Hello Book Bums families!
Happy May! We hope you and your families are enjoying spring. This week in the
newsletter we have ideas for making the season more colorful. We also have some
inspiration for teachers in the home stretch of the school year and, as always,
some nerdy word knowledge to share.
You can always reach us by replying to this email. We love to hear from you!
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Word of the Week
enigma (ee-nig-muh) noun/person, place, or thing - something hard to understand
or explain
I couldn't crack the code, and so the secret message remained an enigma to me.
Literary Calendar
- May is Mystery Month!
- Many adults have childhood memories of being hooked on mystery series
like Nancy Drew and Encyclopedia Brown. - Updated versions of those series are still available along with an abundance
of other choices from The Critter Club to 39 Clues to Mr Lemoncellos's Library. - Do you have a favorite mystery author for kids or adults?
From our Bookshelves
I’m not sure what made me choose Every Sweet Thing is Bitter by Samantha
Crewson, but it isn’t one I would recommend. It was good. I did finish it, and I was
even captivated to some degree throughout the story. I was certainly curious about
how the story would end, but I won’t be pressing this one into the hands of loved
ones.
I mean, even the title is negative. What was I thinking when I chose this Every
Sweet Thing is Bitter?
I have no idea.
Though I didn’t see it when I ordered the book online, the author does warn
readers about potential triggers including self-harm. I’m not easily triggered, so I
read on, undeterred.
Every Sweet Thing is Bitter is about a woman, Providence Byrd, who, after a stint
in jail for running over her mother with a car, returns home when her mother (who,
obviously, survived the car incident) goes missing. Providence tries to reconcile
her relationship with her sisters Harmony and Grace (Too much?)
Though they often stuck out, even to the degree that it became a bit distracting, I
did love that the author threw in some “off the beaten path kinds of words.” She
used the word verisimilitude twice within about twenty pages.
First in this sentence: “He grunts and presses down on the piece with his thumb
but cannot achieve the verisimilitude of it fitting.”
And then in this sentence: “The worlds they inhabit exist only inside their heads,
and like the unsung extras in a Broadway show, the nurses quickly uphold the
verisimilitude. “
Can you tell, using context clues, what verisimilitude means?
verisimilitude: the appearance of being true or real
Tips for Families
Last week we talked about hitting the trails—about getting outside with the family.
This week, we have another activity to inspire an outdoor adventure.
Use a hot glue gun to adhere some clothes pins to a cardboard collection board.
Add a bit of tape to stick some construction paper rectangles of various shades to
the boards (so they won’t slip out) and then head outdoors to find some color
matching items from nature.
You can reuse these boards by swapping out the colors and heading out again.
Notice together the colors that are and aren’t easily found in the outdoors.
Next time you’re at one of those big box home improvement stores, grab a couple
of paint sample swatches. You can use those to notice the great variety in the
shades within the same color.
You can do this activity most anywhere! If you’d prefer the kids not clip a sample
under the clothespin because you’re at the zoo, for example, you can always have
them take a photo instead or simply add a check mark to the paper to show they
found that color in the wild.
Heck. If the weather’s bad, you could do this activity anywhere. You could try the
library or even Target!
The conversations that can result with this activity can be impactful.
Discussing shades of colors can lead to comparing things that are similar and very
unalike.
Purchasing this color wheel for just over $7 might be a fun way to dig a little deeper
into color theory (e.g., tint=adding white, shade=adding black), and these color
paddles that are about $7 and are great for investigating color mixing.
Tips for Raising Readers and Writers
Tittle is a word that means a small dot or mark. It is the official name for the little
dot we use above the i and the j in typography. Note: Tittle can also mean a very
small amount of something.
In some fonts, the tittle for the i is omitted when it follows the letter f. Often, too, f’s
and l’s are combined so they almost look like one unfamiliar letter..
This is something that should be explicitly addressed with beginning readers. Many
kids have difficultly recognizing letters that are connected in this way. Simply
explain that some fonts (or styles of writing) connect letters and, when they make
those connections, dots can get omitted and letters can look a little different.
Because words do not become orthographically mapped into our memories by
sight alone, adults come to recognize words without even noticing that the letters
don’t look as they normally do. When kids notice it, that’s a great thing! They’re
really paying close attention to the text in front of them.
