Speak is a book about a girl named Melinda who has just started high school. From the first day of school, she knew she was in for a bumpy ride. All of her old friends have deserted her and she has no interest or motivation to do well in her classes. However, the only class that gives her hope is her art class.The art class teacher is the only one who gives her a chance and makes her feel like less of an outsider.

Melinda tends to isolate and keep to herself, which is because of a very understandable reason. Last summer, she was raped by one of her peers at a party, which forced her to then call the cops. Everyone blamed Melinda for breaking up the “coolest party of the year.” But no one knew what had happened.. and no one understood. IT even goes to the same high school as her…

I am reading Monster for my verse book. Monster is about a 16 year old boy named Steve Harmon who is on trial for murder. The book as written as if it is a movie script that Steve has created while he is behind bars. This format was a little challenging for me to read because of the numerous characters and ques. I found myself getting confused who was who, or thinking what does VO mean again?(voice over). I felt as if this format did not allow us to completely connect with the main character Steve. It also took much longer to read. However, I did really like his diary entries. They were my favorite part of the book because we could get more of a sense of what Steve is like. I think this book could be used in the classroom by doing role plays and acting out the script so students can imagine what is happening and how the characters are feeling.

Poem:
It’s not good to be weak in here.

The best time to cry is at night when the lights are out and someone is being beaten up and screaming for help.

They say you get used to being in jail, but I don’t know how.

I guess making you live is part of the punishment.

I want to look like a good person, I want to feel like a good person.

He was trying to convince himself that he wasn’t guilty.

I chose the series Diary of a Wimpy Kid written by Jeff Kinney. I find this series to be very silly and entertaining and definitely something I would recommend to my future students. I believe students of all ages would enjoy reading this series because it is hilarious. In this series, Gregory is the main character and he shares his life with us by writing in a diary each day. He is a very funny character and also has many very relatable experiences. He tells us about mistakes he makes and about lessons he learns, which I can say I can most definitely relate to.

In the book, Dog Days, Gregory is on summer break, and unlike the other kids he is looking forward to sitting around the house, being lazy and unproductive. His mother then intervenes Gregory’s plans and forms a book club that she forces him to join. Gregory was not very happy about this and had no interest in reading any of the books his mother picked out. I thought this was ironic because this has been one of the big topics in our class lately. How do we get children to enjoy reading? I can relate this to chapter two in Miller’s book, which is all about the student picking books of their choice. Once Greg’s mother sees that he is the least bit interested in her choices, she lets Greg pick one out himself. However, Greg’s mother does not approve of his book choice because of the graphic cover. She then tells the boys she is going to be making the book choices and chooses Charlottes’ Web. Greg is not too thrilled about this book and has a hard time keeping up with the reading.

As a kid, I was very much like Gregory. That’s what made these books so hard to put down, they were so funny and I felt as if I had experienced everything he was talking about. I was all about play and no work, if I was given a chore or homework to do, I would find every possible way to get around it. I feel that many kids have this mindset, which could be something I struggle with as a future teacher. I need to find a way to make reading interactive and fun for the students so it is something they learn to love.

In chapter two of Reading in the wild, Miller talks about how important it is for students to have enough confidence to pick their own books. I completely agree with this and think students should feel comfortable picking out a book to read, rather than having books being handed to them by their teachers. This allows for the students to really think about what they enjoy reading about, and they can chose a book that they will actually be interested in. Students are not always going to have their teachers there to recommend books for them, so the sooner they can pick out books for themselves, the better.

I found Miller’s ideas to be very intriguing. The way she talked about being a wild reader really resonated with me, that it is not something that they think about, they just do it. She talks about it as if it just comes naturally and there is no thought about it. This is something that I desire to change about my future, to become a wild reader.

I definitely identified with Nathan in my younger years. I remember in elementary school, I was always the student that was ‘fake reading’. Each night we would have to record how long we read for and how many pages we had read.  If we reached a certain amount of books by the end of the year, we would receive a big shiny medal. So of course, being the sneaky second grader I was, I forged all my reading time logs so that I would be eligible to receive the medal at the end of the year.

I completely agree with Miller that sometimes, forcing kids to read at school makes them learn to hate and dread it. I personally have a lot of experience with this in my past. Reading all those boring textbooks in school made me believe that all reading was boring and dreadful. However, thankfully later on I learned that for most books, it is the complete opposite.

We cannot be telling our students that they need to read more without giving them time to read in class. That is another challenge many teachers face, finding class time for independent reading. However, the more students practice reading, the more confidence they will have, and the more they will learn to enjoy it. Students must be able to see themselves as readers to actually be able to leisurely read outside of school.

 

As a future teacher I am very excited to have the capability to teach my students to learn to love reading. Yet, at the same time that is a terrifying thought. I am definitely afraid that my students will have the same experience as myself and dread reading.