Podcasting By Threes: Podcast Number FourChalk + Ink: Episode 70; Praise Then Raise with Jen Gennari It was an absolute pleasure speaking with Jen Gennari. Jen is as insightful as her books Muffled and My Mixed Up Berry-Blue Summer, which a lucky listener can be eligible to win simply by leaving a comment below. In this episode we talk about flagging filter words, personifying drafts and cultivating artistic vision. Podcasting By Threes: Podcast Number FiveChalk + Ink: Episode 71; Narwhals, Puppeteers, and Bush Planes with Brooke HartmanTotally enjoyed speaking with Brooke Hartman. I had the pleasure of meeting Brooke at Highlights Foundation at a retreat hosted by our amazing agent, Sera Rivers. Brooke is as humorous as her picture books Klyde the Kraken Wants a Friend and Watch Out for the Lion, which a lucky listener can be eligible to win simply by commenting below. In this episode we talk about the power of social media, breaking through the fourth wall, and staying true to the original story. Podcasting By Threes: Podcast Number SixChalk + Ink: Episode 72; Reclaiming Our Narrative with Janelle HarperTalking with Janelle Harper was an absolute joy. Sometimes I forget how good it feels to laugh. She’s honest, reflective, and positive, which means she’s the perfect person to critique your picture book manuscript. So, be sure to leave a comment below. In this episode we talk about reclaiming narratives, positive phrasing, and creating safe spaces. Be sure to check back at the end of April to read about our last four interviews of the season. Chalk + Ink will feature interventionist C.K. Malone, elementary librarian Tom Bober, substitute teacher Chloe Ito Ward, and Anders' and Corbin's second grade teacher, Andrew Hacket!
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Although I've been keeping up with the podcasting, it's been more than a minute since I've updated this page. This school year has been a constant balancing act between teaching fulltime, my fulltime administration certification program, and my writing/podcasting career. Phew! I'm honestly tired just writing that all! Anyway, it's not feasible for me to post every time I publish a podcast episode. So, for the remainder of the season, I'm going to post about multiple podcasts at once. So without further ado, here's a taste of the past three episodes. Podcasting By Threes: Podcast Number OneChalk + Ink: Episode 67; All Things Preschool with |
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In case you're unfamiliar with Ruth and/or Veera's work, there are several parallels, which we explore in depth in this episode. Both authors wrote novels around WWII. Ruth's novel Letters from Cuba is set on the eve of the war in 1939, and Veera's novel, The Night Diary happens two years after the war ends in 1947. Not only are these two novels set in similar eras, they're also both epistolary.
These two novels aren't the only similarity between their bodies of work, either. Both authors have novels set in the 1960s. Veera's How to Find What You're Not Looking For takes place in Connecticut, while Ruth's Lucky Broken Girl takes place in New York.
All four of these novels dive deep into othering be it the othering of Jewish people during WWII, the othering of Hindis and Muslims during the 1947 partition of India and Pakistan, the othering of biracial couples and immigrants in the 1960s. While the novels explore the pain of being othered, they also celebrate the power of perseverance and showcase characters who embrace diversity, even in times of duress.
Finally, as showcased above in the two soundbites, both authors write from deeply personal places, which is why their work is so powerful.
Be on the lookout for both of these authors new releases coming in 2024. I can't wait to read the sequel to Veera's The Night Diary, called Amil and the After or to read Ruth's Across So Many Seas, which she compares to Alan Grat'z stunning novel, Refugee.
Hà and I had a delightful discussion about why she chose to include wildflowers in her powerful picture book debut, Where Wildflowers Grow. I shared a memory of picking a peony off a neighbor's bush for my kindergarten teacher, Ms. Young, and the joy I felt giving it to her followed by the shame of admitting I shouldn't have picked a flower off of someone else's bush. She shared memories of all the sweet bouquets she received as a first-grade teacher.
Unlike me who is a card-carrying member of the early bird group, Ha is a night owl. As soon as her children go to bed, she gets busy creating or researching about writing. She doesn't set a schedule for herself, because that stifles her flow. Instead, she works on whatever calls to her, for however long she's able.
When Ha grew up, she didn't see herself represented in books. She thanks authors Minh Lê and Joanna Ho for blazing the trail for her to tell her story.
During the episode, we talk about Eve Bunting's Fly Away Home, a book we've both used with our students to facilitate discussion about challenges that unhoused people face.
If you'd like to register to be eligible to win a free picture book critique from her, fill in this form by Saturday, October 21st, 2023.
Happy listening!
