Reluctant Readers Research Articles

Juana & Lucas by Juana Medina

Reviewed by: Juana & Lucas by Juana Medina Jeannette Hulick Medina, Juana Juana & Lucas; written and illus by Juana Medina. Candlewick, 2016 [96p] ISBN 978-0-7636-7208-9 $14.99 Reviewed from galleys R Gr. 2-4 Young Juana enjoys most aspects of her life in Bogotá—her family and friends, her dog, and the amenities that city life offers—but she does not love learning “the English.” When her abuelos tell her they will be taking her to “Spaceland” (an amusement park in the U.S. devoted to Juana’s favorite character, Astroman) where everything will be in English, though, the prospect of being able to speak to Astroman finally kicks Juana’s efforts into gear—only to discover once at the park that Astroman only offers conversation-less hugs to visitors. This delightful easy chapter book has much to recommend it: a lively and likable child narrator (entirely credible in her ambivalence about scholastic endeavors), a strong plot trajectory and quick pacing (and a page count that will pass muster with reluctant readers), and a generous number of engaging illustrations that will be in color in the finished book. Medina’s cozy pictures depict idyllic interiors filled with books, art, and plants, and the pert, pigtailed Juana is an endearing figure. Juana’s view of English and the U.S. will be a useful discussion point for middle-graders just learning to consider viewpoints beyond their own. Spanish words are sprinkled throughout the text and, although there are no definitions or glossary, contextual clues should enable most readers to decipher the meanings. Both edifying and entertaining, this solid title is a winner. Copyright © 2016 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

Pasadena by Sherri L. Smith

Reviewed by: Pasadena by Sherri L. Smith Kate Quealy-Gainer, Assistant Editor Smith, Sherri L. Pasadena. Putnam, 2016 [240p] ISBN 978-1-101-99625-6 $17.99 Reviewed from galleys R Gr. 8-12 It wasn’t an accident. It wasn’t suicide. No, Jude knows that the death of her best friend Maggie was murder—even if everyone’s saying it’s not—and she’s out for vengeance. Maggie trafficked in secrets and was at turns adored and feared by her friends, so the list of suspects is lengthy: is it Dane, the philandering, STD-riddled cad wearing the loyal boyfriend disguise? The sycophantic wannabe, Edina? Keith and/or Scott, the two brothers Maggie slept with? And there’s always Maggie’s bitter, jealous younger brother. Smith hits the noir genre right on target: Jude’s about as hardboiled and cynical as detectives come; Joey’s the love interest who won’t give up on her; flashbacks cast Maggie as the glamorous but vulnerable dame; the dialogue’s quippy and fast; the cast is eclectically shady; and the ending leaves Jude in the gloom, telling Joey, “Find a girl who knows how to love you the right way.” This is entirely satisfying as a murder mystery on its own, but there’s also a fair amount of emotional depth. Jude’s distrust of nearly everyone is authentically founded on a heartbreaking cause, and Maggie actually never told anyone’s secrets but instead often acted as a compassionate listener. The quick pace, easy appeal, breezy dialogue, and brief page count makes this a perfect quick pick for mystery lovers and reluctant readers. Copyright © 2016 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

