READING LADDERS

withDr. Teri LesesneSam Houston State University

CREATING AND SUSTAINING READERS

I love to laugh…crazy state laws

Alabama

It’s illegal to wear a fake mustache that causes laughter in church.

Alaska

Whispering in someone’s ear while he’s moose hunting is prohibited.

California

You may not eat an orange in your bathtub.

Colorado

It’s unlawful to lend your vacuum cleaner to your next-door neighbor (Denver).

Florida

If you tie an elephant to a parking meter, you must pay the same parking fee as you would for a vehicle.

Georgia

It’s illegal to change the clothes on a storefront mannequin unless you draw the shades first.

Indiana

The value of pi is 4, and not 3.1415.

Kansas

It’s illegal to throw knives at men wearing striped suits (Natoma).  

Kentucky

Every citizen is required to take a shower once a year.

Massachusetts

No gorilla is allowed in the backseat of any car.

Michigan

A woman may not cut her own hair without her husband’s permission.

Mississippi

Walking a dog without dressing it in diapers is forbidden (Temperance).

Montana

It’s a felony for a wife to open her husband’s mail.

New Jersey

It’s against the law for a man to knit during the fishing season.

North Dakota

It’s illegal to lie down and fall asleep with your shoes on.

Oklahoma

It’s forbidden to take a bite out of another person’s hamburger.

Texas

You may not shoot a buffalo from the second story of a hotel.

Wyoming

Unless you have an official permit, you may not take a picture of a rabbit from January to April.

WHAT DOES ALL THIS HAVE TO DO WITH BOOKS AND READING AND KIDS?

IT’S TIME TO CHANGE THE RULES…

AND MOVE INTO THIS CENTURY

WITH READING LADDERS

What ARE reading ladders?

Combination ofVerticalHorizontalThematic units

Build readers fromWhere they areAcknowledging

their tastes and interests

Showing them how to be more independent

Perhaps some examples?

AWARD LISTS

Ah, the award lists…

2010 AWARDS FROM ALA

POSSIBLE READING LADDERSSCIENCE FICTION (TIME TRAVEL)

HISTORICAL FICTION (1970s)

MYSTERY

SCIENCE FICTIONWRINKLE IN TIME

HISTORICAL FICTION OF 1970s

MYSTERIESWHISPERS FROM THE DEAD

Honor books

WHAT LADDERS COULD WE PROPOSE?

Printz

POSSIBLE LADDER RUNGSLAST SUMMER OF THE DEATH WARRIORS

DON QUIXOTE

BOOKS ABOUT JOURNEYS

BOOKS ABOUT DEATH AND DYING

BOOKS WITH MAGICAL REALISM

Printz honor

Printz Honor

CS King Illustrator

CS King Illustrator Honors

New talent

Sibert (nonfiction)

Scott O’Dell

Humor Reading Ladder

Developmentalphysicalcharactersituationlanguage

CHARACTER

SITUATION

There are many ways to describe Ms. Underdorf. She was brilliant and joyous, and she believed-probably

correctly-that libraries contain the answers to everything, and that if you can’t find the information you seek in the library, then such information probably does not exist in this or any other parallel universe now or ever to be known.

 She was thoughtful and kind and always believed the best

of everybody. She was, above all else, a master librarian and knew where to find any book on any subject in the shortest possible time.

 And she was wonderfully unhinged… And so the Amazing Armadillo.

56

LANGUAGE

Now, it’s your turn…Small groups

Brainstorm funny books

Place in the ladder

Nonfiction Reading Ladder

HistoricalHorizontal

66

67

74

78

79

Nonfiction Ladder

Physics for tweens

Biography

HarperCollins

6 word memoirs FIVE ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS AND TWO OBITUARIES.

YOU'RE THE PARENT. ACT LIKE ONE.

EXAGGERATION IS THE SPICE OF LIFE.

GOD ABANDONED ME, SO I RECIPROCATED.

I NEVER GOT MY HOGWARTS LETTER. (could be Hank Green's memoir?)

WOULD BE SLUT GIVEN THE CHANCE.

YOU MADE ME STRONGER. THANKS, RAPIST.

MEASURED OUT MY LIFE IN LITERATURE.

LIFE IS FULL OF "AWKWARD TURTLE" MOMENTS.

INSERT MELODRAMATIC CLICHE-TEEN ICK HERE.

Your turn again…Break into small groups

Brainstorm some good nonfiction (bio, how to, etc).

Place them on a ladder

GN Reading Ladder

Growing more complex

105

Different covers US, Brit

I see dead people…

Start Small with Stepstools…

What could we pair with this one?

137

How about this one?

138

Companion to this?

Here’s an easy one…

Books set in other countries…

Problem pregnancy?

Spare, dark

Stupid teen thinking…

Another simple one…

Compare and contrast author’s works

YA writing for younger audience?

Series make it simpler.

New series

Environmental books

Quirky road trip

Dystopia anyone?

