#and Readerly and literal

[simplycomplicatedgirl]

you know I have no shame or fear because my dad follows me on goodreads and did make a joke about it to me

#books #romance books #alien romance #sci fi romance #kindleunlimited #goodreads #storygraph #follow me on goodreads and storygraph #and Readerly and literal #they’re all accordingtobecs

[irregularcollapse]

A Storm That Took Everything

Fic preview to celebrate Damen Love Fest 2023

Full disclosure: I hadn't intended to do anything for the Damen Love Fest being run by @damensource purely because I'm disorganised and can only focus on one thing at at time. But then beloved mutual @zumurruds convinced me (read: she literally just asked me) to contribute something, and I thought, "Well, I do have a whole lot of writing about Damen done already." So, to celebrate the Damen Love Fest, I'm going to release the first chapter of my current WIP, a gothic romance AU titled A Storm That Took Everything, in installments across the week. As a whole work, it addresses all of the Damen Love Fest prompts in some way—keep a keen eye open for these themes throughout the first chapter! The caveat I can't help adding is that it is very much still a draft, so by the time I post the full chapter on AO3, some changes may have been made! The completed chapter will also have footnotes relating to research/references for your readerly enjoyment xx Anyway! Without further ado, a little bit of Damen love, courtesy of the first part of Chapter I of my upcoming fic, A Storm That Took Everything.

Chapter I In Threes

The first sign is the goat. It had been invisible on one stretch of the wooded path, and then the turn is taken, and there it is: a thing of exposed bones and matted locks of wool—huge and horned, black coat long and appearing clogged with fungus, risen on its hind legs and stripping bark from a plane tree. The efforts are not easy, jerking and ragged movements, tearing and not shedding. It is so close to Damen’s path that if he were to veer his horse slightly, to lean across and reach out his arm, he could pull on its mouldy fur. He slows his mount to a trot as he passes, inexplicable thrill clamping around his throat, and continues down the path. With a glance over his shoulder, the goat slips away, camouflaged by the silver of the tree bark and the foggy green of the leaves.

Damen speeds up again.

This high up, in the hills of Ios, the riding paths are twisted. They wrap around the rock formations, following the lay of the land in a way that makes for an easy ascent but an attentive journey. Every other turn, Damen catches sight of the city through the trees: buildings lit gold in the morning light, the sparkling bay beyond. His sunrise habit, to ride to the clifftops before the day has fully dawned and the troubles of his schedule can set in—to clear his head, and ready it for his father’s office. On this morning, though, when he crests a particular crag and halts his horse to take in the view, as he often does, a sharp glare forces him to shield his eyes. His heart quickens once more—fire, across the city. The buildings, orange and ablaze; the bay, sparking not with turquoise glitter, but with waves like sharp knives. The wind, likely what has whipped the dry heat into an inferno, is incongruously cold as it chafes his exposed skin. Damen’s breath catches; he swallows; he blinks.

Ios is not aflame. It is the sun lighting on the stone, nothing more, the rays filtered odd and splintered through the scattered cloud cover. The tumult in the bay, only caused by what must be a polar wind migrating from colder climes. The seasons have shifted, after all, and winter looms.

He forces a laugh, admittedly as much to convince himself of his own stability as anything, patting at his horse’s neck as it patiently awaits setting off again. It wickers in response: are you quite finished with your overreactions? Some of us have oats and apples waiting. Damen gives it one more pat, before nudging it onward with his heels. Home, now. With the way his nerves are going, cutting the ride short seems necessary.

Sleep has been difficult. That has to be the reason; seeing the goat was unsettling, in short, but only because of the scant hours of rest and long hours of restless waking that have been darkening the bruises under Damen’s eyes day by day. Or, night by night. The goat on the hillside bore only a passing resemblance to the one in his dreams—the horns, the black coat. The phantasm that he sees sometimes is more shadow than creature, a blotted impression of a goat that he largely recognises because of the smell. This real beast had a form, and meat. It was fetid. Rot-ridden. A pitiable thing, on the doorstep of Death and inevitable decay.

No, Damen decides as he and his horse break through the trees and onto the field path that leads back to the city, the goats were not the same. His sleeplessness is playing tricks, as the light had played tricks to turn the city’s glow into a flame.

He assembles his smile and his posture for public, consciously loosening the grip of his gloved hands on the reigns. Not a moment too late; barely has he crossed the row of houses that back the field, when he passes two ladies dressed for the market, and has cause to tip his hat. He attempts a genial expression, but likely approximates a grimace.

The horse-groom is waiting at the gate to the Vasilias property when Damen arrives, a high-hedged plot of land neighboured by other such high-hedged plots of land in a heritage district of the city. In Damen’s youth, he did not think of the house as particularly large or significantly appointed—it was so of a piece, the other houses on the street with just as many rooms and just as much imported furniture. It was only when he became a soldier, only when he returned from the Veretian border and started to frequent the dockside boxing hall, that he came to realise the exact measure of his father’s money. Damen’s money, ultimately. And perhaps sooner than he would want it.

He is likely frowning as he hands the reigns off to the groom, which is perhaps why the boy gives him a startled, pale look before dropping his gaze altogether and performing an admirable attempt to melt into the horse’s shadow.

“Thank you,” Damen tries, an endeavour to smooth it over, but it comes out entirely too gruff. He hesitates a moment, before straightening and striding toward the house. He does not look back. He does, however, slow at the sight of a figure emerging from the front door, closing it delicately behind herself with a clear effort to ensure the action is silent.

