Mr. Crepsley, Madam Octa, and ME at Universal Orlando’s Halloween Horror Nights!

Hey gang! I’m back from vacation and back with you. Last week, Hart County was on Fall Break and I took the opportunity to visit Orlando, FL so that I could experience the most spooktacular event that I know of in the world! Universal’s annual Halloween Horror Nights is a super-scary experience that no horror fan should miss. Well, horror fans who are willing to have the living daylights scared out of them, anyway! 

I’ll have to say one of the highlights of my trip was finding out that HHN had constructed a Cirque du Freak scarezone in addition to all the cool haunted houses. Honestly, I’ve been scared to post this because I’m afraid Mrs. Martin may never forgive me for going! I’m a big fan of Mr. Shan, but she is a MAJOR fan! As you can see in the picture above, I got to meet their Mr. Crepsley and Madam Octa which was REALLY awesome for me! Madam Octa was really moving in that box! My sister and I also got chased by some random vampires, spooked by a creepy announcer and got some pictures of Mr. Tall, Evra the Snake Boy, Rhamus TwoBellies, and Madame Truska! Overall, VERY nifty! I always enjoy seeing books brought to life when it’s done right.

As a little bonus, you can click HERE and go to the Apple site where you can watch a behind-the-scenes featurette that I think you’ll enjoy! There is some COOL stuff in there! If that isn’t enough, you can always go back to my previous post about this movie to watch the movie trailer again.

This video that I made should give you a quick overview…

According to the American Library Association’s Office of Intellectual Freedom, there were 513 challenges to books reported in 2008. The top 10 most frequently challenged books of 2008 are featured in the video below:

So what do you think? Did you see any books that look familiar in either of those videos?

Do you think that other people should be able to decide for you what you can and can’t read? Well, besides your parents. They definitely get a say!

Constitution Day wasn’t that long ago. What connections can you make between the Freedom of Speech guaranteed by the First Amendment and the Freedom to Read?

If you’re interested in finding out where in the country that book challenges occur, check out this interactive Google map that includes challenges from 2007 to 2009.  I found one from Winchester, KY!

So, I’ll end this with reminding you that Free People Read Freely! Read a Banned Book!

Sorry for the delay in getting a post up this week, but we had an interesting Monday here at LeGrande, didn’t we? First the network was down and then the water turned against us! Maybe today will be calmer…

So anyway, I’ll get right to it. This week, I want to know something about not what you DID read, but about what you WANTED to read. I want to hear about the book that somehow might have slipped through your fingers!

JCMS students, you may choose to approach this prompt from the perspective that you MIGHT want to read one of the other books on our Project List on your own sometime in the future. The LG kids looked at all the books before checking out, so they made lists to help them get at least one book that they had been interested in at the beginning. I know that you JCMS kids are only reading one book for this, so tell us about at least ONE OTHER book on the list that grabbed your attention as you were choosing.

And now, the THREE-PART prompt!

• What book from your original list of “things on the Project List that looked interesting” did you NOT get to read? If there is more than one, feel free to share them all!
• Why did you originally want to read that book?
• Will you read it in the future (even without being assigned to do so)? Why or why not?

Pretty simple stuff, I think. I know that my personal list of “things I really want to read soon-ish” just grows and grows. I tend to have stacks and stacks of books around me all the time and it always seems like it gets bigger rather than smaller even though I read A LOT!

Personally, I just bought a book called Rampant by Diana Peterfreund that I’m dying to start. Seriously, it’s about killer unicorns so how could I NOT want to read it? Also, I’ve got Bunnicula Meets Edgar Allan Crow by James Howe, Teach with Your Strengths: How Great Teachers Inspire Their Students by Rosanne Liesveld, and the first Vampire Diaries volume by L. J. Smith! You can see how things pile up for me!

So, tell me about your future reading plans. It might help me get the library prepared! Or at least your Language Arts teachers…  

Sorry for the delay in getting a post up this week, but we had an interesting Monday here at LeGrande, didn’t we? First the network was down and then the water turned against us! Maybe today will be calmer…

So anyway, I’ll get right to it. This week, I want to know something about not what you DID read, but about what you WANTED to read. I want to hear about the book that somehow might have slipped through your fingers!

