Summer Reading

Students took their “Summer Reading Test” this week and I just wanted to reflect on this whole business of Summer Reading… 

As an English teacher, I think, isn’t the whole point of summer to relax and read as many books as you can?  My students, may not feel the same way.  Still, we know what all the studies say about reading…we just have to, and we have to continue to find books that are interesting, inspirational, and just plain good. 

Sophomores read Laura Hillenbrand’s Unbroken.  It is one of my favorite books in the past 5 years.  I have recommended this book to so many people.  It is always an English teacher’s hope that his or her students enjoy the books that they read, but I hope they got more out of this one.   I hope this book taught them to really try to put things into perspective.   All those things we want to complain about:  being so busy, not having this or that, being hot, being cold, etc.   I hope everything that Louie Zamperini had to endure made my students pause and feel blessed at the lives they are living.  And I hope in meeting Louie that they thought a little bit more about forgiveness.  Louie Zamperini’s story is just incredible and Hillenbrand’s writing is impeccable. 

Juniors read Kazuo Ishiguro’s The Buried Giant.  I fell in love with this book.  For me, it stood out amongst the same old –same old books I feel I am continually reading.  Taking place in Anglo Saxon England and full of dragons, knights, and mysteriously dangerous situations, this book is a very challenging read.  A dragon’s mist makes all in this book have very limited memories and killing the dragon will make those memories come back.  Would we, if we could, want to forget some of the bad memories in our lives, in the history of the world?  This is the kind of book that stays with you for a while. 

So I know that students would rather not have their summer reading book chosen for them.   I felt this way when I had to read The Pine Barrens before my freshman year of college.  And even though I can say that I really hated that book, I am glad that I read it.  It is okay not to like or love every book you read, just keep reading!

Lazy Sunday

 Lazy Sunday?  Not if you are a teacher or a professional football player in the Fall.  For teachers, Sunday is the day we get ready for the week ahead,  and most Sundays are full of lesson planning, lesson fine-tuning, a bit of anxiety, and considerable excitement for the week ahead.  These feelings also apply to the month of September.  While half of us is sad summer is ending and we have to go back, the other half can’t wait to get in front of the classroom again and start over with a group of new faces.  There are so many mixed feelings about this whole time and then, just like that, we are back, cruising through September, enjoying getting back to those academic pursuits and routines. 

I teach Sophomore and Junior English, and one Senior Elective class Creative Media at a competitive, college-prep, all boys school.  While a high percentage of my students do not particularly love, or even like, reading and writing, I absolutely LOVE my job.  I really do.  I would also love to get paid as much as those professional football players I mentioned earlier, but let’s save that for another blog.  This blog is going to mainly be about life in the classroom and how to make reading and writing more appealing and relevant to my students.  I want my students to buy books on Amazon, not everything else that they sell.  Is there anything  that you can’t buy on Amazon these days?

Two new things I am excited about this year are:  1)  teaching a new Elective class where one of the objectives is to create and maintain a blog, and 2) having all of my students by an 8 pack of Notecards so that we can do some non-academic writing from time to time and write to express appreciation to a variety of people in our lives. 

So, I hope you follow and enjoy my blog as we navigate the waters through candy corn and apple pie, to candy canes and hot chocolate, to conversation hearts, jelly beans, Peeps *, and then dive into popsicle and watermelon season after a meaningful and productive year!  

*Note about Peeps:  I think I liked it better when we could only get them at Easter and not all throughout the year in the form of ghosts, snowmen, American flags, etc.!!!