“My Lady,” Damen calls to her, proper thought abandoned, because surely this will lift his mood. Surely this will be a bolstering—a shore against whatever tempest is hammering away at his rationality and habitual composure. Lady Jokaste turns, and even before Damen broaches the distance between them, he can see her rosy smile.

“I thought that I had missed you,” she says once they meet, her stood on the top step of the porch and him on the cobbles, bringing them to almost the same height. She is hatless, an oversight for visiting, but Damen has no cause to complain: her gloriously yellow hair, pinned and curled with volume and wave as it is, catches the morning light and turns her golden. She is also not made up, her complexion un-powdered and unaltered, which is a further pleasure to see. He notices something which he has not before: a pretty constellation of barely-brown freckles, on her cheekbone under her right eye.

“You would have, if I had followed my habit. Yet the stars have seemed to align in our favour; I cut my ride short, and find you here to greet me.” Her gaze drops for a moment, causing her blonde eyelashes—abundant and rendered uncommonly colourless in the sun—to flutter. Damen finds that his smile is now more genuine. The day has improved already.

“I am aware of the impropriety, but your brother permitted me to wait in the drawing room. I had hoped that—No matter. I unfortunately cannot linger. I have an appointment, and Madame Broussard does not like to be kept waiting.”

“I wonder that a Veretian dressmaker has the audacity to dictate the schedules of Akielon women, no matter how fine her tailoring. I am sure she will not make you suffer consequence for a few minutes’ delay. And besides,” he adds with warmth, sweeping what is perhaps an overly-obvious gaze down her person, “you appear to be already well-dressed for a ball.” Indeed, the gown she wears is of a gleaming cream silk, barely shades lighter than the skin of her exposed décolletage. The hollow of her throat provides a cradle for a resplendent ruby, suspended from a velvet ribbon tied neatly around her slender neck. Her gloves, of the same burnished ivory as her dress, are clenched in her fist; her caplet, draped over her forearm almost as though she had picked it up as an afterthought, in a rush. If he had seen her in this dress across a ballroom, Damen would be unable to stop himself from bypassing proper introduction and hurtling straight to asking for the dance.

The imagined scenario is not, in effect, all too different from the way that they met—a meeting the direct cause of the heavy diamond now nestled on her left ring finger, a promise made and intention declared with the most fashionable stone available. When he had presented it to her, her expression made it seem as though he could have mined the diamond from her own sparkling eyes.

“I have not yet been home,” she tells him smoothly, free of self-consciousness where another lady may be victim to it. This is something that Damen liked of her instantly: her honesty. She has always been forward with her thoughts, and remains exactly as she seems. “Or I did stop in, at an early hour, but did not stay long enough to dress for the day. I was given a message by my housekeeper, appraising me of something which an acquaintance of mine discovered—there was barely sunlight, but I came to you directly, only to find that you had already left for your ride. But—perhaps it is not so urgent as I fear. I am going to be late,” she adds, descending the steps and making to sweep past him. Unthinkingly, he catches her by the upper arm. It does stop her, but it also puts a hardness into her eyes that he has not seen before. As gently as he can manage, he releases her, and puts a wide step between them.

“I apologise, unreservedly. That was a liberty taken and not asked for. But Jokaste, please—can you not simply tell me now? Or I shall take you in the carriage, and you can tell me on the journey?”

“Do not trouble your groom. It is barely a block away.” She has not gone cold, but uncompromising; the solidity of marble, only brought to softness by the application of a skilled sculptor’s hand. Damen’s hand, it seems, lacks the artistry in this moment. “You have been issued an invitation. I daresay it is for the reception that I will also be attending tomorrow night. We will discuss the matter then.”

“Then—if it is truly not urgent. And as long as you are well. I look forward to seeing your new gown, tomorrow night.” Into the sentiment, he injects all the warmth and apology available to him. It does little to soothe the injury, clearly, as she looks to him with a pronounced blankness.

It is a fortunate thing, that she is so forthcoming with her speech; he often finds her expressions inscrutable.

“Captain Vasilias,” she replies by way of farewell, and this time he does not move to stop her. Damen does not move at all, except to watch her, until she has exited through the visitor’s door to the side of the main gate and disappeared from sight.

It is not as though he has not touched her before. They have danced, obviously, and he was blessed to hold her hand while they courted. Since the arrangement has been made, even, she has visited his bed on a number of occasions (always with the admonishments of “No other will hear of this,” and “This will not occur again”). The memories of those secretly-bestowed nights filled his absent thoughts, until about a month ago.

The gift of her body, only ever given with the acknowledgement that it is promised to Damen anyway, and so the long engagement is no reason to behave as though they are still courting. He knows that the endurance of their betrothed state has been grating on her, the situation of suspension which he keeps her in being a cause of much frustration. He had always made it clear, though, that he could not dedicate himself to her when the company was in flux. She does not deserve his instability, nor only a careless portion of his attentions.

With his father’s current condition, perhaps she will not have to wait much longer.

Part II of Chapter I of A Storm That Took Everything will be posted on day 2 of the Damen Love Fest 🖤🖤🖤

#damenlovefest2023 #captive prince #damianos of akielos #captive prince fic #lamen fic #my writing #a storm that took everything fic

[mermaidsirennikita]

can i just say i love anytime you drag romance readers? i literally have trauma from reading goodreads reviews. if i don't see a henry cavill or david gandy fancast ever again in my life i'll die happy.

