What & Why I Read

I was never really a fan of reading books until high school when I started to read biographies and autobiographies.  In high school I was very interested in music, bands, and the music industry and I started reading Alternative Press, a magazine that had a lot of articles and interviews with bands and musicians I liked at the time.  In reading those articles I was fascinated by the lives of these musicians and eventually I came across The Heroin Diaries, Nikki Sixx's autobiography.  For some reason I was so intrigued reading his story of his rise, demise, and comeback.  After reading his autobiography I read several more from other musicians from the same time period.  I also started reading autobiographies of athletes after reading Kicking Up Dirt, Ashley Fiolek's autobiography which told about her life as a deaf, female professional motocross racer.  Reading books about people and their lives, struggles, and successes made me passionate about reading.  

I also love to read for the purpose of learning new things, I like to know random facts.  If I wonder about something or I don't understand something, I have to find out the answer and that is where most of my reading stems from.  I read a lot of online articles, brochures, fliers, really anything with information printed on it.  I read the packages for almost everything that I come across.  My desire to learn knew things fuels my passion for reading and makes it enjoyable and not the strenuous task I used to see it as.  

I think reading is something that everyone does and learns to love for their own reasons, I did not always love reading but I learned to.  Reading can be enjoyable for everyone once they find what interests them and what makes them genuinely want to read, which is why it is important to let students explore many different genres and books on many different topics.  

My Writing Process [2]

For my genre paper I chose to write about biographies.  I chose biographies because they are the genre that made me become interested in reading.  I especially like reading biographies about athletes and musicians. 

In prewriting my paper I researched biographies and their defining features.  I found many useful resources, including resources that were useful in how to teach students about reading and writing biographies.  Although I did have trouble citing the sources in APA format.  

I found peer editing my paper in class helpful because my partner highlighted some parts of my papers that I should improve that I didn't notice myself.  For example, there is a paragraph that is only one long sentence, so breaking that sentence up into smaller sentences and perhaps elaborating on those ideas will improve the sentence structure in my paper.  I also need to work on starting my sentences in different ways because many of them start in a very familiar passive voice and it starts to sound repetitive.  

As a result of peer editing my first draft, going into my second draft I have identified my targeted areas of growth as: improving my sentence structure, using better sentence starters and transitions, and properly citing my paper in APA format.  

My Writing Process

I don't think I understood the importance of viewing writing as a process until I started college.  For much of my previous education, despite teacher's efforts to instill the importance of planning, drafting, and revising, I was stubborn and wrote most of my papers as one draft.  I didn't necessarily procrastinate and write one draft the day before my papers were due, sometimes I would finish them a week before, but I never put any real effort into planning before I wrote or revising after I wrote.  I just spit everything that was in my head onto paper, finished my conclusion, and considered it finished.  I realize now why the writing process is so important and how it can be very helpful.  

I find that planning before I write helps me to organize my thoughts and prevents my papers from becoming off topic.  I also find that mapping out my paper ahead of time helps me cite sources more easily when I am writing research papers.

I also learned that revising my drafts is crucial.  I am not great at spelling so while re-reading my drafts I find errors that can easily be changed.  Having other people read my writing is also helpful because sometimes after reading the same thing several times small mistakes in grammar or spelling can be easily overlooked.  

Learning to value the writing process definitely improved my writing and made me realize the importance of teaching the writing process and it's importance to students early in their education.  

Third Book Club Meeting

For our third book club meeting our group agreed to read chapters 20-30.  We begun our discussion by talking about Caitlin's literal interpretation of everything and how difficulty interpreting figurative or expressive language is very typical of individuals on the Autism spectrum.  In particular we discussed the conversation Caitlin had with her dad when he asked her how she felt about going to middle school next year, because that is where her brother was killed, but she said she wasn't nervous because they don't have recess in middle school and she doesn't like recess.  Although her father was referring to the correlation between Caitlin's new school and her brother's death Caitlin didn't make the connection and answered the question literally.  Her father then asked her if she wanted to go to a private school and Caitlin said she would if it meant she was the only person there but when she learned that private did not literally mean she was the only one she said she didn't want to go.  I noticed that throughout the book despite Caitlin's literal interpretation of everything her father never seems to ask her questions that would result in Caitlin answering what he intended to ask, he continues to ask questions in figurative contexts and seems surprised when he doesn't get the response he was looking for.  We thought that this was likely because Caitlin's father was trying to cope with the death of his wife and son while still trying to be there for Caitlin, resulting in his overlooking these types of things.  

Our group also discussed Caitlin's determination to finish Devon's eagle scout project. Caitlin thought that finishing Devon's eagle scout project would bring closure to her and her father.  We also talked about how she drew an eagle on a T-shirt hoping her dad would realize that she wanted to finish Devon's project and how that was another example of her literal use of language.  

Lastly, we talked about the difficulties that parents of children with Autism face and how different sources of support can be helpful in teaching parents how to overcome obstacles and better understand their children.  

For our next meeting we agreed to read the final ten chapters of the book. 

