Aside from a hike on Vermont's Long Trail and some quality R & R at one of my favorite beaches, I plan to do a lot of reading, including summer reading books for school like A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier, books for pleasure like The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, and a revisiting of literature for the two Accelerated English 12 courses I'll be teaching next year like Brave New World and 1984.
Three pedagogical texts I want to peruse are Ravitch's The Death of the Great American School System, Pope's Doing School and Jim Burke's latest, What's the Big Idea?
I'm also planning to jog regularly and make it a priority to carry over a fitness regimen to the new school year. And I'm going to get to the links a few times to try and improve what could graciously be considered an "emerging" golf game.
Summer will fly by as it always does. I hope to return to school renewed, refreshed, and ready for the commencement of another year.
Image from http://www.newzonfire.com/2009/05/19/26-outstanding-photos-earth-space/
2 comments:
Great summer reading list! I have just recently started using A Long Way Gone as one of my small group reading recommendations. The students really get into this book, and Beah's website (www.alongwaygone.com) is an amazing resource. I tell the students about meeting him a few years back at the NCTE conference and what a strange feeling it was to meet this gracious, kind, smiling young man given all the trauma that he endured in his young life. It's such a powerful read.
And, happy belated birthday!
Thanks Ms. Ward! I've just gotten into Long Way Gone and am really enjoying it, despite the dramatic - and often gruesome - material. It's stuff like this that lets us feel our own humanity.
That's great that you got to meet Beah. What a wonderful story to be able to share with your students.
Thanks for the birthday wishes! I checked out your blog (hadn't been there in a while), and noticed you have a lot of great new posts. I'm looking forward to taking a more in-depth look at some of your stuff this summer.
Have an awesome break!
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