On being an unofficial ambassador for children’s poetry in New Zealand

On being an unofficial ambassador for children’s poetry in New Zealand Paula Green (bio) Click for larger view View full resolution [End Page 72] Poetry When you unwrap a poem you might find sizzling butter in the pancake pan the flight of a kite in the deep blue sky crackling laughter when you all say cheese the look of love in your grandmother’s eye words that taste sweet and words that hop doorways and windows and rickety gates tickets to space and a wild west wind. Poetry is a vital playground where children can squelch knee deep in the possibilities of words. Here words can tower and tilt and connect. A few years ago, with a number of poetry books for both children and adults out in the world, I invented a role for myself as an unofficial ambassador for children’s poetry in New Zealand. My key aim was to get parents, teachers, and children to fall in love with the delights of poetry. Poems can hook the most reluctant reader and writer and advance the most sophisticated. There are no rules in the poetry playground, unless you choose to make them. Poetry offers the child a most liberating scope for reading and writing. To put my plan into action, I wrote new poetry collections, edited A Treasury of NZ Poetry for Children, undertook a Hot Spot Poetry Tour of the country, visited schools through the NZ Book Council, and kick started a children’s blog called NZ Poetry Box. On writing poems for children a Jack on a camel a Jack and his flannel a Jack climbing rocks a Jack in a box. (From “Which Jack”) Some authors write poems for children with the adult reader in mind as though any other option will compromise the poetic complexity and reduce potential levels of engagement. My primary aim is to catch the attention of the child reader to the point they fall in love with poetry. Poems that hook the child’s ear and eye ignite crucial sparks in their reading life. For me, children’s poetry begins with sound as the poems need to live in the air (ear) as nimbly as they reside on the page. Rhyme may or may not play a part. What matters is the electric charge between one word and the next that may produce a quiet hum or a hubzubadrub and everything in between. When I do use rhyme, I am as fond of the Dr-Seuss-type rhyme (dog, sog, log, frog) [End Page 73] as I am of words that almost rhyme (escape, alligator, skateboard). Tricky rhyme, as I tell children, is an extremely fun thing to hunt for and adds musical zest to their poems. Hiding the rhyme adds another level of excitement for hungry ears. Poems can feed the eye with detail that gleams like little gold nuggets on the line. The detail can have anchors in the real world and help a poem relate little snippets of experience. Conversely, the detail might scoop the child up and carry them through the window into the tunnels and train tracks of the imagination. Good detail can produce laughter (a necessary ingredient in my collections), but it can also provide a landing platform to ponder things that surprise or challenge or move. Children, who have caught the poetry spark, will engage with poems that offer a more thoughtful flipside to zany humor. Poems on the page can catch the eye through form. In my latest collection, The Letterbox Cat, I have played with the tradition of concrete poetry to create poems that produce pictures. Trying to read these sometimes involves a lot of squirming and twisting and getting off the chair to follow the tumble of words (one poem is a rollercoaster; another is a dripping ice cream). When I write a book of poems for children, I want to show that poems can do a thousand things and, while you might experience all kinds of moods as you read, poems make you feel good. Poetry is a way of reading for delight. On performing poems with children The Orange I saw little ships instead of pips on...

Attentional bias toward reading in reluctant readers

Is reading subconsciously experienced as a source of threat by reading reluctant (RR) students which may explain their persistent resistance to reading? In four separate studies (N = 1205), we used a print exposure checklist to identify RR students in primary education (Grades 4 and 5) and secondary education (Grades 7 and 8) in the Netherlands. The visual dot probe task, commonly used to assess feelings of threat in clinical and health psychology, was applied to reading to test whether RR students indeed selectively attended to reading-related stimuli. Using a meta-analytical approach, we found that RR students scoring zero or below on a print exposure checklist were not only less proficient readers with a more negative attitude toward reading as compared to more enthusiastic readers, but also showed an attentional bias toward reading. The findings corroborate the theory that about 60% of reluctant readers avoid reading because reading is a source of threat to them. As part of promoting reading we need to find ways to make reading a less threatening activity for those students.

Wait…This Counts as Reading?

AbstractMany sixth grade students think they are telling the truth when they complain, “Reading is boring.” However, they don't realize what sort of activities encompass reading. As a teacher with a few years of experience, I am finding new ways to engage reluctant readers and show them reading can take many different forms. In this essay, I describe how I have felt defeated by student reluctance toward reading as well as how I am learning a different approach by surveying my students’ interests. These interest surveys fuel my read‐aloud selections and help me arm myself with literate materials seemingly tailored to my students. The students, at first, are surprised some of these materials “count as reading.”

