At the end of last year, the UK media reported the pretty disturbing fact: nine percent of British children are leaving primary school with the reading skills of a seven-year-old. As it happens, I’ve met seven-year-olds who are well into the novels of J. K. Rowling, Roald Dahl, and even J. R. R. Tolkien, but the media was talking about thirteen-year-olds—and boys are the worst offenders, naturally—who can’t struggle their way through much more than a tabloid newspaper.Guest Blogger: Anthony Horowitz
At the end of last year, the UK media reported the pretty disturbing fact: nine percent of British children are leaving primary school with the reading skills of a seven-year-old. As it happens, I’ve met seven-year-olds who are well into the novels of J. K. Rowling, Roald Dahl, and even J. R. R. Tolkien, but the media was talking about thirteen-year-olds—and boys are the worst offenders, naturally—who can’t struggle their way through much more than a tabloid newspaper.
Would you like to listen to this year's award-winning authors and illustrators on their inspirations and influences? In this post, enjoy brief TeachingBooks.net recordings with the 2011 John Newbery, Randolph Caldecott, Michael L. Printz, Robert F. Sibert, Coretta Scott King, Pura Belpré, and Theodor Seuss Geisel medalists.
Dave the Potter: Artist, Poet, Slave (Little, Brown, 2010) is based on the true story of Dave, a man born into slavery in 1800 who created approximately 40,000 ceramic pots in his lifetime. Dave was owned by six slave masters, but was ultimately sold to a plantation that produced large clay pots. It was on this plantation that Dave was trained to make pottery and became a master potter.
At TeachingBooks.net we believe that books belong in every K—12 classroom and strive to support reading experiences by offering multimedia resources to enliven and expand on meaningful conversations about books in the curriculum.