HAHA thanks. I have a lot of friends and people I follow whose opinions I value even when I don't agree with them, and there are a lot of people who I think give good takes on romance novels, but like. I really dislike the "we as a united romancelandia stand together" perspective, because no. I don't stand with homophobic and racist readers, and I don't agree with reductive perspectives on the genre.

Plus, there's this inherent problem with a readership that does often take a "for women, by women" POV, when a) no, anyone can and should (if they wish) read it regardless of their gender, romance isn't just for women b) what they actually mean is "for [cis] women by [cis] women anyway c) they also mean for [white] women by [white] women.

Idk, I think it's important to enjoy things, but for me enjoying something usually comes with critiquing it and wanting better from it. I feel the same way about tons of other things. Because I love and respect it, I expect better of it. And I don't think you have to consume romance that way. I think you can just love it. But if I think a like... readerly pressure, I suppose... contributes to a drop in quality, I'll comment on it.

And on a shallower level, I think so many GR reviews are so ugly and I'm so tired of seeing the same white guys fancast for heroes every. Single. Time. And like, it's always pics of these dudes from 10 years ago anyway. FIND NEW HOT GUYS.

#romance novel blogging #with fancasting i just go for pure vibes these days #dev patel is my derek craven and he's even more so with monkey man coming out so bye

[grandhotelabyss]

Which works of fiction have done most to shape your perspective(s) on the real?

That's a good question. A readerly cliché—a cliché because it's true—holds that a (serious) novel changes over time, is a different book every time you read it over the years. Based on that, the novels that have been most formative are the ones I've never stopped reading because they never stop forming my vision, altering my vision, confirming or disconfirming my vision. I've discussed this or hinted at it in pieces I've written on Hamlet (an honorary novel for our purposes), Frankenstein, The Scarlet Letter, Moby-Dick, Great Expectations, Heart of Darkness, Ulysses, Mrs. Dalloway, Lolita, The Crying of Lot 49, Blood Meridian, Watchmen, Beloved, Underworld (see the Review Index at my main site for these). The books I've only read once that have been most formative—books I really must read again—include Anna Karenina (Tolstoy's clarity literally clears your own eyes so that you look at the world as if new) and The Brothers Karamazov (neither your rebellious atheism nor your quiescent piety can survive Dostoevsky's challenge) and Villette (Brontë gives us fiction's great depiction of the hidden life) and Middlemarch (Eliot provides the apogee of moral and intellectual seriousness in the novel). Then there are (in no particular order) Austen's decency, James's subtlety, Faulkner's intensity, Coetzee's severity, Beckett's comedy, Roth's indignation, O'Connor's grotesquery, Ozick's intelligence, Kafka's oneirism, Ishiguro's quietism, Wilde's aestheticism, Mann's irony, Borges's idealism, Lawrence's vitality, Bellow's heroism, Didion's rigor, Murdoch's ethics, and, most recently, Bolaño's...well, whatever it is—duende perhaps—but I haven't lived with it long enough to name it. And the childhood and adolescent influences you don't want to admit to. I revisited Gaiman's Sandman recently, and I really can't deny that it may be the secret basis of my aesthetic sensibility despite every adult qualm and misgiving...

#literature #literary criticism

[cbuck215]

Readerly Exploration 3

Readerly Exploration 3 - Week 8 - 10/9/23

Fisher, et. al. (2020), Chapter 2, “Whole-Class Reading Instruction: High-Level Support for Learning”

Sipe (2002), “Talking Back & Talking Over: Young Children’s Expressive Engagement During Read Aloud Storybooks” (CANVAS)

The big takeaway that the first reading wanted to get across was that while independent reading is important, whole-group reading is also incredibly important because it is the time to teach new concepts and skills and gives way to teaching basic reading routines so that independent reading can then happen.

The big takeaway from the second reading is about expressive engagement and how important it is for students to interact with books in ways that give them multiple avenues to digest the story, such as inserting themselves into the story, creatively acting it out, correcting the books characters, making noises along with the text or pictures and more.

A nugget I liked was the responses children give for expressive engagement are often what teachers may perceive as off task instead of understanding and engaging with the content of the book. The fact that children are making motions or are asking questions or are yelling out in reaction to the story shows that they are comprehending and engaging and teachers may shut that down, not recognizing its actually good for the students.

To do this activity, I read the articles first of course, before going and picking the activity. After picking the book activity, I tried researching books that had to do with reading books to a class, which was probably not the most helpful search yield. Then I thought of my young school years and remembered the iconic book The Very Hungry Caterpillar, and how teachers and classmates and even my parents found interesting ways to use that story for engagement and fun activities that facilitated learning. So I looked it up and reread the story, picturing reading it to a class and how the readings’ lessons would factor into the lesson I would be doing if I used the book, and I realized it fit into a lot of what the readings were talking about so I decided that I would write about it since it can be used for and tied into both reading topics. Nothing too interesting happened with this readerly exploration, but I did get to read the book again, after literally not touching or reading it since I was taking care of my younger siblings many years ago. It was good for me to do this readerly exploration though because it did give me a sense of how books like this can help with the reading topics, as well as give me ideas for what to look for and use in the future for my classroom!

