I am always on the look out for engaging beginning reader books. And I mean really engaging. When I saw Big Cats, part of the We Read Phonics series, I nearly cried with excitement. Big Cats includes real photographs of lions, tigers and house cats. Below each photograph is one sentence of clearly spaced text containing […]

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  A few months ago, I presented a workshop titled, Books as Gifts. The participants were so thrilled to learn about great, newer titles available for children. As in all things in life, I find that parents get in ruts with their book buying. They buy the titles they know or the titles that are face […]

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There are a few things I can do for hours at a time. These things include reading, browsing in a bookstore or library and finding new websites or blogs on line. I find that my focus here has been on literature but I do also love finding great new resources to use with the early readers in  […]

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Caroline and my husband Rob are both avid Yankee fans and take turns quizzing each other on obscure Yankee history or current statistics. And of course, Caroline also loves to quiz me and relish in my relative lack of knowledge. So when I saw a  baseball book in my new favorite section of the library, I […]

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There is so much to say about the intersection between technology and literacy today. I’m actually considering devoting a day a week to this idea but for now I just want to sing the praises of the iPad. I have been using my iPad with a client for the past few weeks. He is a […]

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We’ve had one of those weeks. Holidays, delayed openings, predictions of more snow and two sick children. I was feeling a bit discouraged this morning before I sat down to read with the girls. I had gone to the library yesterday so we had a full bag of new books. I always get a collection […]

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I am participating (poorly!) in Mother Reader’s Comment Challenge 2011. While I’m not feeling great about my seeming lack of ability to comment on five blogs a day, I am still loving the challenge. I continue to find it really hard to shake my lurker ways but as I break my cybersphere shyness, I am […]

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Last week, I was thrilled to hear from an old friend. She is a friend that I feel like I talk to every week. She writes a wonderful blog and through it, I keep up with her and her family’s daily adventures. In reality though, she and I haven’t talked in months so when I heard […]

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The buzz in the children’s literature blogging world this week has been all about the American Library Association Awards. And the Today Show. The Today Show has always featured the winners of the Newbery and Caldecott awards on the day after the big announcement. I have  enjoyed the segments as I must admit that seeing an […]

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I have had many parents ask the question, “That doesn’t count, does it?” “My son reads magazines, but that doesn’t count, does it?” “My husband reads the newspaper but that’s not enough of a reading model, is it?” “Those graphic novels? Do those count?” And I say over and over again, “Any reading counts.” Really. […]

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