Waiting for Teachers (copy)

Everybody is talking about it. You cannot turn on the news without hearing something about it. Oprah devoted an hour of her talk show schedule to it Monday. WKNO is playing comparable pieces on the situation in California. I have even seen scenes and heard interviews on the Jon Stewart show.

I am talking about the heart-breaking documentary “Waiting for Superman.” The movie is set to air this weekend and it addresses America’s failing schools. The focus is in the District of Columbia school area where a strong reformer, Michelle Rhee, is shaking up the status quo for tenured teachers. She suggests that teachers’ pay be in direct correlation with student outcomes.

I applaud Rhee’s determination, but I refuse to be that negative about school education as a whole. Some of the most caring people I know are teachers with a passion for education. Even my parents are or have been teachers at some point in their careers. Teachers are good people.

After watching the movie, people will want to make a difference. Here are some book suggestions to get started.

Both stay at home moms and working mothers should properly prepare offspring for education. Talk to your child. Read to your child. Sing to your child. Statistics prove over-and-over that language is the key to a successful child. Try reading Growing a Reader from Birth: Your Child’s Path from Language to Literacy by Diane McGuinness or School Starts at Home: Simple Ways to make Learning Fun by Cheri Fuller.

New teachers pick up Jonathan Kozol’s Letters to a Young Teacher. Kozol has spent over 40 years as an educator in inner-city schools. He has also written over 11 books on the subject. In this, his latest, he reaches out to new and enthusiastic teachers with sound advice. One I use, never lie, admit when you do not know and go in search for the answer together.

The funniest people I know are also teachers. My mother could not wait to serve dinner and tell us “the funny” for the day. In The Art of Teaching, Jay Parini has written a very funny memoir of his life as a college instructor. Nuggets of wisdom fill the pages.

Finally, for teachers who need a little inspiration in the classroom, read The Essential 55: An Award-winning Educator’s Rules for Discovering the Successful Student in Every Child by Ron Clark. The last rule, 55, says be the best person you can be. Be a teacher!

Waiting for Teachers (copy)

http://maggiereads.blogspot.com/2010/09/waiting-for-teachers-copy.html

Type Casted?!? (copy)

I must be in a rut. Lately, when people stop me to talk about a good book, they qualify the book as either right down my alley or something I wouldn’t want to read. Hey, a good book is a good book, but I have noticed the right-down-my-alley books are Southern genre, Mississippi authors or readable nonfiction. When did I get in this rut?

Looking back at last year’s work, I do favor these types of books. I steer away from self-help, romance and inspirational, but I thought I read a variety. In my mind it would be hard for anyone to recognize a pattern. Ha! I even had a co-worker say I never book talk self-help titles.

I have an unproven or unstudied theory about self help books. They appeal to the early 20s through middle 30s reader. The person who is looking for a relationship, tweaking a marriage, seeking a better career, going back to school, having a baby, saving money, etc. Those people who have come to the realization that they do not know it all and could use some sound advice.

I did read self-help books, but at some point I became the advisor. I would take what I read and spit it out as fact. Can you say annoying? Now, I go to self help when I have a specific problem. I read everything I can and then try to make a master plan to follow. I do not talk about the books read because I consider them personal.

Here is an example of my latest reads that you know nothing about: 4 Months to a 4-Hour Marathon by David Kuehls, Brain Training for Runners by Matt Fitzgerald, What I Talk about When I Talk about Running by Haruki Murakami, and Run Fast: How to Beat Your Best Time Every Time by Hal Higdon.

Okay, stop laughing those of you who have seen me run. Who am I kidding, right?!? Slugs lift up their back tails to wave at me as they pass by. I have to take a shower when done because moss has grown on my north side. Why, slow-motion action looks speedy alongside me.

I am no runner. At my 13 minute mile pace, I will be lucky to finish a marathon in 6 hours. I can dream though. I can pretend these books might make a difference. When the wind blows my hair back, I can imagine it is because of my speed. The pain I endure is from my athletic prowess and not old age.

So, now you know. The ruts I am stuck in are our Mississippi roads.

Type Casted?!? (copy)

http://maggiereads.blogspot.com/2010/09/type-casted-copy.html

The Whiskey Rebels (copy)

I sit waiting. I am tired of huddling in my home for the inevitable. I figure he will find me anyway. Why not make myself more visible? So I sit at the bar in Lion and Bell resigned to my fate in an unsavory part of Philadelphia known as Helltown. The whiskey and hot water warm my innards as I sit contemplating the man who will spill them.

Really, no place is safe when someone wants to kill you. I have that same sinking feeling I used to get when I served under General Washington. His Excellency had some idea we could defeat the Redcoats with our bare hands since many of us traveled without muskets. Oh, he talked big at the officers’ dinners, but he knew we were under armed.

