Wolf Hall–too complex for my summer brain?

My husband, at gift-giving occasions, heads to our local bookstore, Copperfield’s, and gets help from the front desk.  ”My wife just read x, y & z.  What should I buy her?”  Luckily Copperfield’s knows their stuff.  He walks out with two or three neatly wrapped books just for me.

This is how I acquired Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel, I think, for my birthday back in October.  It’s taken this long to finish.

Not that I was reading and rereading, or picking up and setting down–there are plenty of books like that around here.  No, with Wolf Hall, I tried once, set it down and left it there.  Too many names, vague use of pronouns…

I picked it up again out of pure desperation.  I had ravenously devoured three books in Kauai and arrived home with nothing new to read.  Wolf Hall.  It’s Henry VIII for crying out loud!  I should know all these people!  So I tried it again.  Not bad.

It follows Henry VIII’s reign (mainly the dumping of Katherine and acquiring of Anne) through the rise of Thomas Cromwell.  Thomas is likable–humble beginnings, uses his knowledge, holds his cards close, ruthless without being cruel, loves his family, loyal to his masters.

“Not bad” comes from the lack of ending.  I needed something a bit more wrapped up.  I get the tone that Hilary was going for.  Thomas is a workaholic and the story ends with his busy life serving the king, but it didn’t satisfy me.

So, do I recommend it?  Not sure.  I enjoy this era and the intrigue, but slogging through the families, titles and power struggles is not for everyone.  It can be tedious to look back if you aren’t holding it the information and lineage your mind very well.

It won the Man Booker Prize in 2009 so, for me, that makes it worth reading.  I have loved 99.9% of the books that win or are finalists for that award–good job Booker folks!

Half Broke Horses

Jeannette Walls is amazing.  Or maybe I’m just slow.

When a book is recommended to me, I jump right in and read it.  I try not to read the back of the book, the reviews or anything that might 1) give too much away, or 2) dissuade from reading it.

So I didn’t understand until the very end of this novel, Half Broke Horses,  that it was biographical.  So awesome!  Honestly, it was so cool to read about this amazing woman, Lily, and realize it was the author’s grandmother.  She is an amazing character that seems almost too round and dynamic to be real.

Interesting too (or maybe me being slow again)… I kept thinking I knew where the story was going and it kept taking a left turn on me.  Very unpredictable.  But real life is unpredictable.  It’s only fiction that takes the turns you expect.

And if you haven’t read The Glass Castle yet… what are you thinking?!?!?  Get to the library.  Stat.

Henrietta Lacks. Wow.

I think everyone should read this book.  It’s health care, medical research, racism, privacy, life saving discoveries, class inequalities and a compelling story!

Laboratory animals had rights back in 1910, but humans weren’t considered until Nuremberg.  And even then it wasn’t law, just recommendation.  Wow.  Henrietta’s family couldn’t begin to grasp what it meant that their mother’s cells were immortal.  Was she in pain?  Was the cancer still alive?  What’s a cell?  Wow.  Informed consent wasn’t recognized in the medical research world until after 1971.  Drawing blood was considered a non-risk to the patient.  Wow.

It’s such a tragic story of Henrietta’s kids and her widower husband, but you can’t help but get excited over the huge advances made in medicine all because Henrietta’s cancer cells reproduced in culture at a prolific rate.  One woman, one hard-working black woman, one mother of four who died young of cervical cancer.  Yet her cells live on.

You must read this book: The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks.

A Trip to the Bookstore

I’ve been underwhelmed by my reading lately.  So much so that I have stuck to New Yorker articles and ed leadership blogs.  My attention span is short; I’m restless.  A good book would chase all that away but I’m too restless to dig into one… ironic.

So after much mention of Daniel Pink‘s Drive, I went to the bookstore to find it.  Speaking of motivation… this book is just what I need.  So far, so good.  I’ve often been puzzled by the carrot or stick mentality in school.  I don’t do either with my students.  It’s about mutual respect.  It’s about wanting to do well, wanting to know more, wanting to master the skill.  Not to mention, carrots and sticks are hard to maintain and demoralizing to me, the teacher.  I can’t keep up with the rewards and punishments… I’m too busy trying to get kids to learn.

Also picked up The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks.  She’s the until-now-unknown woman behind the HeLa cells that some many researchers and scientists have used in their petri dishes for years.  I first heard of Ms. Lacks on RadioLab.  It was a fantastic show–a small segment of a medley.  I was enthralled with the story and hunt for the identity of this woman.  I wasn’t willing to shell out for the hardback so now I’m ready!

Finally, I grabbed Mindset by Carol Dweck.  I attended a talk on Educational Rounds at UCDavis by Dr. Richard Elmore.  He mentioned this book.  Then I read an article that quoted her.  It’s a sign!  Get the book.  She uses the phrases ‘fixed mindset’ and ‘growth mindset’… I like it.  You can never rest in the now, the accomplishment, the good.  You can enjoy the moment, but forever we should be growing, changing, evolving.  I enjoy the push forward; it motivates me.  So we’ve come full circle in my book purchases, back to Drive.  Interesting.

I think I might get reading again.

