Just a quick link to another example of how teachers can use blogs to enhance the reading of a book in class by extending conversations past the school day, linking to resources and relevant materials, inviting parents to read and study with their children, inviting students from other parts of the country to collaborate and have students learn directly from interacting with the author of the book. What a concept!
Guerrilla Season is the book, Eric Langhorst of the Speaking of History podcast is the teacher, and it appears he’s looking for more participants.
Check it out and join us if you like. In addition to the students here in Liberty, Missouri we have students in California and a teacher in Louisiana taking part right now. It just started so there is plenty of time to join. I want to thank Pat Hughes for taking such an interest in our project. She is commenting directly to reader questions and spending a great deal of with this project. How incredible it is for an author to be communicating with her readers while they read the book!
Makes me nostalgic…
technorati tags:Eric_Langhorst, blogging, learning, education
Will – Thanks for blogging about our project. Of course your Bees project is the inspiration and the true innovation. Thanks Will!
Is he still looking for more participants? Do you think he would take web participants?
In response to John and anyone else thinking about joining us – YES – we started the project on Oct 23 but go through Nov 17. All you need to do is get a copy of the book, start reading it and then join us for the comments and discussion. We’d like to have as many people join us as possible. There is no formal registration but we’d love to hear who is joining us and where you are located. We only allow comments with first names, pen names or no name but if you want to add you city or state to the comment feel free.
Thanks again to Will for posting about our project. Come and join us – we’d love to have you.
Eric Langhorst
http://www.guerrillaseason.blogspot.com
Just want to add the author’s two cents. This sort of thing is such a terrific opportunity for YA authors to communicate directly, live and online, with students, answer their questions, and get a dialogue going about a book. So I really appreciate innovative teachers like Eric Langhorst who make it possible.
When I was a kid (and a voracious reader), I would have loved to participate in a project like this. Alas my school years were from Kennedy through Nixon – how rare was it to ever have the opportunity to ask even a single question of an author whose book you were reading in class? (Please don’t parse that sentence.) You could only wonder … perhaps write a letter … and then wait for the reply that never came.
I’m hoping the kids – and the adults – will ask me the tough questions as they get deeper into the book, because “Guerrilla Season” really does make demands on what we think we know about the Civil War. In my note to readers on the blog, I basically said I don’t want a bunch of yes-readers; I want arguments and opinions. That will really make it great.
Thanks to Will and weblogged for blogging about the project. …