Letter from the writer/editor Welcome, Imagine. Two hands are pulling you forward. One has purple ink. The other is shaking. They pause. You crinkle your eyebrows. Now image hundreds of them. All of them wanting a hug. That’s what I encountered while writing this magazine. Hundreds of hands thrashing threw the air, trying to get one satisfying hug. Alas, I persevered and wrote the following pages. Before leaving you to peruse this publication, I would just like to clarify what Confetti Attitude is. CA is a place where male educators can discuss and challenge one another to reflect on what education means to them and support one another’s unique talents. I read a post from a blogger who tried to raise the call for teachers to be writers and artists. If teachers become passionate about their curiosities and start to engage in their unique personalities as humans, that interest carries over into the classroom. My hope is that the next edition of this magazine will highlight the talents and ideas of male educators from around the world. Lofty goals indeed. In this issue, I will pose a question for you to knock your neurons around with, review essential books for the upcoming school year, and provide creative enlightenment by sharing my favorite fashion accessory. Sincerely,
Zachary Zidek
“Words don’t merely describe reality. They create it.” — Deepak Chopra
Turn That Tie Down
Wooden planks lined the secretaries office. Built over dead birds and broken rocks. The lady wearing a flag on her neck, whipped her tongue around before she spoke. Biting the air with every itch of enthusiuam, she threw her heart into firing me. I listened as I had before, but it was like listening to static. Silent as I sat, I was still too loud. The white cotton, black slacks, and daft smile were all fine. The blurring thunder of rose and sea swaying over my chest wasn’t. I had gone too far.
Crumple Your Philosophy
I love to take a question that would be posed to a child and see how I respond to it and what the immediate reaction that comes to my mind is. Meaning, I set up a stop watch for five minutes after I read a question and then I stop writing when the timer goes off. Here goes!!
Should teachers grade you on creativity?
Most rubrics have a creativity section. I am going to plunge into the 75% of me who thinks that creativity should not be graded, or rather not graded on the scale that it currently is. Creativity has traditional been placed as a part of the “whole� process and as of late it has shot to the top of administrators and policy maker’s minds. It does not sit well with me that people are looking at creativity as a plot of land to sell and trade. Creativity to me is a refugee. A place where I am neither right nor wrong. I can be a princess or an avocado. To express myself and grow as a person, involves stepping outside myself. To limit what is creativity (in terms of defining and measuring it), you are taking away the very root that holds the word together. Times up.
I could go on about this. I will not because I want others to comment on this. I want you to set that timer and answer this question. I am willing to crumple up my philosophy and start again. And again! And again!
These are books that I have either used in the classroom this past year or intend to use this year.
Age Level: between 1st grade and into 6th grade.
By: Lana Button Grade 1-2 Tag Line: Do you have a student that is shy? Bright thinker, but not very vocal? Get this book! Synopsis: The book follows Willow, a student who does not talk loud enough for people to hear her, so often she gets ignored. After she makes a special microphone that allows her to feel like people are listening to her, she gains confidence in speaking up for herself. Over time the “magical microphone” breaks, but she has confidence in her voice and what she has to say. It may sound cheezy, but having witnessed a story time session (using this book) with second graders, I can say that both boys and girls were engaged.
Classroom Use: First or second week of school BANG! Start asking/showing (by using this book) your students how to build a classroom community. Every classroom has a student like willow. It may not be vocal shyness, but a student may not feel like they fit in or gets left behind with an experience that is less than meaningful in your class. On the opposite end of the spectrum, we have students that just want to shout out and it's very hard for others to verbalize their opinions. For a situation like this, you might want to use My Mouth is a Volcano! By Julie Cooke. This book acts as a stepping stone for a student(s) to see the value in thinking of their unique ideas and balancing them with their peer’s opinion.
I always thought it would be interesting if mid way through the year, students can select their favorite read aloud (which the teacher will have read sometime during the first part of the year) and practice reading it (repeated reads), decide on a presentation platform (read aloud, puppets, Voice Thread, etc) and perform it during an open house or literacy night event. The student benefits by getting practice with his/her fluency, having the choice of how they want to present, and reinforcing the positive messages that underline our shared reading collection. WIN! WIN!
By: Kathleen T. Pelley
Mid Elementary – High School
Tag Line: An inventor that cares more about making his community happy, then he does on being famous or rich. Synopsis: Great read aloud to discuss the prospect of becoming an inventor or someone successful. This author has a knack for superb sentence fluency and excellent word choice. Sample Sentence: 'Sang a snippet of song and twirled a whirl of a fling'
Besides having the conventional writing skills that this book exemplifies, the heart of the book is on being yourself. That term has become a clique in schools and kids know that. Administrators can cram policy after policy into the school's code of conduct, but a lot of students know that those words, “be yourself”, don't mean a thing in the context of school. This is not to say that this book will solve all that, but it does offer a refreshing look at how people interact with one another. The main character shares in the joys and yearnings of his family and community. Once chosen to be a “professional inventor”, he loses the human connection which truly is the catalyst behind his inventions. Classroom Use: Due to the heightened word choice selection, this text is better suited for upper elementary and on through high school because it connects on quite a few different levels. In terms of elementary school, it could fit in as an example of poetry and give introduction into the lives of inventors. A great way to tie this story into a larger discussion is to let students watch video submissions on http://thefuntheory.com/. This site shows how creative thinkers (inventors) are using their heart to guide their creations. One group of people decides to decorate a staircase like a piano (and makes it sound like one) so that people will walk instead of ride an escalator. Another person wants to make people obey the speed limit, so he creates a camera system that takes pictures of people as they drive by. Those that go over the speed limit will have to play a fine. The money from the fine will go to people that followed the speed limit. A reward for following the rules.