While I wait, I spin a pocket watch I took off an unsuspecting fop earlier today. It was one of the only things I had of value. Well, Leonidas is worth fifty or sixty pounds, but I could never part with my slave. He is not property so much as company, but to emancipate him would not be to my advantage. The man who seeks to kill me will not be swayed by money.

A man, two stools down, ogles my shiny timepiece. “What are you looking at Bag-o-Bones?”

He moves to the end of the bar and I grin. No need to make new friends on my last day on earth.

Owen, the barkeep, believes the watch will make a nice down payment on my account. He has a point. If the man shoots me in his establishment, Owen should be compensated for the mess. I ask for another tankard full and run up the tab.

Owen likes me. He carries a certain respect for my war years. I once commanded his dad, or someone similar to his dad, at the fighting in Brooklyn Heights. The more whiskey he pours the more I embellish the all too familiar story.

A single voice booms from behind me, “Captain Saunders! It is time to meet your maker!”

The latest historical novel titled The Whiskey Rebels by David Liss will have you immersed in another time and place.

This is one of hubby’s favorite authors. He picked up my copy of The Coffee Trader out of boredom a couple of years ago and then had to read them all. Liss has also written The Ethical Assassin, A Conspiracy of Paper, A Spectacle of Corruption and The Devil’s Company.”

The Whiskey Rebels (copy)

http://maggiereads.blogspot.com/2010/09/whiskey-rebels-copy.html

Please Help by Voting!

Powerhouse Finalist for Tom's of Maine

$20,000 Grant Public Voting Now Open:
Vote to support the Arts Council!

The Yoknapatawpha Arts Council has been selected as a finalist for a $20,000 award in the 50 States for Good program sponsored by Tom's of Maine. Tom's of Maine receives thousands of submissions for this program. They have selected just 41 groups to consider as finalists. TheYoknapatawpha Arts Council's project to renovate the Powerhouse Community Arts Center is the only organization in Mississippi that was selected.

The program has entered the public support phase and we need your help. We need you to vote for our program on the 50 States for Good website. Voting is active. Follow the links below to vote for the Arts Council. You can vote once a day. Although all the programs that have been selected are worthy we hope you will help bring this support to a program in our community.

Please take time to vote right now. Share this link with your network of people. Then save this link, vote again everyday, and remind your friends to vote everyday.

CLICK HERE TO VOTE

Thank you for your continued support of the arts.

Please Help by Voting!

http://maggiereads.blogspot.com/2010/09/please-help-by-voting.html

Book Clubing (copy)

We had our first meeting of the Northwest Reading Round Table yesterday and the book suggestions were flying. We titled the meeting “Meet and Greet” and everyone was asked to bring a favorite book read over the summer. The books varied with all-time-favorites mingling amongst the latest in (mostly mystery) serials and hardscrabble memoirs. It was a fun afternoon and most left with a title to read next.

Story swapping during a book club meeting is one of my favorite activities. One never knows where the lead to a fabulous book will come from. Reading friends are a great source, too. They usually know you and your tolerance levels for certain things like foul language and steamy love scenes.

As a librarian, I am constantly suggesting books to all kinds of people from close friends and relatives to acquaintances. I get into trouble sometimes with acquaintances because they are—the definition of the word—unfamiliar. I suggest a book with a great story regardless of shock content. Once asked for a good book – I give it warts and all.

In a book club, one should try to read things outside personal comfort zones. One reason is a genre book such as mystery or western does not have the meaty writing to sustain a discussion. Genre books tend to be plot driven, and there is only so much one can say about plot. It takes controversy in a book to make people choose a stance and become passionate.

Some of the books and authors mentioned were Church Folk and Second Sunday by Bowden, Mississippi writer Carolyn Haines, Confederacy of Dunces by Toole, Leaving Gee’s Bend by Latham, Whistlin' Dixie in a Nor'easter by Patton, Same Kind of Different as Me and its companion book What Difference Do It Make? by Rash and Moore, and Grisham’s Ford Country.

Many more titles and authors were batted around, but I lost my list and thus my memory. I do remember the last book by Tony Hillerman titled The Wailing Wind Someone also mentioned author J.D. Robb. Oh, and a rousing book talk for The Glass Castle by Walls. Sorry ladies for my lack of brain power, but I think readers will get the picture.

Did you read a book or author you would like to try out of the list? Would you like for me to give you a good story regardless of content? Do you belong to a book club? What are you waiting for? Get to reading!

Book Clubing (copy)

http://maggiereads.blogspot.com/2010/09/book-clubing-copy.html