And so, a THREE-PART prompt!

• What book from your original list of “things on the Project List that looked interesting” did you NOT get to read? If there is more than one, feel free to share them all!
• Why did you originally want to read that book?
• Will you read it in the future (even without being assigned to do so)? Why or why not?

Pretty simple stuff, I think. I know that my personal list of “things I really want to read soon-ish” just grows and grows. I tend to have stacks and stacks of books around me all the time and it always seems like it gets bigger rather than smaller even though I read A LOT!

Personally, I just bought a book called Rampant by Diana Peterfreund that I’m dying to start. Also, I’ve got Bunnicula Meets Edgar Allan Crow by James Howe, Teach with Your Strengths: How Great Teachers Inspire Their Students by Rosanne Liesveld, and the first Vampire Diaries volume by L. J. Smith! You can see how things pile up for me!

So, tell me about your future reading plans. It might help me get the library prepared!

Last year, LeGrande had the honor of welcoming author Leigh Anne Florence and her wonderful weenie dogs for an author visit. The pups were SO cute and we had a lovely day talking about reading and writing! I was really inspired to try providing a yearly opportunity for YOU (my students) to get to meet real-life authors.

I’ve got a SCARY GOOD surprise for you!

On October 14th, LeGrande will welcome Johnathon Rand for the afternoon! He is the author of the popular American Chillers book series and I think that this is going to be one incredible program.

If you’re not already a fan and you love a good scary story, then you really need to read some of his books. Besides, I think it’s always much cooler to meet an author after you’re at least mildly familiar with their work. I’ve met quite a few authors over the years and I always have a better experience when I can talk to them about what they’ve written AFTER I have actually read it myself.

To give you some inspiration, I created the following video. Take a look!

So, what do you think? Are you excited?

Hey there, JCMS and Mrs. Martin! I know that you won’t probably be dealing with this post until the end of the week, but I hope that your experience commenting on the “Week #3″ post will have been successful and that you’re ready to keep going! I want you to keep in mind that the ultimate product for you will be a booktalk, even if I keep prattling on about scripts for Book Videos. Really, those Book Video scripts ARE a booktalk! We just record ourselves and add some images instead of reading them live in front of people. Hopefully, I might be able to pay Mrs. Martin a visit later this year and get YOU set up for video creation!

Now, the part you’ve all been waiting for…THIS WEEK’S PROMPT! For this round, we’re going to think about the literary element of PLOT. Plot, of course, is the sequence of events in a work and I want you to practice zeroing in on an exciting event. Doing this will help with the scripts/booktalks that you students will be writing!

• When you’re creating your Book Videos/scripts in a week or so, we’re going to ask you to consider using a “cliffhanger” at the end to make viewers curious about what happens later on in your book. The videos and booktalks are supposed to persuade others to want to read the books that they are based on and what better way to do than than to leave the audience wanting more! Your job is to identify and describe an exciting plot point (aka EVENT) and then leave us with a couple of questions. To help you out, I’ve included the following example:

             In Graceling by Kristin Cashore, Katsa is born “graced” – which means that she has a special skill. She has the Grace of killing and her uncle, King Randa, uses her as an enforcer to punish people who have wronged him in some way. Katsa, however, does not enjoy the errands that King Randa gives her, so she also spends time doing the work of the Council. They are a secret group that tries to right many wrongs within the Seven Kingdoms. While on a Council rescue mission, Katsa encounters a Graced fighter from the kingdom of Lienid. He is fascinating, but dangerous to her. Should she kill him to ensure that he will never be able to tells others that he saw her? Should she let him live to prove that she is not the monster many think her to be? If you want to find out, then read this book! 

• You may use any book that you have read on our project list to respond to this prompt!

If you have questions, please feel free to ask me or Mrs. Scott to help you! I’ve been really impressed with some of your comments and responses so far. Keep up the good work!