Shellia wouldn’t shut it. Dark noises abound. It’s what she kept saying. Miracles gonna fade papa. I remember spitting out the window Telling her to stop her gosh darn stupidity. Raspberry avenue was talking too And it wasn’t no end of days speech. Lips puckered, driving on roses It felt as such The wheels stopped buzzing And my senses went into one
Flamingos dance while they sleep.
Wedding in their heads
Bones smack the dirt
Awake in heaven
No Talking! By: Andrew Clements 3th Grade - 5th Grade Tag Line: Remember when girls had cuddies? Well they still do, but this story is about boys and girls entering into an old school competition!
Synopsis: This is a great story and I can't believe it has not gotten more praise! The story follows a rowdy group of students in the 5th grade, who are called the unshusables by their teachers. Along the way, Dave, our narrator, decides he is going to stay quiet for one full day. That's 24 hours long. This is painful for someone like Dave, who loves to talk. Why is he doing this? He is researching India for a school project and stumbles upon readings from Gandhi that describe how the wise Gandhi would take one day out of the week to remain silent, so that he could return order to his mind. Eventually the plot emerges and a female main character decides that she can top Dave's “silent” phase. What develops is a boys vs. girls game to see who can stay quiet longer. Sample Quote: “No Dave couldn't believe it. He couldn't believe that anyone could flap and yap her mouth so fast, and say so many words, and be so boring and stupid-sounding, all at the same time. He took another bite of pizza and tried to stop listening, but Lynsey was just getting warmed up.”
Classroom Use: Past the obvious connections to Gandhi, India, individual identity, and boy/girl rivalries, this story catches hold of something more important; curiosity. The premise of the book is rooted in curiosity. If Dave had not been curios about the phrase, Give order to your mind and/or curios by a challenge of giving up one of things he loves most, this book would have a thinner plot and not be as enticing a read. This would be a great book for a classroom read at the onset of the year or one of the books used for a guiding reading group. The language could work for third grade and definitely works for fourth grade. The story may be set in the fifth grade, but the writing may bore some fifth grades students that are already into the middle school scene of books – (unless their reading level scores are low, in which case this would be perfect). This book would be a good way to introduce healthy competition between groups in one class or between classes. One could also hold a classroom challenge, where students have to give something up for a week and they chart in their journal how it feels/felt to give up something they care about for a chunk of time. Overall, I think this story could be a great way to discuss with students why we become attached to things and if the only limitation on giving them up is our mindset, how to use the mind over matter approach. Can we tell ourselves we don’t need something? What do we put in place for what we want?
By: Sharon M. Draper Upper Elementary- Middle School Tag Line: A young girl with Cerebral Palsy is not able to verbally communicate or control much of her body’s movements, but she can understand the world around her just fine. Synopsis: Melody is the main character who is in love with words and describing her emotions. The only problem is that she can’t tell anyone what she is feeling and what she is capable of understanding. The story starts off bleak with her purposely failing tests at the doctor’s office because she thinks they don’t know anything about her and the same tests have been given to her since she was little. As the story unfolds, the use of a computerized talker and a teacher that is willing to see past her difficulties and pinpoint what she actual knows, and not what she doesn’t now, allow Melody to show her age level peers that she is a smart person. Classroom Use: Let me just get this out of the way, I shed a few tears reading the beginning of this book. I teared up about the beauty of the human mind and how Melody was blessed with a working one, but how the social exile made her want to escape her own head. The tension in her voice will definitely grip the reader. Sample Sentence: “Words have always swirled around me like snowflakes – each one delicate and different, each one melting untouched in my hands. Deep within me, words pile up in huge drifts. Clever expressions. Jokes. Love songs.” The voice of the character is rich in detail and it really helps kids see what it is like to not have something that we all take for granted. The ability to tell another person that you are sad, hurt, proud of something you did, etc. is one of the greatest joys of being human. This would definitely be a good story to look at Voice. Even copying the first two chapters of the story would give the students a great example of how to motivate an audience to feel what the characters are experiencing.
By: Giles and Alexandra Milton
Early Elementary
Tag Line: Have you ever dreamed of creating your own animal? Do you use Switcharoo Zoo? Teaching a lesson on recognition of a familiar topic in a new setting? If you said yes to any of these, then you should find time to read this book. Synopsis: Although the recommend age group for this book is K-2, I have used this book with fifth graders and their first grade buddies. The book has a sense of wonder about it. You take a pigs leg, a pair of alligator teeth, a flamingos beak, etc. and create a new animal. Each page provides a different part of an animal and students have to identify what animal is being represented by that part. Classroom Use: This book could easily be tied to a project involving Switcheroo Zoo. (Don't know what this is? Please go to www.Switcheroo Zoo.com) This book can be used to model how different items, topics, and words all fall under the umbrella of a certain Idea or concept. For example, students can pick a topic and place all the items that fall into that category. Create a book (physical or virtual) and then at the end it culminates into a design of all the individual pieces. (Ex: simple or complex sentence.) It takes a bunch of pieces (noun, verb, adjective, and punctuation) to create the end result of a sentence that has meaning behind it. What would really work best, is if you did an endangered species unit (tied in with Who Killed Cock Robin? By: Jean Craighead George – that is if you are teaching fourth-fifth grade) and had students create a classroom book, where each of the pages had a piece of their animal in the form of a collage, and the end of the book is the unique creation of the “entire” animal kingdom they will be saving. Art + Science + LA = Great Curriculum!
Thank you for reading the first publication of Confetti Attitude. I would love feedback on what you thought about it and what YOU would like to add. Please send me your 5 minute musings on the Crumple Your Philosophy section. Take pictures of your ties with a poem attached. Share books that you have read this summer. Send to mrz.zidek@gmail.com