Well-being and human-animal interactions in schools: The case of "Dog Daycare Co-Op"

This paper draws on Martha Nussbaum’s account of the nature of human well-being to explore the role of animals in formal education settings. Nussbaum equates well-being with human flourishing, and argues that people live well when engaged in essential functions that are particular capabilities, each a necessary but insufficient contributor to well-being. One of these capabilities is the ability to “to have concern for and live with other animals, plants and the environment.” Yet, this condition of well-being remains largely unexplored among in education. In recent years, the benefits of human-animal interaction in education settings has been researched and discussed in the social sciences, particularly the use of dogs to aid reluctant readers in literacy development, and the use of therapy dogs in universities during final examination blocks. This paper presents findings of one particular research project of the effects of a unique, Canadian school-based cooperative education program, “Under One Woof,” in which students work with animals. Based on interviews, students’ own stories of the impact of animal interaction – particularly in light of other challenges they faced academically and socially – appear to support other empirical accounts of positive effects of animals in education settings, and offer insight into the nature and effects of human-animal interaction as an element of well-being.

Hamster Princess: Harriet the Invincible by Ursula Vernon (review)

Reviewed by: Hamster Princess: Harriet the Invincible by Ursula Vernon Jeannette Hulick Vernon, Ursula Hamster Princess: Harriet the Invincible; written and illus. by Ursula Vernon. Dial, 2015 [256p] ISBN 978-0-8037-3983-3 $12.99 Reviewed from galleys R Gr. 3-5 In this humorous twist on “Sleeping Beauty,” a sword-slinging, monster-fighting, fraction-calculating hamster princess, Harriet Hamsterbone, manages to outmaneuver the evil fairy Ratshade, tossing her into the splintery hamster wheel intended for Harriet and turning the sleeping curse back on the fairy; unfortunately, the curse still befalls everyone else in Harriet’s family’s castle. Harriet and her faithful quail-steed, Mumfrey, manage to escape unharmed but are then saddled with the task of finding a prince to kiss everyone to break the curse. Middle-graders with [End Page 171] a taste for absurdity and snark will find plenty of both here, and sassy Harriet is an entertaining heroine. The snappy, funny writing coupled with the plethora of comics-style illustrations and quick pace make this an easy sell to the reluctant reader crowd (who will find themselves happily devouring the occasional higher-level vocabulary word). The frequent art in tones of blue and gray often furthers the narrative via word-bubble interchanges of dialogue, and the carefully cocked angle of an ear or an eye renders the white hamster figures surprisingly expressive. Fans of Holm’s Babymouse (Babymouse: Queen of the World, BCCB 12/05) series or Vernon’s Dragonbreath (BCCB 9/09) series will definitely want to tag along on Harriet’s future adventures. Copyright © 2015 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

Mobile-based Extensive Reading

Mobile devices have sweeping repercussions in education and suggest shifting content-engagement paradigms. Extensive reading (ER) is not unaffected by the many evolving aspects of mobile technology in second language classrooms. This paper reflects on Xreading®, an online graded reader (GR) and learning management system (LMS) designed for digital ER. Students at a private university in Tokyo had access to this online library using mobile devices. While overall reflections were positive, actual engagement with GR's and the software, was significantly lower for a surprising number of participants. Focusing on those reluctant readers (RRs) this study investigates the basis for disengagement, both with ER and perhaps with mobile technology. Using a post-pilot questionnaire and focus group discussion, the authors attempted to understand reasons behind the disconnect. Key findings for why students neglected this system included: insufficient software training, misconceptions about reading extensively and ineffective exploitation of intrinsic and extrinsic motivators.

