Posts tagged ‘interests’
37. Tallchief: America’s Prima Ballerina by Maria Tallchief with Rosemary Wells
Retell: This is an autobiographical story of Maria Tallchief, one of the greatest American-born ballerinas of her time.
Topics: native americans, Osage, Oklahoma, ballet, Westward Expansion, music, interests, biographies, narrative nonfiction
Units of Study: Social Issues, Nonfiction
Tribes: personal best
Reading Skills: inference, determining importance, envisionment
Writing Skills: seeing the world as a writer, using interesting transitional phrases
My Thoughts: This story is great to read when discussing what it means to put your all into something. Maria Tallchief lived, breathed, and ate music and dance. She writes about how her teacher told her to live like a dancer “When you sleep, you must sleep like a dancer. When you stand and wait for the bus, you must wait for the bus like a dancer.” This particular scene reminds me how we often challenge our students to live like writers. Perhaps now we can tell students, “When you wait for the bus, you must wait for the bus like a writer–notebook in hand, waiting to collect stories.”
16. Ish by Peter H. Reynolds
Retell: A young boy loses confidence on his artwork after his brother insults his work.
Topics: art, interests, self esteem, confidence, sibling issues
Units of Study: Realistic Fiction, Launching the Writers Workshop, Character
Tribes: mutual respect, personal best
Reading Skills: inference, making connections
Writing Skills: using a mixture of dialogue and description
My Thoughts: A friend of mine who is an art teacher once told me that between the ages of 8 and 10 many kids give up artistic pursuits. Apparently this age group becomes obsessed with making their art look realistic. Many people, myself included, stopped drawing and painting at this age because they lost confidence in their artistic ability. Ish is a story that addresses this issue in an adorable way. During read aloud students can analzye the role of the narrator’s sister who helps encourage him to recognize the beauty in his work. This book lends itself well to a discussion on personal best. Later in the book, the young artist starts a writers notebook making this a great book to launch classroom writers notebooks.
Teachable Texts 