Benson's Best Books

As we begin to approach the holiday season and hope to have a bit more time to read just for fun, it's time to share some of my favorite recent reads - a tradition I learned from Bonnie Campbell Hill and offer in her honor with this post :)

Children's Literature

Word After Word After Word by Patricia Maclaclan

Falling Down the Page by Georgia Heard

Sara Holbrook poetry collections

Miss Brooks Loves Books

Mirror, Mirror

The Dreamer; Interrupting Chicken

A Fruit is a Suitcase for Seeds

How Rocket Learned to Read

Life-Size Zoo

The Quiet Book

Orange Pear Apple Bear

Born to Read

Miss Little's Gift by Douglas Wood

LMNOPeas

Sit In

14 Cows for America (Thank you, Seamus Marriott!)

Those Shoes (Thank you, Carol Wilcox!)

Terrible Underpants

Busing Brewster

It's a Book by Lane Smith

Guys Read: Funny Business

The Best Place to Read

Read to Tiger

Everything I Need to Know I Learned From Children's Books (Thank you, Beth Hower!)

Novels

Cutting for Stone (Thanks so much, Bonnie Campbell Hill!)

The Help (Thank you so much, Brenna Issacs!)

Five Smooth Stones (Still reading but love it -Thank you, Aunt Susan and Brenna Issacs!)

Swedish mysteries by Stieg Larson and others by Henning Mankell (which are much less graphically intense than Larson's)

Little Bee by Cleave (although incredibly sad - Thank you, Jean Kottke!)

Marriage and Other Acts of Charity by Kate Braestrup (Thank you, Mary Denman!) [nonfiction]

PROFESSIONAL LITERATURE

Clockwatchers: Six Steps to Motivating and Engaging Disengaged Students Across Content Areas by Quate and McDermott

Mind in the Making by Ellen Galinsky

Resonate by Nancy Durate

Conferring by Patrick Allen

Motion Leadership by Michael Fullan

The Six Secrets of Change by Michael Fullan

The Flat World and Education by Linda Darling-Hammond

Making Learning Whole by Perkins

Rigorous Curriculum Development by Larry Ainsworth

Visible Learning by John Hattie

Instructional Rounds in Education by City, Elmore, Fiarman, & Teitel

Compelling Conversations by Thommie Piercy

The Collaborative Teacher and The Collaborative Principal edited by Guskey (Thank you, Ainsley Rose!) Checking for Understanding by Fisher & Frey

Differentiated Instructional Strategy: One Size Doesn't Fit All by Gregory and Chapman

How Student Writing Teaches Us by Mark Overmeyer

Brain Rules; Creating a Learner-Centered Classroomby Kath Murdoch and Jeni Wilson

Formative assessments books by Susan Brookhart and others by Shirley Clarke

...and my two of my most favorites books are The Next Step Guide to Enhancing Writing Instruction and The Next Step Guide to Enriching Classroom Environments by treasured friends and colleagues Bonnie Campbell Hill and Carrie Ekey

More titles to come (I know I have forgotten several really incredible texts here!)...

Hope-Joy to You All!

Linking Our Thoughts and Prayers to Support Bonnie Campbell Hill

Please join my family and I in offering our treasured friend and mentor, Dr. Bonnie Campbell Hill, our unceasing support and prayers as she battles cancer. Bonnie brings radiant light to our practices as teachers, efforts she gives so generously and knowingly to educators and families around the world. In honor of your wisdom and our love for you, please know that we stand with you, Bonnie. Blessings and miracles are yours...

Fight Hunger with Your Words!

Meanings of Hunger ~ Student Contest

Action Against Hunger | ACF-USA invites students to participate in our first online contest! These contests will occur once a semester and will offer students an opportunity to explore global hunger issues and take action in raising awareness about malnutrition.

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ACTION AGAINST HUNGER | ACF-USA

Action Against Hunger Student Contest

What is hunger to you?

hun·ger [huhng-ger] – noun

1. a compelling need or desire for food. 2. the painful sensation or state of weakness caused by the need of food: to collapse from hunger. 3. a shortage of food; famine. 4. a strong or compelling desire or craving: hunger for power.

Using this definition of hunger as inspiration, create a piece that expresses what hunger means to you. Possible projects could be:

- Poem or essay about hunger

- Diorama of a refugee camp

- Letter to a government representative calling for action to alleviate the global food crisis

- Photo essay of hunger in your city

- Painting representing your feelings about malnutrition

- Filmed speech contrasting hunger in the United States to hunger around the world

How to Enter:

• All submissions must be postmarked by December 3, 2010. Anything received with a postmark date after December 3rd will not be considered for the contest.
• Submissions may be mailed or emailed to Action Against Hunger: Action Against Hunger

ATTN: Student Outreach Coordinator

247 West 37th Street, 10th Floor

New York, NY 10018

outreach@actionagainsthunger.org

• If your submission is unable to be mailed, please send at least two photos of the piece, as well as a write-up of the inspiration (not to exceed two pages).

Contestants must include the following information along with their entry:

o Name

o Address

o Email

o Phone

o Birth Date

o School Grade

Judging & Prizes

Contestants will be evaluated on the following criteria:

• 50% clarity of information
• 25% creativity
• 25% connection to topic

A panel of three ACF representatives will judge entries. Winners will be announced on December 17, 2010 and will be notified by email or phone. First, second and third place entries will receive a Student Activist package.

