The White Giraffe by Lauren St. John

I picked up my latest read on another snow day (that makes 4 so far, and remember, usually our snow days occur in March/April;). I'm through the first 5 chapters, which have read quite quickly. The main character, 11-year old Martine, suffers a tragedy within the first two chapters of the book; the result of her situation is to visit her grandma in South Africa. One of the problems with this, though, is that she didn't even realize she had a grandmother. Her widowed grandmother, Gwyn Thomas, also lives at the Sawubono Game Reserve.

Right now Martine is being driven to her grandmother's by Tendai, who works for her grandmother at the game reserve. He has just told her the legend of the white giraffe: supposedly, the child who can ride the white giraffe (thought to be an albino giraffe) will have power over all of the animals. Tendai himself has never seen a white giraffe even though he is in the game reserve every day, and the game reserve itself has not had giraffes in it for two years. However, he has seen footprints, but when he follows them, they seem to vanish.

In a way what I've read so far reminds me of another book I read over Christmas break, Escape Under the Forever Sky by Even Yolahem, which takes place in Ethiopia. The main character Lucy must use her knowledge of African wildlife to survive after she is kidnapped.

I'm sure Martine will be learning more about the animals within the game reserve. Martine also met Tendai's Aunt Grace who told Martine that she had a "gift jus' like the forefathers said" and that she should use it wisely. Hmmm ... I look forward to learning more about both her grandmother Gwyn, the elusive white giraffe, and how Martine's "gift" will come into play within the book.

Whisper in the Dark by Joseph Bruchac

Last weekend I finally was able to start one of the new books from our lit. circle tubs. I've read Bruchac's Code Talker, but I have not read any of his mystery books. Whisper in the Dark has definitely got my attention, and as soon as I'm finished here, I'm going to read more.

The main character, Maddy, fears that she is being stalked by a creature from the legends of her Native American ancestors. According to the legend, though, the creature gives 4 warnings before it makes its final move. The fourth time "The Whisperer" says the victim's name, and then the end for that person is near. So far, Maddy has received at least 2 warnings, if my memory serves me. Now she and her friend Roger, both fans of horror books and films, are trying to figure out what exactly is going on and how to protect themselves. Several of the chapters have a little twist or leave a lingering question so that the reader wants to continue.

As for a prediction, I do think that Maddy will come face to face with this creature, but she will rely on stories that her father had told her and possibly her athleticism and running talent to save her. Perhaps her friend Roger will come to her rescue, too, in some way, and their friendship will blossom into romance.

Snowed in ....again

Well, after our nice Christmas break storm, which allowed me to have a very quiet vacation time, we were hit with another round and were out of school on Wed., Thurs., and Fri. So an update on my students' public service announcement project is unavailable.

Unfortunately, the three days "off" were not as productive as I'd hoped, partly because I still felt "caught up" from the work I'd done over Christmas break. I'm hoping that students used their time to do some reading and, perhaps, blogging. I was able to read a little more in one of my Christmas presents, Twisted Tree by Kent Meyers, a South Dakota author. It's not the type of novel that reads in one day, but the language is like poetry, and after lots and lots of young adult literature, I was ready for an adult book.

Our "technology and society" unit, then, will continue next week, and I look forward to seeing how students organize their time for this particular endeavor.

First Semester

My students are currently working on reflections over first semester, and it's time that I join them in the reflection process. Of course, we accomplished a lot first semester in all areas of language arts, but most recently we finished writing a cause-effect essay based on a personal experience (I ended up writing about my husband's and my move from the farm) and a book project over our first literature circle novel. One of the new tools my students and I were able to use with the essay was the online writing assessment tool called Criterion. Throughout the conversations during the revision process, I kept hearing questions like, "Is this really a run-on? It doesn't seem like it." or "I overused this word, so I changed it." I also reminded them that the computer doesn't always get "it" right, so they needed to use their own knowledge of such things as compound and complex sentence structure (which we'd also been studying) to make final revision choices.

Now that it's second semester, we have started blogging, beginning with three basic posts: a reflection of first semester, a favorite piece or writing, and a piece of writing we'd like to revise (in a way, a simple portfolio). We are also discussing technology issues, issues like "Are video games good for you" or "How much texting is too much?" After exploring these and other topics, students will choosing one to focus on for a public service announcement. The kids have been excited about most assignments that utilize technology, and they have been very receptive to the activities we've done thus far.