PANIC by S. Draper

Draper, Sharon M. PANIC. New York: Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 2013. Print.Imagine ... waking up, tied to a bed, groggy, naked, and alone. What would you do?PANIC is a gripping tale of two teenage girls and their experience with manipulation, abduction, and abuse. After meeting Thane, the handsome Hollywood movie director, 15-year-old Diamond is easily persuaded to accompany him back to his family's home to audition for an exciting part in upcoming movie. It's a dream come true for the aspiring dancer! Diamond ignores everything she's been taught since she was a little girl, and willingly gets into a car with the stranger. Still unaware of the looming danger, Diamond is lured into Thane's house, accepts a drink, and then pays the unthinkable price for the promise of starring in a Hollywood movie. She is now being held captive and forced to "play her part" in Thane's horrifying production, all while her family and friends, who are desperately waiting for news of her safety, live through their own horrors and traumas. While each girl fights for escape from their own personal prison, they desperately search for an inner strength they hope is there. From the award-winning, New York Times bestselling author, Sharon M. Draper, this is a heart-breaking story that quickly turns into an exhilarating examination of power and loss, and the inspiring fight to take it all back.Sharon M. Draper's PANIC is a heart-pounding saga that will easily appeal to a wide age and range of readers. Defined as hi-lo contemporary fiction, it is a novel originally written for a young adult audience, and is a story that addresses important issues like abduction, sexual abuse, and bullying. It is a book that teaches valuable lessons, and so, may also appeal to parents and caregivers, and act as an important discussion piece for families. While offering insightful symbolism and the opportunity to dig deep into heavy themes (like the objectification of women and abusive teen relationships), it will work well for strong and inquisitive readers, however, with its short chapters, sobering plot, and strong young characters, this novel will attract many reluctant readers who are looking for a quick yet interesting read. Although the action is intense, emotional, and distressing at times the ease of dialogue and growth of the characters draws the reader in and forces them to think about their own risky behaviour, and the potential for resulting danger. Be aware that the trivial language used too often by the young characters can become tedious and annoying, and with a religious element to the book, some readers may feel uncomfortable at certain points. Yet, it is Draper's ability to so vividly capture the mind and heart of the adolescent, and the important and powerful life lessons the story delivers, that makes PANIC a must-have addition to any collection.Highly Recommended: 4 out of 4 StarsReviewer: Kimberley K. MortonKim Morton is a secondary History teacher and Learning Coordinator with the Saskatoon Public School Division. She is currently working toward her Masters of Education, specializing in Teacher-Librarianship, through the University of Alberta. She strives to make research and inquiry meaningful, relevant, and fun for her students, and is looking to gain more experience with current technology, trends, and tools. She enjoys sports, is an avid reader of historical novels, and loves going to the movies.

Portraits of Celina by Sue Whiting (review)

Reviewed by: Portraits of Celina by Sue Whiting Kate Quealy-Gainer, Assistant Editor Whiting, Sue Portraits of Celina. Switch, 2015 [352p] ISBN 978-1-63079-024-0 $16.95 Reviewed from galleys Ad Gr. 7-10 After the sudden death of her father, sixteen-year-old Bayley relocates with her family from Sydney, Australia to a small town in the country, where they move into a house with its own tragic past. Forty years ago, Celina O’Malley, cousin to Bayley’s mom, walked to the school bus stop alone and was never seen again. Bayley finds a box of Celina’s old belongings in her room, and her fascination with the girl’s disappearance quickly becomes an obsession, especially when she begins to think that Celina’s spirit may be trying to tell her something. As Bayley’s family continues to spin out of control with grief, Celina’s ghost becomes more insistent, demanding that Bayley take revenge on the man that took Celina’s life. Whiting relies too heavily on tired tropes (a scary encounter in the forest, a “psychic” friend, etc.) for this to be truly chilling, and the subplot involving the unraveling of Bayley’s family is more a distraction than an atmospheric contribution to the chaos. The most intriguing character is Celina herself, remembered by others as a sweet, fun-loving girl but revealed as a rather cold and calculating teen through her interactions with Bayley. The plot is straightforward and the language accessible, so despite the book’s length the pages breeze by while this is not as sophisticated as Suma’s ghost story The Walls around Us (BCCB 6/15), this might still draw reluctant readers looking for a few scares. [End Page 573] Copyright © 2015 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

Children and Technology: Ten Ways to Help Parents Navigate Technology with Children

As children’s librarians, we spend a great deal of time working with and advising not only children but also their parents. We provide tips on early literacy, advice about emerging readers, book recommendations for reluctant readers, and more. As technology becomes more prevalent in the lives of children, we must also serve as a resource for parents in this area. Here are ten ways children’s librarians can ensure that they can adequately help parents become confident about the role that technology plays in the lives of their children.

