It's Monday! What Are You Reading? 09/25/2017

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? From Picture Books to YA! 

It's Monday! What are you Reading? is a meme hosted by Kathryn at Book Date. It is a great way to recap what you read and/or reviewed the previous week and to plan out your reading and reviews for the upcoming week. It's also a great chance to see what others are reading right now...you just might discover your next “must-read” book!

Kellee Moye, of Unleashing Readers, and I decided to give It's Monday! What Are You Reading? a kidlit focus. If you read and review books in children's literature - picture books, chapter books, middle grade novels, young adult novels, anything in the world of kidlit - join us! We love this meme and think you will, too. We encourage everyone who participates to visit at least three of the other kidlit book bloggers that link up and leave comments for them. 

Last Week's Book Adventures:

I finished listening to The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants and I started listening to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory with the boys. 

Reviewed Last Week:

Over at Story Exploratory, I celebrated Story Exploratory LIVE and Younique!

Click on any picture above to go read my review/post.

Upcoming Book Adventures: 

My plan this week is to finish Solo and read Caleb and Kit so I can review it. I'll also read more of The Creativity Project and can't wait to use it with students!

This Week's Reviews:

Check back throughout the week to read these reviews/posts. 

So, what are you reading this week? 

Link up below and don't forget to check out other blogs to see what they are reading!

To help build our community and support other bloggers, 

we ask that you comment on at least three other blogs before you. 

Also, if you tweet about your Monday post, don't forget to use #IMWAYR!

JOIN: Celebrating Story Exploratory LIVE and Younique

Every Saturday, join me as I CELEBRATE This Week 

with Ruth Ayres from Discover. Play. Build.

Today I'm celebrating a new adventure. I like new adventures. A lot. There's something in me that likes doing new things. This could be as simple as trying a new drink at Starbucks to as wild as indoor skydiving.

This new adventure is a two-for-one. It all started over the summer when I watched a video on Facebook and another video popped up. This new random video was a woman talking to the camera while she put her makeup on. I was mesmerized. She was funky and cool and I watched the entire thing. It wasn't until the end that I realized she was a Younique presenter and that she was selling makeup. Then later in the summer my friend Erin started posting about Younique and I joined her group. She talks about books and her life and makeup as self care. And she was having fun going live in her Facebook group.

Here's where my fun comes in. I realized I could buy the Younique kit and get all the amazing products. And I could start my own Facebook group where I could share videos with my friends and host parties. So I did it.

The adventurous thing is I don't know much about makeup and I've never been live on Facebook before. So it'll definitely be an adventure! But I think it'll be super fun and I'm always up for something new.

The cool thing is I get to hang out with amazing friends in what I hope will be a warm, fuzzy place of positivity. Do you want to join Story Exploratory LIVE? Send me an email jen [at] teachmentortexts [dot] com or request to join the group and we'll work it out!

It's Monday! What Are You Reading? 09/18/2017

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? From Picture Books to YA! 

It's Monday! What are you Reading? is a meme hosted by Kathryn at Book Date. It is a great way to recap what you read and/or reviewed the previous week and to plan out your reading and reviews for the upcoming week. It's also a great chance to see what others are reading right now...you just might discover your next “must-read” book!

Kellee Moye, of Unleashing Readers, and I decided to give It's Monday! What Are You Reading? a kidlit focus. If you read and review books in children's literature - picture books, chapter books, middle grade novels, young adult novels, anything in the world of kidlit - join us! We love this meme and think you will, too. We encourage everyone who participates to visit at least three of the other kidlit book bloggers that link up and leave comments for them. 

Last Week's Book Adventures:

We finished reading The Wild Robot this week! And we started listening to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. It's a little tricky to find books to read aloud to both boys and there are some books that I read with Peanut that I want Little Bean to read too. So Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is a repeat for the 10yo and new for the 7yo. It's fun so far. I've been listening to Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants and I did read some of Solo. Oh! And Colby sent me an ARC of The Creativity Project and of course I started reading right away. It's fantastic!

I set a goal to get back to my Celebrate posts and thanks to Crystal for checking in on me, I did! That feels pretty great. 

Reviewed Last Week:

Over at Story Exploratory I celebrated being on a literacy panel at 826CHI.

Click on any picture above to go read my review/post.

Upcoming Book Adventures: 

This week I'll be reading with the boys and listening to Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. I also plan to finish up Solo and read Caleb and Kit so I can review it. I'll also finish up The Creativity Project...because yay! Last week I struggled to find time to read so we'll see how this week goes!

This Week's Reviews:

Check back throughout the week to read these reviews/posts. 

So, what are you reading this week? 

Link up below and don't forget to check out other blogs to see what they are reading!

To help build our community and support other bloggers, 

we ask that you comment on at least three other blogs before you. 

Also, if you tweet about your Monday post, don't forget to use #IMWAYR!

