Grogean

I attended the OELMA conference on Friday, October 22nd and wished I had taken an extra day off on Thursday to attend, as well. I wrote down the date of the next event and will no doubt be back next year. I was overwhelmed with all the different seminars and found myself saying, “so much to learn and such little time.” I also added several new books to my list of “books to read”.

I wanted to attend a book talk so I started the day with the “2010 Live Book Talk” session. It was suppose to be K-12 but the presenter informed us that she would only make it to 5th grade and she would take no offense if we left. I debated on whether to stay since I am more interested in YA and teaching in a high school building but figured I had so much to learn that I would for sure get something out of the session and I did. There are amazing children’s books to include in any curriculum and I found myself with a huge list of books to check out. Having little kids at home, who love books, I also made a list of books they would enjoy. The presenter seemed very genuine about the books she presented and I got some tips on how to effectively book talk books.

The second session was very popular with Chris Crutcher presenting a session on “Turning Real Life into Fiction”. He talked about real life events, both happy and sad, where he pours his emotion into his books. His goal is to stir up those emotions from the readers. He thinks it’s important to introduce bad things with humor so after talking about his experience working with a little girl dealing with her mother’s death, he introduced some humorous stories of him and his brother. He talked about his book Deadline, which I had just read the other month, so it was fun to hear some experiences behind the story.

The “Getting Boys to Read” session was great. It took a couple rooms and it was a full house. Mr. Verdict talked about what guys are like and what they like to read in a very entertaining approach. He told us the importance of reading, regardless of the material. Discouraging boys from reading Captain Underpants, sports magazines, comics and such is discouraging them from reading. He asked the crowd how many times we had to help a guy find something in the fridge and if we ever drove with a guy who refused to stop for directions. This analogy pointed out they will be the same in the library. We need to approach them without making them feel like they’re lost. He suggested subscribing to American Football Coach and to “get gross”. Anything with boogers, germs, snot, pus or blood in the title are “keepers”. Other tips include: #1 Add Noise (audio books, interactive books), #2 Books for boys = Books for Boys, #3 Merchandise the library by subject as well as Dewey (make sure there are signs saying “sports”, “animals”, etc.), #4 Outreach and events. He reminded us that personal interest and personal growth is in our curriculum so provide the media necessary for that portion of the curriculum. Guys share facts so stock the Guinness Book of World Records and Sports Illustrated. They also like books that they can start anywhere so ensure there are magazine subscriptions. I know this all sounds like common sense but it was reassuring to know that magazines, comics and joke books are great literature. He mentioned one comic book that had 152 vocabulary words that were part of a 5th grade curriculum.

I also had the opportunity to attend a 21st Century Learning session that introduced me to Wordle and BubbleUs, not to mention the vendors at the conference. Michelle and I visited several booths, saw many demonstrations and received some nice gifts. It was quite the learning adventure and I can’t wait for next year’s conference!

~Lori Grogean