Guarding Secrets by Patrick Jones, and: Taking Sides by Darby Creek (review)

Reviewed by: Guarding Secrets by Patrick Jones, and: Taking Sides by Darby Creek Elizabeth Bush Jones, Patrick Guarding Secrets. Darby Creek, 2015 89p (Locked Out) Library ed. ISBN 978-1-4677-5801-7 $27.99 Paper ed. ISBN 978-1-4677-6038-6 $9.99 Ad Gr. 6-10 Taking Sides. Darby Creek, 2015 97p (Locked Out) Library ed. ISBN 978-1-4677-5800-0 $27.99 Paper ed. ISBN 978-1-4677-6037-9 $9.99 R Gr. 6-10 Jones’s new urban lit series, Locked Out, focuses on teens whose parents’ crimes and incarceration have sent their children’s lives into a downward spiral. Guarding Secrets, set in Anaheim, California, focuses on high school junior Camila Hernandez, who has spent the past ten years bouncing among relatives and trying to keep her family secret from classmates—her mother, once involved in a Latino gang, is on death row for the fatal shooting of a police officer. Appeals have been abandoned, the execution date is set, and Camila is torn between the fear that she may have inherited her mother’s propensity to crime and the impulse to find her way toward forgiveness before the opportunity is gone forever. The slight page count isn’t robust enough to fully support additional problems and themes, ranging from adoring her model citizen boyfriend, dodging the blackmailing attempts of a gang-banger classmate, shoplifting a new dress for her mother’s funeral, and seeking guidance from a parish priest. Taking Sides is more tightly focused and, consequently, more successful. Narrator Todd and his sister Tina witness their father stab their mother to death, but each attributes culpability to a different parent. Swept into the foster care system and separated from each other in advance of their father’s trial, the pair has a few opportunities for covert communication, and her father pressures his son to convince Tina to change her interpretation of the tragedy in her father’s favor. Both of the titles are quick reads, constructed with plenty of dialogue, controlled vocabulary, and a chronological trajectory that allows less skilled readers to concentrate on content rather than structure. The riveting plots, however, will have appeal well beyond the reluctant reader set. Copyright © 2015 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

Libraries in Online Elementary Schools: A Mixed-Methods Study

School libraries serve an important role; however, elementary students who attend schools online typically do not have a school library. This study followed an online school’s inaugural year in instituting a library. A mixed methods approach examined data from focus groups, interviews, surveys, library-use records and oral reading fluency scores. Stakeholders had various goals from “to get books into the hands of the students” to teachers requesting that Library be a special class to encourage reluctant readers to access the resources. It was found that students who accessed the libraries most were those who were already motivated readers. The findings suggest that access to libraries alone was not enough to motivate students to use the resources. Rather, to empower students to access libraries, a librarian is needed to serve as an instructional partner, an information specialist, a teacher and a program administrator.

The Rule of Three by E. Walters

Walters, Eric. The Rule of Three. Toronto: Penguin Canada Books Inc., 2014. PrintWith all the dystopian novels written over the last ten, years Eric Walters has composed a refreshing and believable look at how a community survives after the world has been changed by a computer virus which has immobilized any vehicle, utility, or device that requires computer technology. The villains the community members have to face are not zombies or other fantasy creatures but humans. How long will this disaster last? They don’t know.The “rule of three” is an idea that we can live for three seconds without air, three days without water, and three weeks without food. Keeping this in mind, the protagonist, sixteen-year-old Adam Daley, his mom, the police chief, and neighbour Herb, an ex-spy, must come up with ways to keep their community of Eden Mills safe and self-reliant. Three days after the outage, people begin to panic because the basics of life – water and food – become either inaccessible or depleted. The protection of one’s own family becomes the priority and mob mentality and the survival of the fittest become paramount obstacles that Eden Mills residents must endure. There is a fight for power both figuratively and literally. They must get energy to survive and also have the physical, mental, and social power to live.In some ways, The Rule of Three takes an idealistic view of how a community could band together to survive after a disastrous event. I would hope that if this happened in any community that citizens would have the same attitude and skills. Following Eric Walter’s style, the characters are realistic, relatable, and believable. Like We All Fall Down and many of Walters’ other books, reluctant readers would find the book both readable and interesting. Readers looking for high vocabulary and intricate plot may find this read disappointing. The Rule of Three has suspense, drama, likable characters, and even a little romance; ages 13 and up would enjoy this novel. I am looking forward to the sequel The Rule of Three: The Fight for Power.Recommended: 3 out of 4 starsReviewer: Marylou DicksonTeaching Division III English Language Arts and impacting students’ abilities to improve their literacy practices are passions of Marylou Dickson. She is a teacher in the Edmonton Public School Board and is also a doctoral student at the University of Alberta researching adolescent literacy. When not teaching or studying, you can find Marylou and her husband Al watching movies, enjoying friends, and/or working on their homestead.

