Verse Novel Book Club #2: Other Words for Home

Yesterday: Verse Novel Book Club Mtg #2, led by Dr. Sarah J. Donovan

📖 : Other Words for Home by Jasmine Warga 

Drawing from observations of her father’s Syrian friends’ experiences, research done with her Middle Eastern community, and her big brain as my students would say... the novel centers on the protagonist of Jude, who moves from her home under civil unrest, with her mom, joining an uncle in Cincinnati. We follow Jude as she navigates questions of identity, culture, language, prejudice, and belonging, all while continuing to worry about and miss her family in Syria. Highly recommend the book for middle schoolers. Keep reading for my take-aways.

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Take-Away 1️⃣ 

As a teacher, I appreciated the challenge Dr. Donovan gave us of producing a CERR vblog on the book. I was not shocked that I scripted out various versions, recorded several times, with some technical difficulties, before I finally made my first far-from-perfect vlog I could share with the book club. It deepened my appreciation of the work and bravery my students put in when I ask them to try something new and share it with classmates. 

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Take-Away 2️⃣ 

As a reader, I loved this book! As a daughter of Mexican immigrants and a teacher of Latinx immigrant and Mexican-American students, I found so many moments portrayed in this book that called out to me and would perhaps also resonate with students. Particularly hit hard by a question Jude asks, “Why do they hate us?” I decided to make my first vlog focused on how Jude copes with the incidents of prejudice and xenophobia she experiences. I shared with a friend how powerful a book like this would’ve been for me as an adolescent and how grateful I am that it exists today for my students!

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Take-Away 3️⃣ 

As both a teacher + learner, I left the meeting feeling awkward, frustrated, and dissatisfied. Appreciated that Dr. Donovan shared resources about how to critically read + analyze texts, including particularly using a feminist lens, the question if this text qualifies as #ownvoices (your thoughts appreciated). I’m grateful to my UTEP educators for training me with such tools. I enjoyed the write-in and subsequent activity to convert our work to verse; love how students react! These activities weren’t the source of my frustration; I am still reflecting on what was.

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Passage I shared: pg 168. It really resonated with me, especially as I see photographs and footage of children in cages near the border. What Jude expressed on this page relates to themes of migrant guilt, family, privilege, sacrifice, and responsibility.

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I loved this book and look forward to the next one!

Verse Novel Book Club #1: White Rose

Yesterday was my first meeting of the Verse Novel Book Club led by Dr. Sarah J. Donovan @sarahjdonovan9, we read Kip Wilson’s @kipwilsonwrites White Rose! Based on the true story of a German resistance group who were caught and executed for distributing “treasonous” leaflets speaking out against the Nazi regime, the novel centers on the protagonist of Sophie as she grows up and rejects the indoctrination to the interrogations she undergoes as a member of White Rose. Highly recommend the book for 8th graders and up. Keep reading for my take-aways.

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Take-Away 1️⃣ 

As a teacher, I appreciated the use of video clips from different sources to help us better understand verse novels. Plus watching clips- as opposed to entire videos- together, left room for more ideas in our short hour together. Now that we’ve been enticed, we can still go and watch the rest of the video on our own time to extend the learning! 

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Take-Away 2️⃣ 

As a reader, I need to read more verse novels! So many from BIPOC and LGBTQ+ authors and/or with said representation were mentioned, I added them to my TBR wish list. 📚 

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Take-Away 3️⃣ 

As both a teacher and learner, I 💜 the Read In that Dr. Donovan had us start out with in small groups. Preparing to read aloud a meaningful passage without the expectation of having to share an explanation tamped down my anxiety, connected me with the writing, and allowed me to use my voice! I have found once an introvert like me has started talking, it’s easier to feel included and increase the likelihood of my participating again... I wonder if anyone else felt that way?

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Passage I shared from White Rose: page 74, titled “Selflessness” as it really resonated with me, especially given the times we are in. Themes Sophie expressed on this single, powerful page: guilt, willful ignorance, sacrifice, justice.

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I really appreciated this start and look forward to the next one!

2016 Resolutions- Create, Learn, & Encourage

I make a collection of resolutions each year, and last year some friends and I grouped them: health, personal, and professional goals. I'm going to attempt to track the professional goals here this year.

I'm going to leverage my strengths to improve upon my areas of weakness.