JOIN: Celebrating 826CHI Diversity in Literacy Panel

Every Saturday, join me as I CELEBRATE This Week 

with Ruth Ayres from Discover. Play. Build.

I'm celebrating something super exciting this week! Yesterday I was invited to be part of a literacy panel with 826CHI. Maria, the Director of Programs at 826CHI, invited me to be part of it and I was thrilled and honored to be in such great company. 

Here's Maria introducing our awesome panel. The space at 826CHI was transformed into a fancy setup with rows of seats and special lighting. So cool. 

And here are the wonderful people I was so excited to learn from: Dr. Horace Hall, Maria Rivera, and Dr. Sakeena Everett. They were fantastic and had such great insight to share. It was so evident that they are passionate about the work they are doing and that was the best part.  

Besides the honor of being on the panel with fantastic people...Chad and the kids came with! They got to shop the Secret Agent Supply Co and explore the writing and tutoring space behind the storefront. I wish I had a video of their gasp when Tyler who works in the store opened the secret door! It was awesome. But then they saw the space behind the wall and they were amazed all over again. They stood on the stage, tried to hula hoop, and found lots of fun games to play with. It made me so incredibly happy that they got to see how awesome 826CHI is and that they go to see their mom doing something so special. 

Someday I hope they look back on all the things we do and have great memories that inspire them to do good in their own lives.

If you aren't familiar with 826CHI or their other branches, be sure to check them out! They are my favorite organization and doing much needed work!

Find Me: A Hide-And-Seek Book

Title: Find Me: A Hide-And-Seek Book
Author: Anders Arhoj 
Illustrator: Anders Arhoj 
Publisher: Chronicle Books 
Publication Date: September 5th, 2017 
Genre/Format: Fiction/Picture Book 
GoodReads Summary: This book has eyes—and an irresistible cover! Kids will delight in this innovative seek-and-find picture book that may be read from front to back and from back to front! Two adorable characters embark on an over-the-top game of hide-and-seek through eleven richly detailed scenes, including a lively neighborhood, a bustling shop, an offbeat office space, a festive concert, and more. Open the book from the front to search for one of the characters. Then, open the book from the back to search for the other. It's two hide-and-seek experiences in one book. As the characters move through each illustrated spread, their colors change, too, adding to the abundant fun.
What I Think: Ohmigosh, I adore this book! It's super unique in so many ways. It's a big book, bigger than most picture books and the cover has holes cut in it for the eyes because there are holes in the pages too. It's so fun! What I really love is that it's such a simple cover but so busy on the inside. I absolutely fell in love with the illustrations right away and we had fun searching for our little friend as we moved through the pages. I'm sure other kids are going to have a ton of fun.  
     I'm not really sure how this books works as a mentor text except for that it's super fun and any young artists out there might get some inspiration from the artwork or the seek-and-find fun!

It's Monday! What Are You Reading? 09/11/2017

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? From Picture Books to YA! 

It's Monday! What are you Reading? is a meme hosted by Kathryn at Book Date. It is a great way to recap what you read and/or reviewed the previous week and to plan out your reading and reviews for the upcoming week. It's also a great chance to see what others are reading right now...you just might discover your next “must-read” book!

Kellee Moye, of Unleashing Readers, and I decided to give It's Monday! What Are You Reading? a kidlit focus. If you read and review books in children's literature - picture books, chapter books, middle grade novels, young adult novels, anything in the world of kidlit - join us! We love this meme and think you will, too. We encourage everyone who participates to visit at least three of the other kidlit book bloggers that link up and leave comments for them. 

Last Week's Book Adventures:

This week I finished reading The Pants Project by Cat Clarke and Wishtree by Katherine Applegate. They were both so good! We read lots of The Wild Robot and are almost done. I've been listening to The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants as a mentor text for a maybe future book I'd like to write. I loved the series when it first came out so it's been super fun to reread it! I also am about halfway though Kwame Alexander's new Solo. 

Reviewed Last Week:

Click on any picture above to go read my review/post.

Upcoming Book Adventures: 

I plan to finish up Solo and The Wild Robot and to get back to Flying Lessons. I also have This Is Just a Test by Madelyn Rosenberg and Wendy Wan-Long Shang to get started. 

I am also super committed to getting back to my Celebrate posts! I haven't been super consistent lately and I miss my Celebrate posts. On September 1st, I started a one-sentence journal like Gretchen Rubin talks about in The Happiness Project so I have things to celebrate AND this weekend I signed up to be a Younique presenter which I'm super excited about too! Lots to celebrate so I'm doing a mini-celebration today to get myself excited about getting back to my Celebrate posts. :)

This Week's Reviews:

Check back throughout the week to read these reviews/posts. 

So, what are you reading this week? 

Link up below and don't forget to check out other blogs to see what they are reading!

To help build our community and support other bloggers, 

we ask that you comment on at least three other blogs before you. 