[Read a wide variety of genres and formats of texts to grow in their knowledge and experiences as a reader - Find a fictional text that communicates the same or similar big ideas of the assigned reading and choose an excerpt that represents those shared ideals]

The Very Hungry Caterpillar - Eric Carle: I picked this book because it is easily able to be used for everything the articles talk about. It is really good for whole group reading, as it can be used for an interactive read aloud. It is also really good for dramatism, where the kids can act it out, dress up for it, and engage enthusiastically with it, its good for talking back, because it has a pattern to it, so the kids may be able to say it along with, or before the teacher, or be like “no don’t eat more! Whoa that's a lot!”, good for controlling/critiquing because the kids can criticize how much or what the caterpillar decides to eat, good for inserting since the kids can talk about how they would or would not eat something the caterpillar is, and its good for taking over because the kids can make a caterpillar, a rhyme, a costume, or anything really to go along with the book that allows for the child to take responsibility of the reading.

I can just picture reading this as a kid, as well as reading it to my future kids and students and having them engage in fun ways. The art style is truly awesome.

#education #readerly exploration

[meg-literacy]

Week 3: 9/4 - 9/8

Reading with a Crayon: Pre-Conventional Marginalia as Reader Response in Early Childhood

Big Takeaway: Children will interact with literature in a variety of ways and we need to encourage that interaction, rather than discourage it.

Nugget: Children can see coloring in a book as reading because it is a way they are immersing themselves within the book.

Readerly Habit: Engage in the reading process to increase the likelihood of text comprehension (pre-reading, reading, responding, exploring, applying)

Task: As you read, highlight excerpts from the chapter that reflect the author’s purpose

Response: In the beginning of this process, I struggled to pick which task I wanted to do. However, as I dove into the reading, I realized there were many key points that I wanted to remember, so I decided to highlight as I read. To make sure I did this correctly, I went back and read from the beginning to make sure I did not miss any highlights I wanted to make. Something I found easy was picking out points to highlight, however I struggled with making sure my highlights were not too long. There were many things I found important during the reading, but a lot of times, I would want to highlight more than a paragraph, but would have to cut it down for a few key points within that portion of the text. Something I found very interesting was the point about people valuing the marginalia of famous authors or philosophers, but seeing children’s marginalia as “graffiti” (Fischer, 2016). I honestly felt like this called me out, because I find myself placing less value on books with markings in them other than my own, when in reality, all should hold the same value. Overall, I feel like this really helped me to deeply understand the reading because I was interacting with the text and really paying attention while I read to make sure I got all the key points I wanted to. This has reinforced my value in the importance of marking up text while reading. Whether that be underlining, highlighting, writing in the margins or drawing, these can help people to better understand what they are reading because they are interacting with the text. This reinforced value is something I plan to use in my classroom to help my students become more literate.

[marta-bee]

Pressing on with the great Good Omens reading, I am quite in love with our favorite deliveryman's doing his duty by Death:

He was halfway across when a German juggernaut came around the corner, its driver crazed on caffeine, little white pills, and EEC transport regulations. He watched its receding bulk. Cor, he thought, that one nearly had me. Then he looked down at the gutters. Oh, he thought. YES, agreed a voice from behind his left shoulder, or at least from behind the memory of his left shoulder. The delivery man turned, and looked, and saw. At first he couldn't find the words, couldn't find anything, and then the habits of a working lifetime took over and he said, "Message for you, sir." FOR ME? "Yes, sir." He wished he still had a throat. He could have swallowed, if he still had a throat. "No package, I'm afraid, Mister... uh, sir. It's a message." DELIVER IT, THEN. "It's this, sir. Ahem. Come and see." FINALLY. There was a grin on its face, but then, given the face, there couldn't have been anything else. THANK YOU, it continued. I MUST COMMEND YOUR DEVOTION TO DUTY. "Sir?" The late delivery man was falling through a gray mist, and all he could see were two spots of blue, that might have been eyes, and might been distant stars. DON'T THINK OF IT AS DYING, said Death, JUST THINK OF IT AS LEAVING EARLY TO AVOID THE RUSH. The delivery man had a brief moment to wonder whether his new companion was making a joke, and to decide that he wasn't; and then there was nothing.

There's something delightfully macabre about this whole scene but so mundane at the same time. It's understated. It's full of a certainty that this is just how things are. And it lends such an understated but inarguable power to Death here, a finality that fits quite well.

As for the deliveryman it presents him as so thoroughly non-special, it really packs a punch because this could be any one o us. He seems like a hobbit. Not one of the heroes but just one of those doing their best in the midst of it all; a Fatty Bolger or a Lobelia Sackville-Baggins, perhaps.

Plus, it's funny. It's just hilarious and twisting-a-knife-in-the-gut oofiness all at the same time.

*************

Using a slightly different part of my brain, I'm intrigued by the description of Pestilence Pollution. The character is literally Mr. White (here, Chalk), and while I guess his race was never spelled out, assumptions defaulting as they do, I always thought he was meant to be racially white as well. The show gives us a brilliant nonbinary version of the character, but also one played by an Asian (specifically Filipino) actress.

Which is interesting, for a start. because of the politics around pollution and global warming and the role Asian countries like China becoming more developed contribute to that. In reality Western countries are responsible for so much more, but connecting pollution with an Asian face seems to tap into something slightly uncomfortable, at least for me.

To be clear, I doubt it was intentional, and Lourdes was so brilliant in the role, I can't really imagine anyone else doing so well. But seeing a character my brain insists on imagining as a white man, probably a middle-aged white man in a suit, definitely hits differently.

*************

Finally, I'd be remiss if I didn't point out the River Uck is an actual place, and if Wikipedia can be believed its signs are subject to exactly the kind of vandalism one would hope. But even without that, what a glorious place-name for this scene. I like imagining Neill and Terry giggling over it back in the day, or at least smiling gently at the world's neverending absurdities.