General Rules:

• Participants must be no older than 18 years old.
• Inappropriate material or incomplete submissions will not be considered for the contest.
• Entries will not be returned.
• Any questions regarding the contest can be directed to outreach@actionagainsthunger.org or (877) 777-1420 ext.134.
• You can get more details online: http://www.actionagainsthunger.org/students

Thank You, African Educators!

In honor and gratitude for the inspiring educators of the AISA (Association of International Schools in Africa) Conference! I loved learning with you. Hearing all your thoughtful "I wonder..." questions and your "I learned..." insights, it is clear to me how richly blessed your students are to have YOU in their literacy lives.

Wishing you great joy on all your journeys, here are a few touchstones from our professional studies.

Warmest regards and respect,

Laura

Key Tenets of Literacy Workshop Learning and Teaching:

Students engage in daily practice of reading and writing

• Student engagement and growth are continuously monitored by the teacher with one-on-one conferences and his/her anecdotal notes. Additional evidence of students’ literacy progress and investment are regularly harvested from students’ responses in whole group discussions; book club talks and guided reading studies; written responses; and self evaluations (for example). The teacher employs predictable yet compelling rituals and routines are to support student engagement, community spirit and support, and intellectual rigor.

Students read and write from their choices (most of the time, 80%) as well as guided choices from their teacher (20%)

• Guide students to “Just right” books to ensure that students comprehend what they read
• Students have access to a variety of literacy resources and texts from a well stocked and diverse classroom library and writing center.

All members of the workshop community are both student and teacher

• Students serve as fellow mentors voicing their thinking processes during focus lessons, small groups, and author’s chair (for example).

Teacher as reader and writer

• Students witness their teacher engaged in his/her own reading and writing.
• By revealing why and how s/he works to read and write/articulating the dynamic processes for how we need to think to understand (as readers) and be understood (as writers), the teacher is a vibrant mentor in his/her students' lives.

Teacher and students work with intention and focus

• The teacher determines worthy literacy studies for his/her students by knowing each child as individual and identifying class patterns of performance, too.
• Guided by their teacher(s) and supported by all members of the classroom community, students study an edifying literacy focus over a long period of time in a variety of learning settings and texts for and with a variety of audiences.

Furthering Our Studies of Bonnie Campbell Hill's Developmental Continuums and Our Focus on "Teacher as Mentor" ~ a few thoughts about how we can support each child's journey...

The Gradual Release of Responsibility model stipulates that the teacher moves from assuming “all the responsibility for performing a task…to a situation in which the students assume all of the responsibility” (Duke & Pearson, 2002, p. 211). This gradual release may occur over a day, week, month, or a year.

Graves and Fitzgerald (2003) note “effective instruction often follows a progression in which teachers gradually do less of the work and students gradually assume increased responsibility for their learning.”

A common framework for implementing the model is I do it; we do it; you do it…Many models lack a vital component: learning through collaboration with peers (Fisher & Frey, 2008).

The Gradual Release of Responsiblity model is the intersection of several theories and multiple research studies: · Piaget’s (1952) work on cognitive structures and schema · Vygotsky’s (1962; 1978) work on zones of proximal development · Bandura’s (1965) work on attention, retention, reproduction, and motivation · Wood, Bruner, and Ross’s (1976) work on scaffold instruction · Pearson & Gallagher’s (1983) research with reading students · Duke & Pearson’s (2002) studies on modeling & guided practice to build students’ independence as readers, writers, and learners · Tomlinson’s (2001; 2003) research about differentiated learning · Kersten’s (1987) studies articulating the importance of organizing instruction so that students increasingly take responsibility for their own learning · Palinscar and Brown’s (1984) and Oczkus’ (2003) reciprocal teaching research · Studies on the effectiveness of peer learning: + Gersten & Baker’s (2000) with English language learners; + Stevens & Slaven’s (1995) for students with disabilities; and + Coleman & Gallagher’s (1995) learners identified as gifted.

Model & Practice Self Talk with Students

How do proficient readers work to understand the texts they read, view, and hear?

Connect Use existing knowledge to make sense of new information	Wonder Ask questions before, during, & after reading	Infer Draw inferences from the text	Check & Repair Understanding Monitor their own comprehension and use fix up strategies when they get “stuck”	Evaluate Identify important ideas in text	Synthesize Integrate information to create new ideas and deeper understanding
“This reminds me of…” “This is like…” “This is like ___ but not like ____ because…” “I am connecting ____ to ____ because…”	“I wonder…” “Why did they…?” “I am curious about…” “What…? How…? Where…? When…? Who…? Why?”	“I bet…” “I am guessing that ____ because…” “I predict…” “It seems like ___ and, so, I think that…” “I infer…”	“I think…” “I know…” “I don’t get it. I’d better read that again…” “This was about…” “I am confused…” “I know that I know…”	“I learned…” “This seems really important because…” “A big idea I am taking from this text is…” “The author wants me to consider...”	“Putting all this information together, I now know that…” “In the beginning…and at the end…” “Now I realize that…” “I feel that ____ because…So, now I will…”

...and Continue Your Collaborations to Name and Create Formative Assessment Practices and Tools to INFORM Your Teaching Work

Making Formative Assessment Connections for My Students...

Let's keep the Conversation Going!

Formative Assessment Strategy/Tool	Why & How Considerations	Implementation Plans: How I will use this will my students
Regular Classroom Work
Oral Response & Talk Strategies; Self Evaluatiion Strategies
Writing & Written Response Strategies
Artistic Response Strategies
Developmental Continuums
Rubrics & Scoring Guides