If you have never tried it check out Library Thing (LT).  It’s a social networking site for book lovers.  Even if you don’t create an account and start cataloging your own library take the time to look at other people’s libraries.  One of the entries in LT is for Thomas Paine’s “Common Sense.”  You can see what tags people have assigned to this work, descriptions, reviews, and more.  Do you agree with what people are saying?  What do you think about the tags people have attached to this title?  How would you review this book?

Web English Teacher has a very helpful site with links dedicated to Pam Muñoz Ryan and her books, Becoming Naomi Leon, Esperanza Rising, and When Marian Sang. One of the links for Esperanza Rising takes you to Scholastic’s suggested unit plan with three lesson ideas. It includes handouts for story mapping and a “Setting Comparison Graphic Organizer.” The William Allen White Children’s Book Award web site has a more concise offering with discussion questions and activities. There are not too many discussion questions on the site but they are of good quality and could help a book club start an excellent conversation about the book. In addition to links for the book, there are a few links to sites that talk about the author. One of the most fun links to a video interview with Pam Muñoz Ryan on the Reading Rockets web site. Consider reading Esperanza Rising with your book group or classroom and take advantage of these fabulous online resources.

Poetry can inspire creativity. People have written songs, painted pictures and created sculpture when inspired by poetry. One man has been inspired to create Lego models of some of his favorite verses. William Ward has a Flickr photo set called Poetry Vignettes and you will be amazed at his ability to interpret famous poems in 3D. The one that caught my eye is his depiction of Robert Frost’s Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening. We have a beautifully illustrated copy of this poem in our collection as part of the We The People Bookshelf, but this puts a pop culture spin on the classic. He also has impressive representations of Mending Wall and The Road Not Taken. Have some fun and take a look. Maybe you will be inspired to try one yourself. This site was found through “And The Cow Said Moo.”

We are celebrating Banned Book Week at the Oro Valley Public Library through October 6th.  You may be amazed at some of the most often challenged books.  Among those on the list is A Wrinkle in Time by Madeline L’Engle.  As a fan of the book I encourage you to rediscover this classic.  Meg Murry, her brother Charles, and their friend Calvin must brave strange and terrifying obstacles to rescue Meg and Charles’ father.  With the help of three very unusual and wise women they travel to astonishing worlds and meet people, both cruel and kind.  If you’ve never read this book before, please pick it up and give it a try.  You’ll be glad you did.  If you have read it, please share you thoughts by commenting on this post.

This month in Crafty Readers we are reading Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel by Virginia Lee Burton. Mike and his steam shovel, Mary Anne, worked on some big projects. They helped build highways and skyscrapers, but when the new gasoline and electric shovels hit the scene Mike and Mary Anne fear becoming obsolete. This is the story of how Mike and Mary Anne make a new home for themselves. The craft this month will teach us about simple machines. Mary Anne is made up of many different simple machines put together. We will use one simple machine to make our own catapult. Come join the fun at the Oro Valley Public Library on October 4th at 4:00 p.m. in the Children’s Room. Please sign up first since space is limited. Call us at 520-229-5300 or stop by the Children’s Room to register.

The Cather Foundation in Red Cloud, Nebraska, received an important boost to its plans for the creation a Willa Cather archives. The Senate recently passed an appropriations bill that includes $1,000,000 for the foundation to restore historic buildings to their former 1800s condition and to assemble an archives devoted to to the author. Willa Cather, who won the Pulitzer for her book 1 of Ours and also wrote classics like O Pioneers!, moved to Red Cloud Nebraska in 1883 and later graduated from the University of Nebraska. Many of the people she met while growing up on the prairie served as inspiration for her novels. The Cather Foundation was established in 1955 through the efforts of a small, dedicated group of volunteers. If you are interested in the news story about the funding bill go to the Omaha Action 3 News site.

The Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery has a beautiful online exhibit on Walt Whitman. The timeline of his life is told in portraits of himself and of his contemporaries. The exhibit is titled One Life: Walt Whitman, a kosmos and offers a real sense of his contributions to poetry over time as well as how he was viewed by fellow artists and intellectuals. His tendency to aggressively self promote annoyed and even angered some of his early supporters, most notably Ralph Waldo Emerson. His innovative, free verse style is widely respected and influenced many later movements in art and poetry, especially the beat poets. Please take a look at this exhibit. It is well worth a few minutes of your time.

I think most people over the age of 10 have read a book by Madeline L’Engle. I was forced, kicking and screaming, to read A Wrinkle In Time for a book report when I was in the fourth grade. Science Fiction was not for me, and I wasn’t going to like this book anymore than I liked peas and lima beans. I still won’t touch peas, but I learned to love Madeline L’Engle. On Saturday she passed away at the age of 88. Slate included a nice remembrance of her.

Although L’Engle worked at various times as a stage actress, playwright, and librarian, she was best known for her dark and beautiful children’s novels, which were predicated on the author’s “faith that the universe has meaning, that our little human lives are not irrelevant, that what we choose or say or do matters, matters cosmically.” Her books matter cosmically to most everybody who is lucky enough to have read them.

The New York Times published a longer piece that shares more of her life story.

As part of our We The People grant the Oro Valley Public Library received a copy of the CD Happy Land: Musical Tributes to Laura Ingalls Wilder. In an interview recorded more than two years ago Dale Cockrell discussed the inspiration for the music compilation with VUCAST, Vanderbilt University’s News Network. This CD compiles music from the Little House books with a little updating. Cockrell notes that the old time music Pa played would sound a little thin to our modern ears. The music recorded on the disc is a blend of old time and bluegrass and is not “kidded down” so that adults and children can enjoy the music together. As a fan of bluegrass music I can certainly vouch for the beauty of this recording, and it easily deserves equal footing with recent compilations like the soundtracks for O Brother, Where Art Thou? and Cold Mountain. Since music plays such an integral role in Wilder’s stories, being able to hear some of the songs that were important to the Ingalls family and to American pioneers adds a new dimension to our enjoyment and understanding of the books. Please reserve a copy of this CD and enjoy Laura Ingalls Wilder’s stories in a new light.

ArtsEdge (The National Arts and Education Network), part of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, offers lesson plans to help young people become better acquainted with art through “creative use of technology.” I recently learned about a new lesson plan from ArtsEdge that focuses on Jacob Lawrence’s The Great Migration. Here is an excerpt from the lesson description:

In this lesson, students will learn about the migration of African Americans to Harlem, beginning with the original migration of blacks to North America. Students will explore paintings by Jacob Lawrence to understand the experience of blacks who migrated from the South. Then students will take a closer look at Harlem and its place in African American history and make a travel brochure of Harlem’s historic landmarks. Finally, students will create a mural representing one period studied in the lesson, such as the migration from Africa, life in the South, the Great Migration, the Harlem Renaissance, or the Great Depression.

In an extension of the lesson children are asked to consider that when Africans were forced to migrate to North America during the slave trade they couldn’t bring any material possessions and later when African Americans migrated from the South to the North they brought very few belongings because many were poor and the trip was long and difficult. Instead they carried valuables in their minds and hearts. Students are asked to imagine what things the migrants might have packed in their “mind’s suitcase.” After studying The Great Migration what do you imagine they carried with them? How does this book challenge or reinforce your perspective of African American history?