Summer reading, part onePosted Wednesday, July 1, 2009, at 3:06 PM
I'm reading "The Catcher in the Rye" right now and trying to get a 13 year old girl to read it with me. She's reading, I know, because we talk about it every couple days. I admit, I was more ambitious about it than she was. I thought together, we could read 30 pages every two days. It's been almost a month and she's just crossed the 100 page mark.
I keep telling her she's making me look bad, but her mom understands. Still, we could be doing better. We won't finish all seven books I had planned for the summer. I'm hoping now to get through four. My plan was to read the following books, in addition to what we are reading now: "Shane," "1984," "The Outsiders," "Treasure Island," "The Grapes of Wrath," and "Something Wicked This Way Comes." Ambitious? Maybe. Impossible? Definitely not. We would be through at least two of these books by now but there is a major roadblock and I don't believe it is an uncommon one. There are too many distractions. There always seems to be a TV show to watch, a video game to play, a friend to visit, a nap to take, or a little sister to play with. I blame technology. At the same time, technology could save my summer reading program. My student is in love with the first generation iPhone her mom is letting her borrow. There is an application which allows downloads of e-books. Most of the books in the program I designed are available and have since been downloaded and are ready to read. I'm torn on this. I want her to hold the book, to feel it, to feel closer to the millions of people who have held similar books and gone through the same experience of reading these books for the first time. When distilled down to the basics, I just want her to read and if this works, great. She'll just have to take more notes. Comments Showing comments in chronological order [Show most recent comments first] |
From a small town in Utah, to Las Vegas, to the University of Idaho, back to Las Vegas and a few stops in between, I have been around. I've reached the age of 29 having had a lot of different jobs in different places. Somehow I have managed to keep my sense of humor and individuality. I have been able to maintain my small town ideals while experiencing the big, bad world.
Some people even gave me some awards along the way, including being a national finalist in the SPJ's student awards and twice the first place Idaho Press Club student review writer.
I was born on Halloween and have had an affinity for horror movies and books my whole life. Thankfully, I do read and watch other genres, too.
Hot topics Summer reading, part two: 1984 and a secret(7 ~ 6:25 PM, Sep 2)
Summer reading, part one
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That's great, good luck!
The Outsiders, one of my favorite books along with To Kill a Mockingbird. I have been fortunate to read 3 books this summer so far! You are so right about making time to read! One of my favorites that I read this summer was Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel. Very good and a fast read.
Enjoy your summer reading list!
...and in rereading your post, your student needs to be able to SMELL the book...there's nothing I love more than the smell of those pages as they move the air under my nose when I flip through them. Love it.
Smell is not always so great if the library book was read by a smoker. Have you ever checked out a book that smelled like smoke? Yuk!
Lots of great books out there and lots of book stores. Burley has the best one I have found that carries used books and they take all your used soft cover books and give you credit towards their used books. For the adult person Janet Evanovich has many witty books but some people are offended by her choice of words. Lawrence Sanders is another top notch writer.