Bad girls, bad girls….whatcha gonna do?

Alien invaders

BUILDING TO SOME CLASSICS

Last summer of the death warriors

Black Hole Sun

Build your ownSelect topic or theme

Brainstorm list of books (4-5)

Determine “order”

Every year, English teachers from across the country can submit their collections of actual similes and metaphors found in high school essays. These excerpts are published each year to the amusement of teachers across the country:

1. Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had its two sides gently compressed by a Thigh Master.  

2. His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.

3. He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.

4. She grew on him like she was a colony of E.Coli, and he was room-temperature Canadian beef.

. She had a deep, throaty, genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up.

6. Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.  

7. He was as tall as a six-foot, three-inch tree.  

8. The revelation that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife's infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free ATM machine.

9. The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn't.  

10. McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty bag filled with vegetable soup.  

11. From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you're on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m. instead of 7:30 p.m..

12. Her hair glistened in the rain like a nose hair after a sneeze.  

13. The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease.

14. Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of a speed of 35 mph.

15. They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan's teeth.

16. John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.  

17. He fell for her like his heart was a mob informant, and she was the East River.  

18. Even in his last years, Granddad had a mind like a steel trap, only one that had been left out so long, it had rusted shut.

19. Shots rang out, as shots are known to do.  

20. The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work.

21. The young fighter had a hungry look, the kind you get from not eating for a while.  

22. He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame, maybe from stepping on a land mine or something.

23. The ballerina rose gracefully en Pointe and extended one slender leg behind her, like a dog at a fire hydrant.

24. It was an American tradition, like fathers chasing kids around with power tools.  

25. He was deeply in love. When she spoke, he thought he heard bells, as if she were a garbage truck backing up.

LOOKING AHEADBig Books of 2010 already getting award talk

At the top of the game…five stars--

COSMIC by Frank Cottrell BoyceINCARCERON by Catherine Fisher KAKAPO RESCUE by Sy Montgomery THE DREAMER by Pam Munoz RyanA CONSPIRACY OF KINGS by Megan Whalen Turner

4 stars

BORROWED NAMES by Jeanine Atkins THE WAR TO END ALL WARS by Russell Freedman FINNIKIN OF THE ROCK by Melina MarchettaTHE DEATH-DEFYING PEPPER ROUX by Geraldine McCaughrean AS EASY AS FALLING OFF THE FACE OF THE EARTH by Lynne Rae Perkins FEVER CRUMB by Philip Reeve REVOLVER by Marcus Sedgwick NOTHING by Janne Teller COUNTDOWN by Deborah Wiles ONE CRAZY SUMMER by Rita Williams-Garcia THE INCORRIGIBLE CHILDREN OF ASHTON PLACE by Maryrose Wood

3 stars

SHIP BREAKER by Paolo Bacigalupi ALCHEMY AND MEGGY SWANN by Karen Cushman TRICKSTER by Matthew Dembicki OUT OF MY MIND by Sharon Draper MERCURY by Hope Larson WILL GRAYSON, WILL GRAYSON by John Green & David Levithan TURTLE IN PARADISE by Jennifer Holm THE YEAR OF GOODBYES by Debbie Levy EFRAIN'S SECRET by Sofia Quintero THE LAST SUMMER OF THE DEATH WARRIORS by Francisco StorkAMELIA EARHART: THIS BROAD OCEAN by Sarah Stewart Taylor

2 stars KEEPER by Kathi Appelt

IF STONES COULD SPEAK by Marc Aronson THE DARK DAYS OF HAMBURGER HALPIN by Josh BerkWHITE CAT by Holly BlackSPIES OF MISSISSIPPI by Rick Bowers THE HIVE DETECTIVES by Loree Griffin BurnsA NEST FOR CELESTE by Henry Cole FALLING IN by Frances O'Roark DowellHAPPYFACE by Stephen EmondMOCKINGBIRD by Kathryn Erksine HOW TO SURVIVE MIDDLE SCHOOL by Donna Gephart ONCE by Morris GleitzmanOSTRICH BOYS by Keith Gray ILLYRIA by Elizabeth Hand13 TREASURES by Michelle Harrison

2 stars THE LAST BEST DAYS OF SUMMER by Valerie Hobbs

GREEN WITCH by Alice HoffmanTHE WATER SEEKER by Kimberly Willis HoltCITY OF SPIES by Susan Kim, et al THE SHADOW HUNT by Katherine Langrish DRIVEN by Don MitchellUNDER A RED SKY by Haya Leah Molnar THE SKY IS EVERYWHERE by Jandy NelsonTHE STAR IN THE FOREST by Laura Resau THREE RIVERS RISING by Jane Richards THE RED PYRAMID by Rick Riordan THE CARDTURNER by Louis Sachar MEANWHILE by Jason ShigaAFTER EVER AFTER by Jordan Sonnenblick DRIZZLE by Kathleen Van Cleve NUMBERS by Rachel Ward