The Dark Lens by T. K. Troupe

Troupe, Thomas Kingsley. The Dark Lens. Mankato: 12 Story Library, 2015. Print.One day, on his way to work at the Gas N’ Grab, Alex takes a detour to avoid a gang of potential muggers. Along the way, he discovers a mysterious, heavy, dark lens. As he holds it up to the sun to inspect it better, he is transported to a dark and dangerous world filled with terrible monsters. Luckily, upon holding the lens up to the sun a second time, he is transported back to his own reality.However, he is now late for work and feels compelled to explain to his co-worker, Turd, why. Turd, also intrigued by the lens, locks up the station and forces Alex to show him how it works. Alex agrees to let Turd have a brief look and the two boys are once again transported back to the horrible alternate reality. However upon returning, Alex discovers he has lost the keys to the Gas N’ Grab and must return to retrieve them.Alex soon realizes that Turd is entranced by this horrible world and, as a result, the next trip over isn’t as brief. Alex and Turd end up wrestling over the lens and it becomes lost in a nearby swamp. To make matters worse, it is now getting dark and the lens won’t activate without sunlight. The two must now travel into the burned out city to avoid creatures lurking in the darkness and to hopefully survive the night.This book will appeal to teens who are reluctant readers as it has a fast-moving plot and accessible language. The author expertly describes the setting and uses vivid imagery and sometimes violent descriptions of grim creatures and scenery which will appeal to readers who enjoy the horror genre. For example, upon arriving to the other side, a creature who “tore into a hunk of mangled meat with twitching legs” is noted by Alex. At only ninety-five pages, it is a quick read but sadly feels somewhat underdeveloped in character and plot. Alex and Turd’s characters are flat and there is no explanation as to where the lens might have come from or how the creatures on the other side became the inhabitants of such a disturbing world. Yet, despite some underdevelopment, it is refreshing to see expanded options for reluctant readers and diversity in hi-lo fiction, a category which typically deals primarily with teen issues and does not often tread into the genres of fantasy or horror.Recommended with Reservations: 2 out of 4 starsReviewer: Aleasha KachelAleasha Kachel is a Teacher Librarian at Westsyde Secondary School in Kamloops, BC. She is currently working towards her Master of Education Degree in Teacher Librarianship. She loves reading teen fiction, especially dystopias.