Chalk + Ink Chat: Episode 63; All Things Kindergarten with Jyoti Rajan Gopal and Tina M. Cho
9/23/2023
We celebrated so many wonderful community building books. Here are just a few of the titles mentioned in the episode.
This year I added Jyoti's book, American Desi. The bumper sticker phrase changes in American Desi, which my students didn't notice. We had a deep discussion about how the changing bumper sticker phrase illuminates the themes of the book, embracing diversity and acceptance.
We talked about the stereotypical representation of grandparents in media. Often times older people images depict older people as being sedentary and rickety. This is not the case in Tina's The Ocean Calls or Jyoti's My Paati's Saris. Both of these grandmas are on the move, filling their grandchildren's lives with vibrant colors.
We also talked about Jyoti's and Tina's upcoming releases. Jyoti's Desert Queen looks absolutely stunning, and ever since I heard about Tina's middle grade graphic novel, I have been waiting anxiously to hold a copy in my hands. It will be a wonderful sliding glass door book to add to my classroom library collection.
Be sure to read Hà Dinh’s wonderful debut picture book, Where Wildflowers Grow, to prepare for our next episode.
Until then, happy listening!
That's what happened in this episode when H.M. Bouwman took a deep dive into interiority. This summer, when I was working on drafting a new novel, I had the thought that I should reread the first chapter of Jennifer Brown's Perfect Escape, try to write it from memory, see what I missed, and then analyze it to figure out how to make the opening chapter of my rough draft better. I never got there due to the demands of my summer classes, but the idea lingered.
Well, it turns out that Heather Bouwman does this exact activity in her college creative writing class with Tracy Deonn's Legendborn to help her students see that they need to add much more interiority to their novels be it interior thoughts, flashbacks, or setting details. There's a lot more space in a novel than a picture book, so use it!
Heather also talked about the power of sharing her writing process with her students. How does one respond when a well-respected critique partner points out that your witch is a half-hearted villain? What does that mean, and how can the problem be fixed? Can sea monsters fix all problems in drafts? Finally, and this one's a lot less fun, what's the difference between revising and editing?
Speaking of revision, that's one of the other topics we delved into. Heather uses revision rounds to flush out the emotional arc of her major and minor characters. In Gossamer Summer, Jojo deals with grief in one way. In order to contrast Jojo's interior arc with the minor characters' interior arcs, she made sure that Jojo's older sister and Jojo's friend dealt with grief in different ways. By using multiple revision rounds to flush out different characters, the reader has many opportunities to find mirrors in the book.
For modern classics, Heather recommends Holes by Louis Sachar and When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead.
For modern author recommendations, please read anything by Varian Johnson, Gene Luen Yang, and Christina Soontornvat.
But as an expert in eighteenth century literature, she wants make sure she tips her hat to titles from other eras. Please check out James Thurber's The 13 Clocks. It's a playful text that launches into rhymed iambic pentameter. Also, for upper middle grade readers, be sure to read Frederick Douglass's first autobiography, The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass. Heather emphasizes that he's absolutely not in favor of enslavers, which is misinformation that it currently being circulated, and that he writes deceptively simple, beautiful sentences such as, "You have seen how a man was made a slave; you shall see how a slave was made a man."
If you and your class have read some of Heather's novels, and would like to be eligible to win a virtual author's visit with her, please leave a comment below or share this episode on your favorite social media platform and be sure to tag Heather and me.
If you're a preschool or a kindergarten teacher, be sure to join us live on Saturday, September 16th for our first Chalk + Ink Chat of the 2023-2024 school year with kindergarten teachers and authors Tina M. Cho and Jyoti Rajan Gopal. Sign up here.
Happy listening!
My mind is 100% on school right now. I'm thinking about how I can make this school year better than last year, and one way to do that is by facilitating a better writers' workshop. Stacy gives listeners a ton of tips in this episode including offering students a smorgasbord of planners, how to help students develop multiple leads or hooks or attention grabbers, and how to help individual students revise in whole group settings-wow! Listening to Stacy was just what I needed to get me jazzed up for writing with my students.
Many podcast guests have talked about how getting to know their local librarian helped them research their books, but Stacy's librarian story is different. Her local librarian taught her about children's publishing. Granted, not everyone's local librarian is a member of the Sibert Committee or the Caldecott Committee. Nevertheless, the point is librarians have knowledge, and they're more than happy to share it. So, be sure to ask them for help.
