Unfortunately, my book didn't win an award, which is sad, but I know there are things that I could improve to make the book spectacular, such as the overall appearance, grammar and word choice. While, I attended this conference, I gained knowledge from several motivational speakers: Harvey Alsted, Frank Kitchen, Nick Jackson and Danny Ciamarra. Additionally, I attended two crucial sessions for educators, which I have included below.
Teaching children how to find themselves in children's literature: Diversity in books is very limited, as most American books are written by white Americans and focus most specifically on the lives of the majority: white children. So, it is important that as teachers we learn to incorporate much more diverse lessons into the curriculum and teach students to relate to the characters in the book so that they see maybe if the characters in a book have a mom and a dad and a student has a mom and a mom hat they are still similar to those kids, as they like to play with friends, eat ice cream and to be happy. It demonstrates a way of relating the students together despite their differences in culture of family life. I think as I have been writing children's books it can be a future reference for me to write about children that may be a minority.
Using puppets in children's literature: this lesson was taught by peers from Perry high school with a huge bag of puppets from all different types of animals, from alligators to mice. And, they all correlated perfectly with the books that were read. The students also had other props, so when they read, "If you give a Moose a Muffin," they brought a fake muffin, some blackberry jam, a sheet, a sweater, and all types of things that correlated with the book! It is a spectacular technique to unite students in the classroom, practice social skills and develop oral and literacy skills, as well as simply adding some creativity to the classroom! It's a great method that I can't wait to use as a teacher!
Teaching children how to find themselves in children's literature: Diversity in books is very limited, as most American books are written by white Americans and focus most specifically on the lives of the majority: white children. So, it is important that as teachers we learn to incorporate much more diverse lessons into the curriculum and teach students to relate to the characters in the book so that they see maybe if the characters in a book have a mom and a dad and a student has a mom and a mom hat they are still similar to those kids, as they like to play with friends, eat ice cream and to be happy. It demonstrates a way of relating the students together despite their differences in culture of family life. I think as I have been writing children's books it can be a future reference for me to write about children that may be a minority.
Using puppets in children's literature: this lesson was taught by peers from Perry high school with a huge bag of puppets from all different types of animals, from alligators to mice. And, they all correlated perfectly with the books that were read. The students also had other props, so when they read, "If you give a Moose a Muffin," they brought a fake muffin, some blackberry jam, a sheet, a sweater, and all types of things that correlated with the book! It is a spectacular technique to unite students in the classroom, practice social skills and develop oral and literacy skills, as well as simply adding some creativity to the classroom! It's a great method that I can't wait to use as a teacher!