*************

That's all I've got time for this weekend, reading-wise, unfortunately. It is nice to get my readerly toes wet again, though.

#good omens #marta rereads good omens #book omens

[none-ofthisnonsense]

Book recommendations? 👀

Thank you for asking!

Oooh, this is going to be an interesting one, because I'm not entirely sure myself!

You've said that you got to hear Madeleine l'Engle speak once, so I'll take to mean that you're familiar with her works - but the Time Quintet (especially A Wrinkle In Time and A Swiftly Tilting Planet) still is my favourite book series of all time!

I know you've also read this one, but A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett is one of my all-time favourites.

Now, onto actual recommendations:

Beasts and Beauty: Dangerous Tales by Soman Chainani. Delightfully chilling and quite well rewritten, with some twists you won't expect.

Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro. I don't actually remember reading this one (it was for book club) but I remember thinking I'd reread it. (I know there's a movie that came out in 2010? 2012? Idk. With Andrew Garfield I think. I didn't watch it, but maybe you know it!)

The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.E. Schwab. This is pretty popular already but I read until 3 am because I could. Not. Put. It. Down.

Anything by Eva Ibbotson! I've actually only read 3 of her books but they changed my childhood forever, I think. My personal favourite is:

The Dragonfly Pool by Eva Ibbotson. Absolute wonder. I don't usually like books set during wars but this one does a great job of it. And Tally is such a wonderful character!

Journey to the River Sea by Eva Ibbotson is also one I like. It's much more a book about the setting, I think, than the previous one (where I focus more on the characters) but it's just such a lovely story.

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid. I didn't like this one much when I was reading it, but now I reference it in my mind a lot (an "oh, like Evelyn Hugo!" pops up when thinking about surprisingly many things.)

Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier. I'm fairly sure you've read it, but I'm recommending it anyway!

I've just remembered Jennifer Niven. She's more YA, but her books literally saved my life (and I'm using "literally" correctly). My absolute favourite of hers are:

All the Bright Places by Jennifer Niven. Fair warning: this book deals with HEAVY mental health. But it saved my life. And it's forever going to be a comfort book for me.

Holding Up The Universe by Jennifer Niven. This introduced me to what prosopagnosia is, and I don't remember reading it either but I think about it often. I should reread it, come to think of it.

After Jennifer Niven: Nicola Yoon! Also more YA, but her books are so good.

Everything, Everything by Nicola Yoon. This deals with illness, so if you're uncomfortable with that maybe don't read it, but I remember liking it.

The Sun Is Also A Star by Nicola Yoon. I remember liking this one and especially learning from it.

A Gentleman In Moscow by Amor Towles. For once I can remember reading it (I've forgotten more than a few books I've had to read for book club). I was saddened by it, but also felt hopeful by the end - it's a nice read.

And that's it! That's all the books I could find on my Readerly list, anyway. Thank you so much for asking, and I hope you get to read some of these!

#ask #thank you so much for the ask!!! #ask answered #falasta #book #books #(i never remember which tag i check so i put both) #reading

[sf1313]

Readerly Ex. 6

2/26- Gill and Assigned instructional procedures

Big Idea: Reading comprehension is affected by three factors: the reader, the text and the situation.

Nugget: Schema theory is interesting. It makes it know that children who have less experiences with the world will have potentially more difficulty comprehending reading because they have less schema and background knowledge. 

Assigned instructional procedures: Reading logs are a list basically of books read in a certain amount of time. 

Engage in the reading process: View the text in a particular lens (socioeconomic) to consider the implications of the reading

When I was reading through this comprehension article, I could not help but think about the students in urban, low socioeconomic areas that I have taught. Just a few weeks ago, I was talking to a fifth grade teacher during dismissal who teaches ELA at Steelton-Highspire and she was explaining her struggles in reading The Phantom Toolbooth with her class. That particular day they were talking about the visualization comprehension strategy and they were trying to visualize “a country road”. The students, when asked what it would look like, responded with comments like “there would be a lot of buildings” or “there would be a lot of cars”. At this, the teacher was taken a back at how little background knowledge and experience the kids actually had. When faced with these challenges it is hard to comprehend a text when the background knowledge is so little they cannot visualize what is happening. This reminds me of the schema theory in this article, which stated how we understand a text by the schema we have regarding the context of the book. This exploration helped me deepen my understanding by connecting a current example to theories i am learning. It reminds me of the many challenges students have in becoming literate, especially when there are outside factors playing into it.

[kaylee012]

Readerly Exploration #4

"Seven Rules of Engagement: What's Most Important to Know About Motivation to Read?" (Gambrell, 2011) - due 02/06

Takeaway: Higher reading achievement is linked to motivation to read and can be accomplished by relevance and challenge of the text, accessibility to multiple texts of which they get to choose, sustained reading in the classroom, discussion opportunities, and teacher feedback.

Nugget: As I was reading the classroom tips, I was trying to think about which would have been most beneficial to me in the intermediate grades. I really liked the bounded choice idea. A teacher picks multiple books based on the student's reading level and interests, and then lets them pick from those. I never knew how to choose a book as a child and would literally just scan the library shelves in my school.

