A Little Light Reading

During my long, slow summer in Tennessee this year I spent lots of time reading books with cover art that usually involved high heels, bearing titles with cleverly altered classic rock lyrics, slightly nauseating puns or a combination of the two with a fashion designer’s name thrown in. Now I’m reading books with names like “Looking Inside the Classroom: Reflecting on the ‘how’ as well as the ‘what’ in effective reading and instruction,” and “Text Talk: Capturing the benefits of read-aloud experiences for young children.” I am disappointed to find that shockingly few of these works have anything to do with a juicy romance, an inspiring adventure or a wardrobe make-over and none of their covers are pink.

I’m reading these ultra-boring things in an attempt to devise a plan to improve the Language Arts program at the Soufriere Primary School. This, in even fewer words, has been my only job description for the next two years of my life. So, because I grew up with Jim Dyer as a dad, I just grabbed every single book I could find about reading and grammar and teaching and am desperately devouring them as if they were SAT prep books a week before the test. I have abandoned my vision of me (looking fabulous but not so fabulous as to scare people – certainly not sweating) gliding into a classroom full of happy, quiet children, sitting in a circle of bright and interested faces and singing the “Getting to Know You” song from The King and I. Closer to reality were my pre-Peace Corps fears of me (looking thrown-together at best – certainly sweating) stumbling into a raucous mess of screeching kids, begging the attention of distracted, apathetic faces and humming a funeral dirge. Real life falls somewhere in the middle but leans toward the latter.

On a happier note - only yesterday I was established as the CARE School (mentioned in an earlier post) Arts and Crafts Program Senior Coordinator (a title I made up and will definitely not tell anyone at the school about.) Now every Monday afternoon I will have craft hour with the 25 students at the school, starting with simple projects then working up to something they can sell at the national CARE School Craft Exhibition. It would be difficult to over-estimate how excited I am about getting started and have been furiously researching kids’ craft projects that can be done with little resources and recycled found objects (my specialty.) Any and all project suggestions are welcome, and thanks already to Robley Hood for the “Single Page Book” instructions, which I plan on using for our first session!