Warning: I’m going to drop some useless knowledge right here.
A ligature font is a font that includes characters combining two or more letters into
a single, joined character. Ligature fonts are used to promote an improved flow
and/or to improve the aesthetics of printed text.
These letterpress printer blocks show how the letters truly were combined to make
one block for these letter combinations.
If you’ve been in any Book Bums location, you may know that I have a thing for
printer blocks. I have collections throughout my spaces.
And now I need to go to the local antique malls to see if I can find the ffl for my
Foundations for Literacy curriculum! The Springfield antique show May
extravaganza is in just a couple of weeks, and guess who’s going to be looking for
a particular ligature font?
If you want to go down a fun rabbit hole on all things print and font, check out this
episode of the podcast Words Unravelled.
Practical Grammar
Though they are homophones (they are words with the same or very nearly the
same pronunciations), very and vary have different meanings. Be sure you vary
the spellings when using these words.
vary- (verb), to differ
The start times vary.
very- (adverb used to intensify an adjective or another adverb)
The horse is running very quickly.
Wordology Workshop
- Remember that the Latin root ver means truth.
- We use it most frequently in that brief adverb, very, which is another way of
saying truly. - If you notice characters named Vera, consider whether their names are
telling you something true about the character or being satirical because
that character is not a truth-teller. - Can you find another ver word featured in this week's newsletter?
News from Book Bums
We’re looking for 100 volunteers to help serve struggling readers this summer!
The Book Bums Summer FUN program
will be held at
VanGorden Elementary School
Monday through Friday, June 2 nd through June 20 th
from 8:30-11:00 a.m.
and/or
VanGorden Elementary School
Monday through Friday, July 7 th through July 25 th
from 8:30-11:00 a.m.
Our programming is perfect for:
1. high schoolers who are looking for volunteer experiences (think: job
references, college references, National Honor Society applications, etc.)
2. adults who have some margin in their summer schedules and want to be
generous
3. students looking into education as a major
4. retirees who want to get up and at ‘em early so their summer days are not
wasted away
5. parents who want to be equipped with helping their kids to learn to read and
spell well
6. teachers who’d like to tutor kids at Book Bums
7. adults who wish they were better spellers
8. ministry workers serving English learners
9. parents who have struggling readers they want to help at home
10. teachers applying for positions this coming school year (to provide specifics
about working directly with students employing the reading science)
11. athletes whose coaches encourage helping others in the community
12. teachers who are interested in seeing the science of reading in action
13. church groups who want to be “hands and feet” in the community
14. retired teachers who feel they have more to give; they just don’t want the
headaches of running a classroom
15. besties who want to serve kids together and then grab lunch to chat a
couple of times a week
16. readers who want to help equip struggling readers so they can love books
too
17. youth groups who want to serve kids within their communities
18. Teachers Academy high school students
19. adults who are learning to better navigate the English language
20. teachers who want free access to the Foundations for Literacy curriculum to
use in their classrooms
Join us once a week every week, or every day for one week, or whenever it fits
your calendar. We have a couple of folks who’ve already committed to volunteer all
30 days!
Remember, our volunteers are not responsible for any planning or teaching. They
sit alongside kids to smile and to encourage them as they do their work. Volunteers
listen to kids as they read, and they coach and encourage the students to do what
the classroom teacher instructed them to do with accuracy.
It’s easy and oh so rewarding!
In every classroom of 20 students, there will be a lead teacher, two assistant
teachers and as many volunteers as we can recruit. We want you to join our
team—and invite a friend to come along too!
If you’d like to volunteer, please email Dr. Christy at [email protected].
Tips for Teachers
Remember that we want to build into our students those things at the ends of the
lines.
Our engagement with students must promote students’ hearts and minds.
Let’s:
Inspire our students’ ambition.
Promote their wisdom.
Fuel their dreams.
Shine light upon their growth.
Emanate peace.
And boost their confidence.
Just for Fun
I had some fun brainstorming some other frustrating inconveniences, like these,
that can make us want to pull our hair out. You know, the “I hope you step on a
Lego” kinds of things . . .
What would you add?
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