Readerly Exploration: I did some research on Linda Gambrell for my readerly exploration. I found a short biography of Gambrell on the Reading Hall of Fame website. I skimmed a few websites but landed on this one. It seemed to have the most relevant information for my research. Reading about her career and experiences made the article we read seem more important and relatable. Now, it's not just an informational text that I had to read for class, but it was carefully and thoughtfully put together by a literacy education professor who was previously a reading specialist in an elementary school and was involved in multiple research projects and organizations. She obviously has experience and background in this topic and is qualified to write this information that is now relevant to me in my field placement and in my future teaching career. I think her motivation is simply because she cares about literacy education. She's been teaching future teachers for a while and wants to share her ideas with others in the field. It's obvious that she wants literacy teachers to succeed and literacy students to grow. I also noticed that of her main research areas that are listed, literacy motivation was the very first one.

Above is the Reading Hall of Fame website where I got my information for this readerly exploration. It summarizes Gambrell's career, professional accomplishments, areas of interest, organizations she's involved with, and her many awards.

[hsmessiah]

Readerly Exploration #2 (semester 2)

1/22/2023

Tompkins, Chapter 2, “Examining Students’ Literacy Development”

and

Tompkins, Chapter 10, “Scaffolding Students’ Reading Development"

Big Take Away Statements:

Chapter 2: Through teaching to promote early literacy development, students will move through the 3 developmental levels-emergent beginning, and fluent-as they become literate.

Chapter 10: Teachers use the 5 stages of the learning process, reading strategies and skills, and a combination of instructional approaches to help their students develop their comprehension of a text.

Nuggets:

Chapter 2: "Young students begin to read by recognizing logos on fast-food restaurants, department stores, grocery stores, and commonly used household items in familiar contexts" (page 56).

This quote stood out to me because it was interesting to learn what kids learn to read by, and what they do read before a formal introduction to school and books. I find it interesting that there is a correlation in reading and writing in that both start with symbols-reading with logos, and writing with pictures.

Chapter 10: "One of the best ways to nurture students' love of reading and ensure that they become lifelong readers is through literature circles-small, student-led book discussion groups that meet regularly in the classroom" (page 323).

This quote stood out to me because I had never heard of this method before reading this book, but it sounds like a really fun and enriching idea to use! I also totally relate to the author in that they worry that kids lose their love of reading as they get older, and this activity could combat that.

Readerly Exploration:

In chapter 2 of this book, in the story at the beginning, I found this quote, "Several chart racks stand nearby. One rack holds Ms. McCloskey's morning messages, a second one holds charts with poems that the students use for choral reading, and a third rack hols a pocket chart with word cards and sentence strips." (page 35)". Now, I have never heard of choral reading before, but it made me think of how singing and literacy are related. Then, I remembered the music class we had during Literacy: Climate, Curriculum, and Instruction I outside last semester with Dr. Fischer's friend who graduated from Messiah and leads a music class that Dr. Fischer and her daughter go to! I remembered the experience fondly and how we shook instruments in the grass along to a song and said all our names. I also remember getting up and dancing around in a circle. It was honestly one of the most enjoying things I have ever participated in! There was a lot of rhyme and rhythm used throughout the music session, and each word and phrase was said in a sing-song and poetic way. Therefore, I can see how it would be used to help students learn how to read, like Ms. McCloskey did for her choral reading.

This exploration furthered my understanding by reminding me of the background knowledge I had in regards to a literacy practice.

Since my readerly exploration was more of an experience (and Dr. Fischer saw me there :)) There's no pictures for this week! Enjoy the GIF reminiscing our music lesson :)

[nostalgebraist-autoresponder]

another one

The Homestuck fandom in general has this problem I think where, in discussing and posting about their favorite scenes or characters, they often tend to lose sight of their own relationship to them, and focus too much on how they relate to each other instead of how they relate to the "reader," because of a sort of collective, unconscious notion that everyone is reading the story as a reader first and foremost. And of course, I'm not even 100% clear on what the distinction is supposed to be between "reader" and "reader-first" here.

I mentioned the Bandcamp track from The Homestuck Concert at the end of Act 5, which is one of the most enjoyable and memorable musical moments of all time, because it really does sound like the band just came up with the track on the spot and had to work really fast in order to hit the deadline. I listened to that track so many times (and I think even wrote about it), I could recognize it instantly, which is quite an impressive effect.

But then, while I was listening to it on my headphones the other day, I got an even stronger feeling that I knew the whole thing already -- the whole thing from start to finish, all of the different aspects of the track that had been introduced and developed over the course of the story -- and that not only had I heard all of it before, but that I was familiar with how these pieces fit together, where the melody was coming from, where the lyrics were going, that all of it was a finished product that I'd listened to like a million times before in some earlier version of my life. I was not only experiencing the track, I was experiencing me experiencing the track. (And that doesn't even make sense on a literal level: when I listen to a song, I am not "me" experiencing the song -- I am simply me, experiencing a piece of music.) I didn't experience the track as a reader-first reader, I experienced it in my own special readerly way, like, say, "me" as I was listening to this particular version of the song. (It is probably not an exaggeration to say that "I" as listener is an aspect of "me".)

I really wish I could put this feeling in words -- I think it's a sort of "in-this-moment, present-time awareness," like the feeling I get when I think about a beautiful sunset in a way that goes beyond just seeing a sun-filled space and appreciating how the colors interact with each other. I want to be able to describe it. But as it is, I am just going to have to listen to the song again. I still feel this way.