Superpowers! We all have them. One of Stacy's superpowers is reading quickly, which helps her in the classroom and when she's writing. During readers' workshop, Stacy rapidly reads a chapter of a student's book before conferencing with them, unless of course she's already read the book! For writing, Stacy's reading superpower helps her know just which mentor text to turn to, when she wants to create a craft move in her own work.
Here are Stacy's book recommendations for the upper elementary classroom:
The One and Only Ruby by Katherine Applegate
Stacy says this is a book that lives in her heart and that it's a fabulous story about friendship.
The Last Mapmaker by Christina Soontornvat
This is a 2023 Newbery Honor book. So, obviously Stacy isn't the only one who thinks it's a wonderful read. I agree 100% with Stacy. This book is set in a fantasy world, where family heritage determines one success. But even though the main character has no family legacy, she's an incredible artist who gets to participate in a high sea adventure full of friends, foes, and fantastic beasts.
The Last Beekeeper by Julie Carrick Dalton
In this dystopia, all the honeybees are presumed extinct. But when the main character sees a honeybee on her family's abandoned farm, she knows it's important. Meanwhile, there's a company trying to control all the world's technology that produces the world's food supply. I haven't read it yet. But, it's definitely on my tbr list now!
Get a Grip, Vivy Cohen by Sarah Kapit
This book is about a little girl who loves baseball and who also has autism. She learns how to throw a knuckleball and becomes a successful little league pitcher. This is an epistolary novel told in letters written by Vivy and a local major league star. This book pairs well with Stacy's middle grade novel, The Sweet Spot, which is also about a female little league star.
The Secret of the Dragon Gems by Rajani LaRocca and Chris Baron
Full disclosure-I love anything written by Rajani and Chris. Last season I interviewed Chris. Click here to listen to his episode. This novel is told from two points of view. Two campers become friends at a summer camp where they find some rocks, which they feel connected to. They take the rocks home and communicate through email, texts, and letters. Meanwhile, the owners of the camp are looking for these rocks, too. I haven't read this one yet, but my classroom has a dragon theme this year. So, this seems like it would be a perfect read aloud.
Don't Want to be Your Monster by Deke Moulton
This is one of the most interesting novels Stacy has read because it's a vampire novel for middle grade students. This novel debunks the way we see one another, and why we're scared of people who are different than ourselves. It also addresses anti-Semitism. I haven't read this one either, but it sounds fascinating.
If you would like to be eligible to win a 30-minute virtual classroom visit with Stacy, write a comment below by Friday, September 1st. The winner will be announced on the next episode.
Before our next episode, be sure to read one of H.M. Bouwman’s fantastic middle grade novels. Gossamer Summer just came out this past May. In addition to being truly delightful, it’s less than 200 pages. It’s a quick, fun read jam-packed with magic.
Happy listening!
It's funny how someone can rephrase an idea and it revolutionizes the concept. So many people say, "Write what you know," but Chris Baron says, "It starts with you." The difference is the immediacy of the statement. Starting with me begins inside the heart, while writing what I know starts with the mind, and those are two very different starting points. Chris talks about how even though he had an elementary teacher who told him, "It starts with you," he had a professor in college who hit him over the head with a rowing oar, not literally but figuratively, with the same concept. Ever since then, his writing has come from his heart
When writers start from the heart, they reach unseen readers--readers who haven't seen their struggles revealed on the page. Whether it's through Ari's self-hatred, Etan's inability to trust, or Sasha's anxiety as he tries to navigate his father's toxic masculinity, readers will find themselves and their fears inside Chris's novels.
The magic of maps threads itself all three of Chris's novels, too, but it's front and center in The Gray. Preorder your personalized copy here so that you, too, can feel like a character in a video game navigating through unfamiliar landscape to rescue a friend.
Chris recommends the following authors and these books:
Read all of Rajani LaRocca's and Mae Respicio's books.
Check out Reem Faruqi's Golden Girl, Shari Green's Missing Mike, Remy Lai's Pie in the Sky, Jess Redman's The Adventure Is Now, Nikki Grime's Garvey's Choice, and Gillian McDunn's, When Sea Becomes Sky.
There are so many names here that are new to me, but I know where I'm starting. People are tweeting morning and night about When Sea Becomes Sky. So that's the one I'll be checking out.
If you would like to be eligible to win a signed copy of one of Chris's novels or a ten-page middle grade novel critique, be sure to leave a comment below.
Finally, many thanks to Sarah Brannen for Chalk + Ink's art. Just like Chris's novels are great summer reads, so is Sarah and Melissa Stewart's Summertime Sleepers. Be sure to add it to your summer stack.
Happy listening!
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