Interview with Brenda Maier, Author of The Little Red Fort, Peeping Beauty and The Little Blue Bridge and Talented and Gifted Elementary School Teacher
Thanks for listening to the second episode of Chalk and Ink, the podcast for teachers who write and writers who teach.
It was an absolute pleasure to talk with Brenda Maier, talented and gifted elementary teacher in Tulsa, Oklahoma and the author of The Little Red Fort, Peeping Beauty and The Little Blue Bridge. If you've been procastinating when it comes to writing, you'll be inspired by Brenda because she manages to balance a full-time teaching job, writing and raising five kids. In addition to inspiring listeners to prioritize their passions, Brenda shares ways to push students' critical thinking with perspective exercises and encourages people to read widely so that we can can increase kindness and empathy in our world. Brenda recommends that all elementary school teachers have these four titles in their classrooms: 1)What If, a picture book about resilience written by Samantha Berger and illustrated by Mike Curato. 2)Alma and How She Got Her Name, a picture book that encourages each child to tell their story by Juana Martinez-Neal. 3)The Wall in the Middle of the Book, a picture book about assumptions we make about characters by Jon Agee. 4) We Are Grateful: Otsaliheliga, a deceptively simple and lyrical picture book told from the perspective of a Cherokee Nation citizen, written by Traci Sorell and illustrated by Frane Lessac. Happy listening!
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Interview with Angela Shante, Author of The Noisy
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We created this list for part of our presentation at the Massachusetts School Library Association’s Annual Conference which was supposed to occur on March 29th and 30th. We had planned to have all of the titles on the list available for the attendees to browse through and sort in three different ways. If you click this link, you can print out the three different recording sheets attendees were going to use to sort the books. But you don’t have to be at a conference to do this activity, you can do it in your classroom, whether that’s at school or at home.
The first way attendees could choose to sort the titles would have been through text structure. The five nonfiction text structures are: 1) Cause and Effect; 2) Chronological/Sequential 3) Compare and Contrast; 4) Main Idea and Detail/Description; and 5) Problem and Solution. If you are unfamiliar with these text structures, watch the super-fun video below. Then, grab some of the informational texts you have at home, or check out some of the titles we suggest on our list, and sort them by text structure. Sometimes authors use more than one text structure in a book like Jason Chin does in Grand Canyon.
Finally, we were going to encourage attendees to look for Robert Probst and Kylene Beer’s nonfiction signposts in the texts. The nonfiction signposts are: 1) Contrasts or Contradictions; 2) Extreme or Absolute Language; 3) Numbers and Stats; 4) Quoted Words; and 5) Word Gaps. For me, signposts are an extremely powerful teaching tool because you can usually find one, some or all of the signposts in each book no matter its structure or its type. If you’re unfamiliar with the nonfiction signposts, check out the short videos below. Then, use the nonfiction signpost recording page and note the signposts! Have fun!
One of the tasks our fourth graders are supposed to be able to do on our state test, the MCAS, is to write a narrative from a different perspective. In the past, I’ve only used released MCAS test passages to practice this. Let’s face it. That’s so boring! Even if the test makers picked an interesting text, there are no pictures to accompany the words. Anyone who knows picture books understands that you can’t grasp the complete story arc of a picture book without the… you guessed it! Pictures!
So, here are some picture books I’ve used in the classroom, or plan on using whether that’s in person or through Flipgrid to teach perspective in a fun way.
Enjoy!
Chalk and Ink
Chalk and Ink is a biweekly podcast that publishes on Fridays throughout the school year. Learn how teachers who write and writers who teach combine craft moves to create outstanding products for their students and readers. Download Chalk and Ink wherever you get your favorite podcasts.
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