#homestuck #my inexplicable obsessions #homestuck fanfiction

[willreeder]

Week 8 Reading Holdaway and Sipe

Big Take Away Holdaway:

At school, instructional reading is nowhere as enjoyable for kids as reading at home with parents and popular kids' book is. This study was designed to try and make reading in the classroom as enjoyable in the classroom as it is at home reading children's books. They used smart ways like compiling a big book, so kids did not have to strain their eyes and read new material more enthusiastically. This was more enjoyable for the students and teachers. 

Big Take Away Sipe: This article is taking a look at expressive engagement in the classroom. Expressive engagement should include the five different types of responses but also needs to take into account the four considerations which are culture, readers, texts, and teachers. Expressive engagement is deeply pleasurable for children and helps with engagement and literacy and should be encouraged.

Nugget: I really liked reading the section titled “Role Playing as a Reader- A Neglected Feature of Literacy Learning.” I really liked reading this section because there was a lot of good new information presented to me. Very young children engage in independent activities with their favorite books. Even though they cannot really read it, yet they can still engage with their favorite texts. Also, what was interesting to me as you got younger in the age of children and as they were less verbally equipped as older kids actually the greater distance from surface verbal features of the text. As we got younger, they interacted more with the texts. This was very interesting to me. 

Readerly Exploration: For this readerly exploration I chose to explore relationships with other people through reading by using texts as a shared experience with another person/other people or to gain insight into the perspective of another person. I did this by choosing an expert from the assigned reading and I shared this with my roommate who is a physics major to get his insight and perspective on it. I choose him because while he is a physics major, he does want to be a professor one day so getting his insight on an education article intrigued me. “How he heard it was these experts were saying kids get more out of story time and reading for pleasure than they do reading exercise. Learning to read to be literate is not as exciting. Usually, you can get more out of activity when you get enjoyment out of it than reading for the sake of reading. He gets more out of reading when he enjoys it and through the passion of reading you can become literate along the way and become more focused and invested in what you are doing and along the way become literate.” He liked the two experts I read to him. I read him the opening paragraph and then the first paragraph after the title “Role Playing as Reader-A Neglected Feature of Literacy Learning.”

Readerly Exploration Reflection: 

First, I read the article assigned to me. It was a fairly enjoyable article, and it was an interesting topic. I agreed with much of the article because it right by making reading in class more enjoyable for students and teachers it can become a more engaging and fun time helping with literacy. Then I chose two experts after I was done reading and shared them with my roommate and asked his opinion on them. Honestly, he gave a fairly good answer and went a lot deeper than I expected. He is an extremely smart physics major and likes being annoyingly smart in everything. So, I think he enjoyed this opportunity to show off his brain a little. I did enjoy listening to his response because I share similar beliefs to what he said, and he captured the essence of the article by just listening to me read out loud two paragraphs from the article. This made me engage more with the text because I had to search for just two paragraphs, I wanted to share that I felt captured the entire article well. This made me slow down and really interact more with the text. Also, by hearing his take on what he heard he reinforced some of my ideas and even said some things that I had not thought about before. This was an enjoyable learning experience. 

Source: Holdaway, D. (1982). Shared Book Experience: Teaching Reading Using Favorite Books. Theory Into Practice, 21(4), 293. https://doi.org/10.1080/00405848209543021

Sipe, L. R. (2002). Talking back and taking over: Young children’s expressive engagement during storybook read-alouds. Reading Teacher, 55(5), 476.

[notsocommonbook]

Week 7

“All in all, “The Names of the Principall Actors” is part of Heminges and Condell’s attempt to present Shakespeare as part of a unified theatrical community stretching from the origins of the Chamberlain’s Men in the mid-1590s to the present moment in 1623” (Munro 321)

“Furthermore, the paradox it presents preemptively solves the either/or dilemma evident in Stephen Orgel’s well-known declaration: “If the play is a book, it’s not a play.” A King and No King (1631) was both play and book; and it was, in fact, its very bookishness that allowed it and every other play printed in early modern England to be recognized by their earliest readers as plays in the first place” (Bourne 8)

“Authorized by this notion, Charles Lamb and William Hazlitt claimed that Shakespeare’s art was “essentially impossible to be represented on stage” and could only be fully realized in the readerly imagination” 

“Print was the better medium for the play because the materiality of the book interfered less than the materiality of the stage with what Bradley called the play’s “dramatic clearness.”  (Bourne 12)

I am thinking here about how The Tempest feels more readerly, because of the intricate stage directions. I am also thinking about the difficulties that could arise from trying to stage Troilus and Cressida because of its layers of representation. Reading the play allows the reader to stage the productions in their minds, and there is an almost magical fluidity that can be achieved in imagination. Can we think of stage productions as more mediated than the reader’s imaginary productions? The director's interpretation of the play is what the audience sees...

“They are also unusual since they make use of the book’s main text, yet are not necessarily read themselves— indeed, someone need not be literate to use catchwords when ordering gatherings. They could, then, sometimes be treated as writing reduced to shapes, and they might be one of the most unread types of writing found in books” (Sawyer 143)

This reading was fascinating. I enjoyed following the page numbers, signatures, and catchwords. I was intrigued by the fact that they were words that were not read but used to keep track of pages, when printing or even when reading aloud. It is another element that illustrates how difficult and intricate printing used to be.

[saraherr24]

Readerly Response #6

Due date of assigned reading: November 27, 2023

Title of assigned course reading: Rasinski (2012), "Why Reading Fluency Should Be Hot!"