1. Create- Increase my professional social media presence. Blog at least once a month. Tweet at least once a week.
2. Learn- Keep track of time spent on professional commitments in my calendar, and analyze how I'm spending my time to budget time better. In an effort to avoid over-committing or stretching myself too thin, I need to both plan forward and log endeavors honestly. I'll log to the best of my ability and reflect at the end of each month to make more specific and measurable goals for the next month.
3. Encourage- Really see the people (all kinds of colleagues) I interact with and offer specific praise. As an introvert, I spend a lot of my time observing and listening to others, speaking up about things when an original idea comes to me or I notice something problematic. I want to purposefully work on regularly praising some of the good work others are doing around me. This comes from wanting to not just steer clear of the negativity that seems to cloud education lately, but to work against it. (Inspired by http://smartblogs.com/leadership/2015/12/24/new-years-development-goals-for-leaders-2016-edition/ shared by a moderator on https://www.facebook.com/IllinoisECET2)

Here's to 2016! #teacherresolutions

WIP Decision

I think I've made a decision on what Work In Progress I want to stick with for the next month, I'm going to refer to it as MiraMira for now. I've often said to students that I wish I had more novels, short stories, and poems written by Latino/a authors, starring Latino/a protagonists to share with them. I've encouraged them, when they express the same sentiment of wanting to see themselves in a book, to write it!

Well, I've struggled to find the idea to use to follow my own advice into a good story.... until Monday's Teacher Writing Group. We wrote to a prompt from last week, Thursday from Kate Messner's Teachers Write! blog.

What was thinking---
My protagonist- Amira, nicknamed Mira, Mexican-American, loves Madrid
Diverse friends with diverse views in school- what brings them together? They want to travel, but as they are of low socio-economic status they've resigned themselves to just dream of traveling someday, hopefully together.
-Emma- @EmNew, African-American, positive outlook, incredibly friendly, except w/ppl who suck, loves NYC
-Daniel- @LonDan, Polish, Jewish, loves London
- ?? -He's Puerto Rican, loves Paris

There's a "bully" at school, Mabel, also Mexican-American, second generation, who thinks this group of friends is too lofty and uppity in their ambitions... she's jealous of the group for many reasons, and she's got a secret she's keeping hidden from everyone.

The usual everyday workings of the school are interrupted when a new student arrives a month into the school year- still brainstorming on her name- and she's the first white student to join their middle school class. Nobody knows how to react, and everyone seems to react the wrong way.

That's what I'm thinking so far... I'm not sure if I want to keep this so realistic fiction. I'm not sure what complications I want to add to the plot. Is the ideas of friendships, betrayal, jealousy, and home juxtapositioned with the intensity of race, gender roles and identity, and gentrification issues too much or not enough?

Summer 2015 #WriteAway with us!

I'm trying Kate Messner's Teacher Write! Camp on her blog again this summer. Today: Teachers Write! Minilesson Monday.

The Zapata Teacher Writing Group will be writing together every week in a different coffeeshop in Chicago all summer. I'm so grateful for the chance to sit and write with other teachers! We'll be trying to recruit more teachers to join us this summer. Know anyone who is interested? Please let me know! We'll be at CC Ferns Coffee Bar & Spirits 2806 W Augusta Blvd, Chicago, IL on Monday, July 13th. #WriteAway with us this summer!

Here's my work from sitting with a couple of teacher colleagues today at Jackalope. I found the courage to post on the blog today for the kick-off... but it wouldn't let me post the hashtag about #2 in the blog. This is the unedited version below.
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I'm a middle school teacher in Chicago Public Schools and this is my second summer attempting to do Teachers Write! Loved it last year, and hope I can overcome any nerves in order to post regularly!

I wonder...
1. how do people overcome the influence of controlling parents? (can you tell I work with adolescents?)
2. about female scientists' contributions and challenges throughout the years (especially in light of recent comments about #distractinglysexy women in the lab- if you haven't looked up the hashtag, please do!).
3. about my neighborhood-- the history, the people now and in my childhood, and gentrification
4. how people turn a disability into an advantage?
5. about the path of the margarita... how did it get to be what it is today? How has it evolved?
I have many more on my list but these were the ones I'm still wondering about hours later! Quite the range :-)
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Thanks for reading,
Eliza