The Newbery Challenge: Strawberry Girl

It's time to CELEBRATE the winner of the 1946 Newbery Medal.

Visit Colby's blog to see what he thinks of Strawberry Girl.

This photo is rather artistic, eh?

Illinois State University received a portion of Lois Lenski's collection.

Travis Jonker is "Covering the Newbery." He designed the cover on the right.

Borrow Strawberry Girl from your school or public library. Whenever possible, please support independent bookshops.

Here's today's bonus video.

"Celebrate good times..."

Video of the Day: Al Roker's Book Club Chats with Newbery Medalist Rebecca Stead

Too bad Colby Sharp and I are not up to When You Reach Me in the Newbery Challenge. We could have convinced Al Roker to let us participate in his book club discussion (Dream big, Mr. Schu!) I'm determined to film my When You Reach Me video in NYC.

OK, enough about me. It's time to hear what kids, Rebecca Stead, and Al Roker said about When You Reach Me.

Thank you, Al Roker, for selecting Rebecca Stead's award-winning book.

Borrow When You Reach Me from your school or public library. Whenever possible, please support independent bookshops.

Colby Sharp Discusses Linda Urban's School Visit

Mr. Colby Sharp is a children’s literature enthusiast. He connects his fourth graders with authors and members of his professional learning network. I invited him on Watch. Connect. Read. to discuss Linda Urban’s visit to his classroom.

I wrote seven sentence starters and asked Colby to complete each sentence using fewer than twenty words.

*We prepared for. Ms. Urban's visit by reading Hound Dog True, studying Linda's website, reading about her visit to Brook Forest, and decorating the classroom.

*Ms. Linda Urban is one of the nicest, most generous, and intelligent people I have ever met.

*My fourth graders learned more from Mattie Breen than any other character they read all year.

l recommend A Crooked Kind of Perfect to boys, girls, adults, former students, current students, and anyone else who I think would benefit from Zoe's story (EVERYONE).

*Hound Dog True is well written, as powerful, and as important as Because of Winn-Dixie.

*Twenty years from now my students and I will remember Linda's story about when she was bullied as a child, and how that story helped lead to Hound Dog True.

*Mr. Schu, you should have asked me about how Linda found out a boy in our class was a huge fan of one of Linda's writing fans. Linda took a letter that he had written to the author and delivered it to the author.

Borrow Linda Urban's books from your school or public library. Whenever possible, please support independent bookshops.

The One and Only Ivan Twitter Book Club

Colby Sharp, enthusiastic readers, and I connected last night to discuss Katherine Applegate's The One and Only Ivan. Below are some randomly selected tweets from the discussion. If you would like to view the archive, please click here.

-@MrSchuReads: @Kaaauthor shares how to pronounce her name and a story from her childhood: LINK #TheOneandOnlyIvan

@ColbySharp - @AnitaSilvey discusses #TheOneandOnlyIvan on her Book-A-Day Almanac: LINK

-@MrSchuReads - #TheOneandOnlyIvan is traveling with @AkGal68 and me: LINK

-@MrSchuReads - Meet the real #TheOneandOnlyIvan: LINK

-@ColbySharp @FuseEight compares #TheOneandOnlyIvan to Charlotte's Web: LINK

-@MrSchuReads - Download #TheOneandOnlyIvan discussion guide: LINK

-@ColbySharp - @Kaaauthor discusses The Home of the Brave #TheOneandOnlyIvan

-@MrSchuReads - 5 Questions with Katherine Applegate. #TheOneandOnlyIvan

Colby and I will announce the July book club selection on Sunday, July 1.

The Newbery Challenge: Rabbit Hill

I am trying my best not to feel guilty about posting this video three days late. I thought I could film videos and update my blog during ALA '12. I guess I'm unable to juggle presentations, sessions, social events, United sending my luggage to the wrong airport, losing an iPhone, misplacing my iPad, and spontaneous nose bleeds. Anyway, I am back and will not apologize for this delay. (Well, OK, sorry!)

Check out Colby Sharp's video.

Travis Jonker designed the cover on the right.

Borrow Rabbit Hill from your school or public library. Whenever possible, please support independent bookshops.