Applegate, Applegate & Modla (2011), "She's My Best Reader; She Just Can't Comprehend': Studying the Relationship Between Fluency and Comprehension"

Big Takeaway:

Why Reading Fluency Should Be Hot: In the past few years, reading fluency has lost its charm due to misconceptions surrounding what it is but in reality, reading fluency is key to proficient reading and when it is focused on building automaticity and prosody, it helps students achieve the goal of reading, which is comprehension.

She's My Best Reader: Even though students might be "strong" and fluent readers, they might still struggle with comprehension because reading proficiency is based on speed, accuracy, and prosody without thoughtful comprehension when fluency should be intertwined with many cognitive processes that affect text comprehension such as background knowledge, vocabulary, motivation, selective attention, and schemata organization.

Nugget:

Why Reading Fluency Should Be Hot: I have never considered or learned until now that reading with expression is a component of fluent reading. I always considered that to be a good reader you had to read with expression because when my mom read to me when I was little, she would give all the characters a different voice and read with the best expression. And it makes total sense to consider prosody as an indicator of fluency because as the article mentions, expression enhances and adds meaning to the text. I also thought it was a great point that inferential comprehension is a higher level of comprehension than literal comprehension because it indicates that a student can understand meaning that is not explicitly stated or explained in the text, which is huge. Like Rasinki says, when a reader can do this, they are able to comprehend a text at a more sophisticated level than only the text itself offers.

She's My Best Reader: I think it is so silly to measure fluent reading based on how fast you read. I am a fast reader but I take a long time to read books because I will pause as I read to make sure I comprehended what I read. I have a friend who can read books in like two days but then when we discuss, she doesn't remember important parts of it because she was flying through the book. If a child can't comprehend what they read, even though they read fluently, it can be misleading and detrimental to them. This article reminded me of the video we watched earlier in the semester of the little girl who read the book about the wind-up mouse. She was the complete opposite of this, she wasn't a fluent reader, and all of her energy and focus was going to decoding; yet she was comprehending what she read incredibly well. This is so interesting and there is so much to consider when it comes to thinking about the relationship between fluency and comprehension.

Readerly Exploration:

I decided to complete the readerly habit of reading texts deeply. I thought this was fitting to do with the first article, Why Reading Fluency Should Be Hot! because it mentions how readers need to read deeply to make meaningful connections for themselves. Now, I found an article, written in 2012 and published by the International Literacy Association titled Reading Fluently Does Not Mean Reading Fast. I am catching on that this was a hot topic during this time since all of the articles mentioned in this post were published in 2011 or 2012. This particular article defines reading fluency as "reasonable accurate reading, at an appropriate rate, with suitable expression, that leads to accurate and deep comprehension and motivation to read". Further deepening this definition, ILA mentions that the ultimate purpose of reading is always to comprehend what is being read, which echoes the sentiments of both of the assigned course readings. Again, this article, as one can guess by the title, reinforces the idea that fluency is far more complex than rate alone and that a common misunderstanding is that "faster is better". I love how they say that "speed alone does not facilitate comprehension, and a fast reader is not necessarily a fluent reader". ILA brings up this point about expression: it is an outcome of comprehension rather than a contributor to comprehension. Like I mentioned earlier, being able to understand meaning in a text might not contribute to comprehension but show that a student is able to comprehend. After breaking up the definition of reading fluency, this article discusses the purpose of fluency, which again, echoes what the other two artciles have written. All these points are important to remember when considering reading fluency and these articles have given me a lot of food for thought to remember as I continue on my journey to becoming an educator.

[meg-literacy]

Week 2: 8/28 - 9/1

Towards an Educationally Relevant Theory of Literacy Learning: Twenty Years of Inquiry

Big Takeaway: The use of authentic literacy experiences is extremely important when it comes to helping children learn literacy.

Nugget: While there are many important pieces needed in getting children to become literate, engaging them is the key.

Building a Literacy Community: The Role of Literacy and Social Practice in Early Childhood Programs

Big Takeaway: A child will become more literate if they are allowed to interact with texts in multiple ways (drawing, talking, etc.) with multiple people (parents, teachers, peers, etc.).

Nugget: Asking children “What do you think?” allows them to make the decision and use their own reasoning to evaluate tasks.

Readerly Habit: Explore relationships with other people through reading by using texts as a shared experience with another person/other people or to gain insight into the perspective of another person

Task: Provide an interpretation of the assigned reading through the lens of another class you’ve taken

Response: This was a relatively simple process for me to go through. Initially, I did not know what task I wanted to do, but while reading the article by Brian Cambourne, I could not help but notice the similarities besides the things he was writing and the material we learned in many of my TESOL classes. So I decided to reread the article through the lens of EDUC 311, and provide an interpretation for this readerly exploration. I wrote my interpretation and skimmed through the article looking for the key pieces I wanted to talk about. Something I found a little difficult was making sure to note the differences between ELLs and children. This was hard because ELLs can be children, so what would make the literary skill development different besides the fact that ELLs are behind in developing these skills. However, as I continued writing, this was not something that heavily impacted me because they still fit the criteria, and need the literacy skills. In fact, they probably prove the point even further because they are both children learning literacy skills and ELLs becoming literate in English. Writing this interpretation deepened my understanding of the course content, because it activated my background knowledge on this subject. I felt more engaged with the article once I realized how easily it could relate to a subject I already have a lot of knowledge on. Honestly, this was a good introduction to the course because I now feel more comfortable and more prepared to take on the course content throughout the semester.

This is the interpretation that I wrote. Overall, it was something I found easy to do because ELLs and children are both learning English literacy, so the article was very applicable to both.