Image Grammar: Using Grammatical Structures to Teach Writing [Harry Noden]

Breaking The Rules: Liberating Writers Through Innovative Grammar Instruction  [Edgar Schuster]

Crafting Authentic Voice [Tom Romano]

 Alternatives to Grading Student Writing  [Stephen Tchudi]

Especially recommend the Noden and the Schuster.  They help you teach real writing, not just filling out worksheets. The last one helps you grade real writing.  Great books for new and veteran teachers.  IMAGE GRAMMAR really helped me revamp my entire teaching paradigm.  I finally understood how backwards my methods were and why my students couldn't translate grammatical knowledge into decent writing.  IG changed all that and now my TAKS scores have increased 3 years running.  But more important than that, my students develop writing style.

Trip to Barnes & Noble -----> a dross of dosh dropped, dozens of ducats dispersed, dollops of dollars dumped.

I've never done this before.  Frankly, I didn't know I had the strength in me to do it.  But I did. And it feels at once great and foolish.  I go to the bookmart. I fill up my basket.  My cousin that was with me has an even better system. She stops buying when she runs out of arms.  Hmmmm...why not.  So I pick up a nice variety -- that's the first sign I don't even know what I want. 

I looked for the Loeb Greek and Latin Classics series. Nothing.  No Thing.  Nada. Zero.  Zilch. Bupkus. Why am I even surprised. (Rhetorical question, hence no question mark.)

But enough banter...

WHAT I BOUGHT:

• 442 MAGAZINE: Wayne Rooney on cover. 
• [SAMPLE COVER]
  • You really have to love the beautiful game to buy a mag with Wayne's monkey mug on the cover.  They could double their selling power by having the Rooney story headline on the cover with a picture of someone more photogenic like Fernando Torres, Cesc Fabregas, Cristiano Ronaldo, Raul, and my current hottie o'the year -- Kaka. 

• Meditations of Marcus Aurelius.  Penguin Books GREAT IDEAS Series.  Some of his ideas are echoed in the Bible, esp. Book 2, Item 1:
  • Begin each day by telling yourself: Today I shall be meeting with interference, ingratitude, insolence, disloyalty, ill-will, and selfishness -- all of them due to the offenders' ignorance of what is good or evil...none of these things can injure me, for nobody can implicate me in what is degrading...  [Luke 23:34]

Book 8, Item 38: In the words of Crito the Sage, "If thou hast eyes to see, then see." [Luke 16:31, 17:22-23]

• Dawn's Awakening by Lora Leigh
  • I've been waiting for this story for ages and ages! Seth Lawrence is a god who walks as man.  Woof!  The whole novel is very exciting and I just love all the characters, not just Seth and Dawn.  Jonas...rrrrowrrr!
  • Previous post re this book: http://festeringblurb.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!D403F49AD16FC1EE!280.entry
• The Truth About Chuck Norris
  • Chuck Norris jokes. I love! CN jokes, but it's cheaper to get them off the internet
  • 
• The Ode Less Travelled by Stephen Fry
  • My favorite raconteur.  I read his bio MOAB IS MY WASHPOT and I was blown away by the breadth of his intellect.  But the trickster gods have not been kind to him.  He can't dance, but he can write award-winning musicals.  He doesn't look like  a romantic hero, but he can play one in the movies (Oscar Wilde).   He can't play any instruments, but he can write a book about how to understand classical music. 
  • In this, though, all the stars are aligned.  He's like the "cool" teacher -- the one who understands but is not afraid to laugh at eccentricity.  He understands the nature of beauty and talent in a way worthy of any philosopher.  But alas, I did not keep the book.  I had to choose and since soccer is in full heat, I kept monkey mug.
  • 

 WHAT I RETURNED:

Chuck Norris book

Ode Less Travelled

You Scored 85% Correct

You are an 80s expert You never confuse New Order with the Pet Shop Boys You know which classical musician Falco rocked When it comes to 80s music, you Just Can't Get Enough!

What I can get enough of...what I have had enough of...is a dozen or so overplayed, overhyped, overblown, overemphasized pop songs that 80s pundits drag out to cover 10 years' worth of musical styles. There was so much variety going on during the 80s that, if you get your music history from any channel associated with MTV, you will never see because the song owners did not buy advertising on those "music" channels.

But on a more positive note, the 80s was the best time of my life! High school. University. England. First love. All my coming-of-age milestones. The soundtrack was a parade of musical styles from country-crossover of Juice Newton to uber-techno like Kraftwerk. Any clip show you see on VH1 is completely detached and alien from my actual experience.

A really good music magazine is England's Q magazine or NME, a couple of times mentioned by Rik on Young Ones.