Also, if you tweet about your Monday post, don't forget to use #IMWAYR!

The Evaporation of Sofi Snow

Title: The Evaporation of Sofi Snow 
Author: Mary Weber 
Publisher: Thomas Nelson 
Publication Date: June 6th, 2017 
Genre/Format: Sci-Fi/Novel
GoodReads Summary: Ever since the Delonese ice-planet arrived eleven years ago, Sofi's dreams have been vivid. Alien. In a system where Earth's corporations rule in place of governments and the humanoid race orbiting the moon are allies, her only constant has been her younger brother, Shilo. As an online gamer, Sofi battles behind the scenes of Earth's Fantasy Fighting arena where Shilo is forced to compete in a mix of real and virtual blood sport. But when a bomb takes out a quarter of the arena, Sofi's the only one who believes Shilo survived. She has dreams of him. And she's convinced he's been taken to the ice-planet.
     Except no one but ambassadors are allowed there.
     For Miguel, Earth's charming young playboy, the games are of a different sort. As Ambassador to the Delonese, his career has been built on trading secrets and seduction. Until the Fantasy Fight's bomb goes off. Now the tables have turned and he's a target for blackmail. The game is simple: Help the blackmailers, or lose more than anyone can fathom, or Earth can afford.
What I Think: The gamer in me really loved this book! But I especially loved that it was a book gamers and reality tv show lovers could relate to. It's such an interesting premise and world...and then Mary throws in a few twists so I just wanted to keep reading so much that I couldn't put it down. 
    As a mentor text, I love the world building but also how she shows us the characters. She layers in what they are doing, what they are thinking, and how they are feeling. It took me a lot of writing so start to pay attention to all the layers that go in to good writing. 
     I would especially pay attention to word choice and use this to show how word choice really makes a difference when it comes to descriptive writing and showing readers what is going on. This is a YA novel and I usually use the $100 word term to talk to younger writers but I think it would apply to teen writers as well. $100 words means we're using words that are more descriptive than $1 words. It's like going out for a super fancy steak dinner instead of the dollar menu at McDonald's. Which kind of writing would you want to devour? Right? It's a great metaphor and helpful as student writers think about which words they use in their description. 
Snatch of Text:  
"The floor beneath Sofi's feet shuddered, and a second later her stomach lurched as the entire level of gamer rooms began to descend. Waves rocked against the giant windows, slapping them with foam while they sank down, until all but the top three feet of glass was submerged beneath the oceanscape. She was staring into an enormous pool of water reaching higher than her head and deeper than she could swim. And so lucid she could almost see the other side." (p. 37)
Writing Prompt: Use descriptive writing to describe a fictional or real setting. Write about how Mary Weber's word choice helps you better understand the situation the character Sofi is in. 

It's Monday! What Are You Reading? 09/03/2017

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? From Picture Books to YA! 

It's Monday! What are you Reading? is a meme hosted by Kathryn at Book Date. It is a great way to recap what you read and/or reviewed the previous week and to plan out your reading and reviews for the upcoming week. It's also a great chance to see what others are reading right now...you just might discover your next “must-read” book!

Kellee Moye, of Unleashing Readers, and I decided to give It's Monday! What Are You Reading? a kidlit focus. If you read and review books in children's literature - picture books, chapter books, middle grade novels, young adult novels, anything in the world of kidlit - join us! We love this meme and think you will, too. We encourage everyone who participates to visit at least three of the other kidlit book bloggers that link up and leave comments for them. 

Last Week's Book Adventures:

I had a great reading week! I'm loving finding time for audiobooks again! This week I listened to All The Bright Places by Jennifer Niven and I started The Testing by Joelle Carrbonneau. I finished reading The Epic Fail of Arturo Zamora and the boys and I are still reading The Wild Robot. I've also been reading Flying Lessons and I started The Pants Project by Cat Clarke and Wishtree by Katherine Applegate.

People ask me all the time how I keep track of so many books...it's kind of like having a ton of tv shows to keep up with. I read them all at different times in different formats and I don't find it hard to get back on track. Right now I'm listening to an audiobook, reading an ebook on my phone, and then reading the three hard copies...one is in my school bag, the other is by my bed, and the third is in the kids' room. Idk, it works for me! Can you manage more than a book or two at a time? I'm curious!

Reviewed Last Week:

Click on any picture above to go read my review/post.

Upcoming Book Adventures: 

I'll be listening to The Testing and reading The Wild Robot, Flying Lessons, The Pants Project, and Wishtree! I'm hoping to also start Caleb and Kit by Beth Vrabel.

This Week's Reviews:

Check back throughout the week to read these reviews/posts. 

So, what are you reading this week? 

Link up below and don't forget to check out other blogs to see what they are reading!

To help build our community and support other bloggers, 

we ask that you comment on at least three other blogs before you. 

Also, if you tweet about your Monday post, don't forget to use #IMWAYR!