a bower and kill doves while your henchmen bumble about.
The plot seemed to be a little unsure of itself - the theft was the most obvious McGuffin I've seen recently, and the henchmen were made out to be as nasty and petty and racist and misogynistic as possible, which is odd to me, considering that Tom Swift at least is a fairly well-known and beloved character. Finally, the decision to head for the Antartic was a spur of the moment lark - "I can do whatever my dad can do" out of nowhere on Janni's part. None of that seems necessary to the central point of the story (or at least the focus based on page-count and really lush spreads and vistas): the journey/chase through Mountains of Madness. So - I'm a bit perplexed there. My best guess is that the oddities of plotting are either hooks from previous or to upcoming installments.
Verdict? Weird. However, I very much like the Mountains of Madness section, especially the "space and time" plateau - I would think that would be a difficult concept to render artistically, and it was clear and confusing at the same time (in a good way). I could see hitting this one up again for that, and for the epilogue, which was frankly hysterical.
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