Sunday, September 7, 2008

Our Read ALOUD

The Wednesday Wars
On Wednesday afternoons, Holling Hoodhood is alone in the classroom with his teacher, Mrs. Baker, who Holling is convinced hates his guts. He feels more certain after Mrs. Baker assigns Shakespeare's plays for Holling to discuss during their shared afternoons. Each month in Holling's tumultuous seventh-grade year is a chapter in this novel set in suburban Long Island during the late '60s.
Mrs. Baker is too good to be true: she arranges a meeting between Holling and the New York Yankees, brokers a deal to save a student's father's architectural firm, and, after revealing her past as an Olympic runner, coaches Holling to the varsity cross-country team.
However, Schmidt, makes the implausible believable and the everyday momentous. We are finding the story's themes: the cultural uproar of the '60s, the internal uproar of early adolescence, and the timeless wisdom of Shakespeare's words very interesting. Holling's unwavering, distinctive voice offers a gentle, hopeful, moving story of a boy who, with the right help, learns to stretch beyond the limitations of his family, his violent times, and his fear, as he leaps into his future with his eyes and his heart wide open.
Schools then Vs. NOW
SO far we have found that in Y2K there aren't many chalk-filled erasers here to clap at Baldwin.
Just like Holling's school, we too have little rodents running around freely!
They have textbooks for each subject while we only have 1.
That Shakespeare is a wordsmith!

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