I’m a Louise Erdrich Fan

Currently reading Four Souls and completely enjoying it.  My only issue with Louise Erdrich’s style is the brevity of her books.  I need a longer read.  It’s beautiful, smart, mysterious and short.  I need more than 210 pages.

So I linger over each page, even reread a passage now and then in an attempt to stretch it out.

“I am the sound that the wind used to make in a thousand needles of pine.  I am the quiet at the root.  When I walk through your hallway I walk through myself.  When I touch the walls of your house I touch my own face.  You know me.”  This is Fleur talking to the man who stole her forest as she holds a knife to throat.

Unfortunately he knows more than she suspects yet doesn’t know the things she assumes he does.

“Gradually, he felt the woman’s curiosity gain the upper hand.”

 

The Back of the Napkin

Reading, or more like, sifting through, Dan Roam’s The Back of the Napkin.  It’s too business-y for me, but I find nuggets of usefulness here and there for application in the classroom.

Doodling sounds inherently distracting, but I know when I doodle mindlessly, it actually allows me to focus my mind on what I’m hearing.  On the other hand, when I doodle purposefully, my mind is focused on the doodle.  Nothing else.

So let’s use that to some good ends.  We read about Maniac Magee’s neighborhood, then we doodle what the neighborhood might look like from a bird’s view.  Not a full blown art project, nor a quick stick figure.  Something in between… useful, quick, detailed but not elaborate.  Goals: to communicate, to understand, to clarify.

“No Longer Say, I Can’t Draw.”  This is Dan’s 2nd commandment.  I like it.  Drawing shouldn’t scare people.  It goes hand-in-hand with commandment 4: “To Start, Draw a Circle and Give it a Name.”  In other words, just jump in and get started sorting out your ideas.

So with more sifting through Dan Roam’s book, I’m planning to incorporate more doodling.

Fish Tales

Can you believe it?!?!  I got 2 New Yorkers in the mail on Wednesday!  I was beside myself.  Where to begin?  Which first?  How to read it all?

So I settled on chronological order.

March 7, 2011: Fish Tales by Kelefa Sanneh

These are the stories I love the most.  It’s about a real bar/art gallery, in a real place, with real people (owner, Ulli Rimku).  I live in my own corner of California.  But through articles like this, I glimpse tenement neighborhoods, artist uprisings, bar/art culture and class changes.  My little neighborhood is so benign in comparison.  It’s these glimpses into other folks’ worlds that I love and feel so broadened by.

It’s amazing to me that rest of the world.  The people, the locations, the ways of being.  I love the eye opening perspective.  I like my little world to be challenged and say, “Wait, there’s more out there.”

Not to say that I’m wanting to go see it or in any way change my own little world, but I like to KNOW.  I never want to assume that my way, my life, my habits are how all people think/live/feel.  It’s stories and writers that help me ‘visit’ what I otherwise wouldn’t know.

Thanks, Kelefa.  Great piece.

Reading Student Blogs Tonight

Did I mention I teach?

And my students blog?

Tonight I had the pleasure of reading their homework–a free choice blog post.  Fairly routine.

But I’ve decided to jazz things up with Blog Badges.  Yes, I designed them–simple, to-the-point.

“Awesome Post”

“Catchy Title”

“Notable Comment”

I made some decisions and awarded some badges.  Then, the epiphany!

What if the next step were to allow students to award Blog Badges.  Ok, it’s still an idea in infancy, but how creative and empowering.

Question: What do you value in a peer blog?  How do you know it when you see it?

Coach them toward criteria.  Then allow the award to be given.

I think I like it.

It’s the Anniversary Issue!

The New Yorker arrived today.  It’s the Anniversary Issue.

Here’s my way:

1) Turn each page to admire the ads until I arrive at the table of contents.

2) Read the table of contents for favorite contributors, titles that grab my attention or subjects I’m into

3) Flip through the rest of the pages, one by one, reading the cartoons–making a mental note of the ones appropriate for the bulletin board outside my classroom (see step #6)

4) Check the Cartoon Caption Contest for folks from California (not sure why that matters)

5) Return to the articles I want to read first, second, and so on

6) After a few weeks of ‘visiting’ the issue (it sits on the coffee table in clear view), go back through the cartoons and rip out the ones to share with students

7) Check the mail for next issue.  Repeat.

Food Allergies

February 7, 2011 The New Yorker

The Peanut Puzzle by Jerome Groopman

What a great article! I have often wondered about the rise in food allergies and how this can be.  I personally subscribe to the ‘hygiene hypothesis’ in all things parenting.  This says that our cleanliness has lessened our body’s ability to fight off infection, germs, reactions, etc.  More dirt is better for kids.  Step away from the Purell.

So this article gets into the nitty-gritty on how the allergic reaction occurs, how cooked dairy has a different profile than raw and what is being done currently to get a handle on the situation.

I especially enjoyed reading about the on-set of warnings to pregnant women about foods to stay away from and likewise, foods to keep infants and toddlers away from.  Why?  Do not eating something keep your body from reacting?  The honest comments that at this point, we don’t know what to recommend about food really were refreshing.