Also, have you been taking your AR tests on your project books as you finish them? I hope so! Passing your quizzes is a nice little chuck of your project grade!

Now, the part you’ve all been waiting for…THIS WEEK’S PROMPT! For this round, we’re going to think about the literary element of PLOT.

• When you’re creating your Book Videos in a week or so, we’re going to ask you to consider using a “cliffhanger” at the end to make viewers curious about what happens later on in your book. The videos are supposed to persuade others to want to read the books that they are based on and what better way to do than than to leave the audience wanting more! Your job is to identify and describe an exciting moment of the story and then leave us with a couple of questions. To help you out, I’ve included the following example:

             In Masterpiece by Elise Broach, Marvin the beetle reveals that he has a talent for creating miniature drawings that are similar to the work of the famous artist Albrecht Durer. However, the drawings are attributed to his human friend James. When the Metropolitan Museum of Art wants James to help catch an art thief by creating a copy of a famous artwork, James and Marvin must go to the museum and not get caught while Marvin is working! Will they be able to fool everyone? Will Marvin be able to survive in the world without being squished? Read the book to find out! 

• You may use any book that you have read on our project list to respond to this prompt!

If you have questions, please feel free to ask me or Mrs. Scott to help you! I’ve been really impressed with some of your comments and responses so far. Keep up the good work!

I’d like to take this opportunity to welcome Mrs. Martin’s 7th Grade Reading Class at Jessie Clark Middle School in Lexington, KY to the party! They will be joining us for the duration of the project and will be reading from the same book lists as the 7th and 8th graders at LeGrande. This is a big experiment for Mrs. Martin, Mrs. Scott and myself (Mrs. Northcutt) and we hope that it works like we think it will!

I hope that you LG kids have been enjoying your reading so far and I’ll be curious to see how many JCMS students already have gotten their hands on a project book! There are some really excellent choices on your list and I hope that you’ve been able find some material that has kept your attention! Oh, and I REALLY hope that you used part of the 3-day weekend to read! I know that I got quite a few comments on the Week #2 post to moderate over the break!

So, here are the prompts of the week…

• What book did you choose as your second project book? JCMS students, just tell us what book you chose to read since you’re just getting started. LG students really should be reading their second book by now, but I also know that some of my students are on your third or fourth books! Go you! 

and

• Explain how you came to a decision on what book you were going to read for this round. Maybe you didn’t get your first choice when we started, maybe you picked it based on another student’s blog responses maybe I recommended it to you or maybe it was a random choice that just sounded good at the time. It could be just about anything. Whatever it was, we want to know!

All right, gang. Don’t be shy! Let’s get to know one another a little bit through our literature discussion!

I hope that you kids have been enjoying your reading so far! There are some really excellent choices on your list and I hope that you’ve been able to get your hands on some books that have kept your attention! Oh, and I REALLY hope that you used part of the 3-day weekend to read! I know that I got quite a few comments to moderate over the break!

So here are the prompts of the week…

• What book did you choose as your second project book? You really should be reading your second book by now, but I also know that some of you are on your third or fourth!

and

• Explain how you decided what book you were going to read for this round. Maybe you didn’t get your first choice when we started, maybe you picked it based on another student’s blog responses maybe I recommended it to you or maybe it was a random choice that just sounded good at the time. Whatever it was, we want to know!

I found the link to the video below in my Inbox on this morning and I was so psyched about it that I thought I’d make it the subject of my first post of the 09-10 school year!

I understand that you can’t access it at school, but you CAN watch it at home (and you know I’ll show it in Library class)! This film is apparently based on the first three books of the Cirque du Freak series by Darren Shan. Apparently some Hollywood big-shot thought that the title of the first book wasn’t catchy or easily pronounceable enough so, it has been officially re-titled, The Vampire’s Assistant (which happens to be the title of the second book in the series).

You can visit the official website for the movie HERE or you can cruise by Darren Shan’s website and check out ever more cool stuff.

I think this is a great way to start the year!

Cirque fans, let me know what you’re thinking about this!