Hot Off the Press!

Our very first publication has been released!! Candy Houses Vol. 1 is available for purchase in our shop at: Candy Houses Publications.

On Monday during writing workshop, we spent the hour constructing our books and then we celebrated with a book release party.  Over popcorn, the kids curled up on couches and soft chairs in the school library and read through looked through their published books with excitement and admiration for all of their hard work.  Then we took some time to share some writing pieces- author's chair style.

My favorite quote of the day came from an 8th grader who said, "I really like seeing my story in print!"



Coming Up:

Next week we'll begin working on pieces for our next publication Due for release December 1st. We will begin our family memoir series which involves a strategy I learned about in the latest issue of Language Arts.  The article I've extracted this project idea from is dedicated to the use of integrated literacy practices common in digital environments The authors discuss the use of new practices in literacy to have meaning beyond the use of digital devices.

I am intrigued by the concepts introduced in this article, because although I believe that a lack of incorporating digital literacy platforms in language arts curriculum is a disservice to students in today's schools, I am also a firm believer in creating art and constructing knowledge with our own hands.  I appreciate the perspective of the authors of this article, New Literacies in the Material World when they argue that "The tools are not the point.  New literacies are new ways of doing things, new ways of creating and working with text" (Bomer, David, Patterson Zoch and Ok, 2010).  In terms of bringing digital technology into classroom curriculum, I believe it is an educators job to observe their students uses of digital devices and accept that this will provide insight into deeper levels of meaningful literacy.  As we come to understand more about what is happening young people's lives with respect to digital culture, we can begin to understand the uses of digital devices as a necessary tool for meaningful teaching and learning.

I have profound respect for the authors' view of each writer as a designer  of texts.  The writer makes decisions about materials, page size and orientation, overall look, fonts,, spacing, and other design factors (Bomer, David, Patterson Zoch and Ok, 2010).   This brings to mind how much of the creative design process my students were not involved in, not because I wanted to insert my own control over the aesthetics of their first publication, but rather because for lack of time, I wanted the focus of the workshops to be on completing writing pieces.  However, I firmly believe it is important for the students to be equally involved in the design and layout of their publications as they are in their writing.  Perhaps we should have a small meeting about this and make a list of our top priorities for our next publication.

Generating Ideas Composing Text Via Image Making

Since the beginning of the school year, we have mostly been focusing on writing as a means of generating and recording thought.  I would like to introduce a new dimension by playing with visual elements borrowed from concepts we know from using digital devices as an additional strategy for coming up with ideas.  As we know, tapping into our memories (prior knowledge) is an essential strategy for extracting innovative and personally meaningful ideas for writing.  For this activity, I have asked students to bring in a family photo, or a photo from a memorable day.  As a warm-up writing piece, I'd like the students to begin by writing anything and everything they remember from that day. This can be in the form of a list or a couple of sentences, or paragraphs. Then, using handmade cropping tools (2 pieces of card stock cut into an L shape, I will have the students crop the photo in any way they choose.  This will be the writing prompt for this activity.  Once the focus has narrowed, students will then write a piece on the focused frame of reference.

To Do:

• Publication Meeting (Goals and Priorities for our next book)

• Business Card Design

• Create a Writing Prompts Box