Book Club Meeting 4

After reading the final ten chapters of Mockingbird our book club met for its last meeting. We began our meeting by discussing how we all enjoyed the book a lot.  Personally I thought it was a great book that was in a lot of ways very relatable.  I think the author did a good job of portraying characteristics typical of people with Asperger's through Caitlin. I also think the author did a good job of showing Caitlin's father's struggle to find closure while also doing his best to still be there for Caitlin. 

We also talked about Caitlin and Michael's friendship throughout the entire book and how they unknowingly helped each other out tremendously.  Michael helped Caitlin to develop self-confidence and improve her social skills and Caitlin became like an older sister/role model to Michael.  Josh and Michael's relationship also taught Caitlin a lot about social relationships.  For example, when Josh was holding up Michael on the monkey bars she thought he was hurting him and after she yelled at Josh he became emotional and explained to her that he was just trying to help Michael and that it isn't fair to him that everyone thinks he is evil because his cousin was the shooter.  After Josh told Caitlin that it hurt his feelings that everyone thought of him that way Caitlin expressed empathy for the first time.  She was able to put herself in Josh's shoes and she comforted him. 

Caitlin also finished Devin's eagle scout project which she presented at an assembly at his middle school.  At the assembly Caitlin talked about her brother and his project and how it would help her and her father find closure which was a big deal for her because talking in front of that many people was very difficult.   

In this last part of the book Caitlin also started to make a genuine effort to make friends and work on her manners.  She told her teacher she wanted to be in a group for the group project and she also agreed to draw pictures for the yearbook when one of her classmates asked her to.  

Throughout the book Caitlin made great strides towards overcoming many of the obstacles that she faces because of Asperger's.  I really did love this book and I think it is a great book for kids to read because I think it will help them to see other people's perspectives and learn to accept others despite their differences.  Overall I liked the book club experience and I would definitely be willing to do it again.    

Second Book Club Meeting

The next ten chapters of Mockingbird focus primarily on Caitlin's developing friendship with Michael and her desire for closure with her brother's death.  Mrs. Brooks decided that to help Caitlin work on her social skills and making friends she would go to recess with the younger kids, which initially Caitlin does not like the idea of.  However, Caitlin saw a boy at recess that had a hat that reminded her of her brother and went to talk to him, learning that his name was Michael.  Realizing he looked sad she asks him what is wrong and shares her gummy worms with him and he told her he missed his mom, who had also died.  Michael asked her if she was the, "wierdo whose brother died," and they bonded over their losses.  Eventually Caitlin develops a relationship with Michael and looks forward to seeing him at recess, which is a big step for her because he is her first friend. Another significant part of this section of the book was Caitlin's search for closure.  After hearing the word closure on a news story about the shooting that resulted in her brother's death, she looked it up in the dictionary and decided to focus on finding closure for herself and her father.  Caitlin also talked a lot about her relationship with her brother who served as her protector and her teacher.  He helped her with a lot of the things that she struggled with, like social cues and what to do/not to do in certain situations.  She viewed him as a role model and felt that he understood her better than anyone else. Their relationship reminded me a lot of the relationship that I have with my sister because she looks out for me in a similar way. 
  
After reading chapters 11-20 our group met in person again after class.  We discussed Caitlin's relationship with Michael and how they help each other in grieving and Michael helps her develop social skills.  We talked about when Caitlin told her classmate that her face looked ugly after she fell and offended her even though she thought she was doing the right thing by being honest and how honesty was another characteristic of Asperger's. We ended our meeting by deciding to read the next ten chapters for our next discussion.  

First Book Club Meeting

Our book club is reading Mockingbird by Kathryn Erskine.  Mocking bird is book written from the perspective of a ten year old girl named Caitlin that has Asperger's  Caitlin lives with her dad, her mom died of cancer and her brother was killed during a school shooting.  She is in the fifth grade and works closely with a social worker named Mrs. Brook who works with Caitlin on understanding other people's feelings and expressing her own.  Caitlin struggles to develop relationships with people and doesn't really have an interest in making friends, despite the encouragement from Mrs. Brook.  She finds comfort in her dictionary and would much rather read her dictionary to learn the concrete meanings of words than engage in social activities with her peers which requires more abstract interpretation of emotions and social cues, which she doesn't understand.  Caitlin also has tantrum rage meltdowns (TRM), which usually happen when she is overwhelmed or anxious and can't express her feelings or otherwise effectively calm herself down.  She also sucks on her sleeve when she is anxious or uncomfortable.  The first chapters also describe what Caitlin calls 'stuffed animaling', which is when she focuses on something until the colors blur together and she forgets where she is and pretends she is somewhere she feels safe.    

For our first meeting we decided to read the first ten chapters.  We met in person after class and discussed what we had read so far.  We talked about how we think that the author is doing a good job of portraying Asperger's syndrome through Caitlin.  Many of her characteristics are very typical of individuals on the Autism Spectrum and the story being told from her perspective does a good job of portraying the common thought process and difficulty understanding social and emotional expression of individuals on the spectrum.  We also talked about wether or not Caitlin fully understood that her brother passed away and was not coming back because she talks about him in the present as if he was still there.  We concluded our meeting by agreeing to read the next ten chapters before we met again.