The Rithmatist by B. Sanderson

Sanderson, Brandon. The Rithmatist. Illus. Ben Sweeney. New York: Tom Doherty Associates, 2013. Print.What if the survival of humanity depended on the geometry skills of a few elite youths? But it does.Winner of the YALSA 2014 Teen’s Top Ten Award, this book asks readers to envisage an alternate history for Earth. The Asian nation of JunSeo has overtaken much of the globe, and technology relies on elaborate systems of springs and gears. Society relies on the skills of Rithmatists, who use geometric shapes and angles to wage war against a rogue force of chalklings – two-dimensional chalk drawings with a penchant for blood.All Joel has ever wanted to be is a Rithmatist, but he has not been chosen by the Master. In spite of this, he spends all his time exploring Rithmatic principles. Joel’s dreams are realized when the disgraced Professor Fitch begins to tutor him along with remedial Rithmatics student Molly. When the far-off war against chalklings in Nebrask becomes more real and Rithmatic students begin to be targeted close at home, Joel’s suspicions are fixated on the new Rithmatics professor, Nalizar.In the misdt of this fantasy novel, American author Brandon Sanderson has embedded a number of intriguing questions. What would the world be like if a power other than Great Britain had achieved world dominance? What does the idea of predestination mean for those who are not chosen? What if different technologies had taken hold?Although there are literary and symbolic elements that posit this story as a thriller, the author has included enough humor that it still maintains a playful and adventurous tone. A sense of anticipation is maintained throughout, as the principles of Rithmatics and the plot are gradually revealed. Though Sanderson’s writing style at times impedes the immersive quality of the story, the reader is kept deliciously in suspense until the end. Ben Sweeney’s illustrations at the end of every chapter masterfully enhance the reader’s understanding of Rithmatic principles.The first in a series, this book would appeal to readers who enjoy fantasy, such as the Harry Potter series or The Golden Compass. It is recommended for children in grades 7-12 and is a good example of “hi-lo” fiction. The accessible language will engage reluctant readers. A reading and activity guide is included at the end of the book, suitable for discussion and exploration in a classroom setting.Highly Recommended: 4 out of 4 starsReviewer: Kelsi McGillivrayKelsi McGillivray teaches grade 3 at an international school in Kathmandu, Nepal. She is currently working on her Masters of Education in teacher-librarianship and aspires to become the school librarian in the future. She enjoys reading, hiking, and adventures.

Apocalypse Bow Wow by James Proimos, III (review)

Reviewed by: Apocalypse Bow Wow by James Proimos, III Deborah Stevenson Proimos, James, III Apocalypse Bow Wow; illus. by James Proimos Jr. Bloomsbury, 2015 [224p] Trade ed. ISBN 978-1-61963-442-8 $13.99 E-book ed. ISBN 978-1-61963-443-5 $6.99 Reviewed from galleys R Gr. 2-4 It’s apparently the apocalypse outside, in this humorously dystopian graphic novel, but the big goofy mutt and the little yappy dog inside the house are mostly concerned that their people haven’t come home to feed them. They head out into the world to find a blasted landscape and a few other dogs, one of whom points them to the grocery store (“Building full of food!”). Once there, they join forces with the resident bulldog and gorge themselves silly; the three, aided by a local rat and a tick who’s been reading Sun Tzu’s The Art of War, then take on a horde of invaders who seek to claim the territory. This is typical Proimos (Proimoi?) in its affable weirdness and loopy, slightly edgy cartoonish artwork; though occasional scenes are on the dark side, the black and white illustrations have a countercultural feel that adds extra appeal. The dogs’ dialogue is snappy, with fine comic contrast as the dopier dog starts passing on the tick’s sophisticated observations from Sun Tzu. The action transpires in brief demarcated scenes, making this loopy story perfect for reluctant readers who need frequent breaks. The plot trickles to a stop rather than ending with a bang, but it’s clearly setting up for a sequel, so the forthcoming Apocalypse Meow Meow should satisfy kids desperate to know what happens next. Copyright © 2015 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

How Can Teachers Motivate Reluctant Readers

Motivating students to read is an important aspect of being an elementary reading teacher. Five second graders and their teacher were involved in the original work that this article is based on. Through classroom observations and one-on-one interviews, this research showed the importance of motivating reluctant readers. This article focuses on one student (Ben) in particular and his struggles with reading motivation. Through this lens of motivating reluctant readers, this article proceeds to share ideas of how classroom teachers can motivate reluctant readers in the classroom setting. Teachers can do a variety of things to motivate theirstudents to read. One of the first things teachers need to do is get to know their students. Teachers also need to utilize a variety of motivating reading experiences to help motivate students as well as create an engaging and open literacy environment. A final way teachers can motivate their students to read is to implement motivating and relevant classroom activities. Utilizing these ideas to motivate readers will hopefully work to create lifelong learners.

Quizzical about reading

The Accelerated Reading Programme is proving highly effective in engaging reluctant readers by involving them in a quiz about what they have read.

From the Editors

From the Editors