CCBC-Net Archives
RE: Notable Non-Fiction
- Contemporary messages sorted: [ by date ] [ by subject ] [ by author ]
From: Cynthia Grady <gradyc_at_sidwell.edu>
Date: Fri, 08 Oct 2010 08:32:19 -0400
I find that only a very small percentage of our middle school students browse the nonfiction shelves on a regular basis, but when I booktalk nonfiction titles in my classes, the books always circulate and get passed back and forth for weeks. Browsing nonfiction doesn't come naturally to them, even if it's all they like to read.
The highest circulating nonfiction areas (not used for assignments) are the sciences (animals, mainly, and some astronomy, chemistry, and medicine/disease books) and any World War II books. And while many students tell me they love to read biographies, those books don't go out as much as the others.
Some of my favorites this year:
Lost Boy, Lost Girl: Escaping Civil War in Sudan, by John Bul Dau and Martha Arual Akech.
Driven: A Photobiography of Henry Ford, by Don Mitchell.
Spies of Mississippi: The True Story of the Spy Network that Tried to Destroy the Civil Rights Movement, by Rick Bowers.
Birmingham Sunday, by Larry Dane Brimmer.
Hot Diggity Dog: The History of the Hot Dog, by Adrienne Sylver.
I've haven't gotten to any 2010 science books yet . . . . but soon.
I'm a huge, huge fan of picture book biographies and enjoyed Black Elk's Vision: A Lakota Story, by S.D. Nelson, but I question its classification as nonfiction since it is told in the first person. . . . and, since I brought it up, two other picture books about people I really enjoyed, but are classified as fiction by LC, are Skit-Scat Raggedy Cat: Ella Fitzgerald by Roxane Orgill, and The Extraordinary Mark Twain (According to Suzy) by Barbara Kerley.
I'd be interested in hearing from people (off-list, if this is not exactly appropriate) regarding picture book biographies-can any picture book about a real person be classified as nonfiction if the book uses a medium other than photos for illustration? Wouldn't a drawn or painted rendering automatically fictionalize the piece as a whole?
Just wondering,
Cynthia
Cynthia Grady
Head Librarian
Sidwell Friends Middle School
3825 Wisconsin Ave. NW
Washington, DC 20016
(202) 537 - 8157
gradyc_at_sidwell.edu
Received on Fri 08 Oct 2010 08:32:19 AM CDT
Date: Fri, 08 Oct 2010 08:32:19 -0400
I find that only a very small percentage of our middle school students browse the nonfiction shelves on a regular basis, but when I booktalk nonfiction titles in my classes, the books always circulate and get passed back and forth for weeks. Browsing nonfiction doesn't come naturally to them, even if it's all they like to read.
The highest circulating nonfiction areas (not used for assignments) are the sciences (animals, mainly, and some astronomy, chemistry, and medicine/disease books) and any World War II books. And while many students tell me they love to read biographies, those books don't go out as much as the others.
Some of my favorites this year:
Lost Boy, Lost Girl: Escaping Civil War in Sudan, by John Bul Dau and Martha Arual Akech.
Driven: A Photobiography of Henry Ford, by Don Mitchell.
Spies of Mississippi: The True Story of the Spy Network that Tried to Destroy the Civil Rights Movement, by Rick Bowers.
Birmingham Sunday, by Larry Dane Brimmer.
Hot Diggity Dog: The History of the Hot Dog, by Adrienne Sylver.
I've haven't gotten to any 2010 science books yet . . . . but soon.
I'm a huge, huge fan of picture book biographies and enjoyed Black Elk's Vision: A Lakota Story, by S.D. Nelson, but I question its classification as nonfiction since it is told in the first person. . . . and, since I brought it up, two other picture books about people I really enjoyed, but are classified as fiction by LC, are Skit-Scat Raggedy Cat: Ella Fitzgerald by Roxane Orgill, and The Extraordinary Mark Twain (According to Suzy) by Barbara Kerley.
I'd be interested in hearing from people (off-list, if this is not exactly appropriate) regarding picture book biographies-can any picture book about a real person be classified as nonfiction if the book uses a medium other than photos for illustration? Wouldn't a drawn or painted rendering automatically fictionalize the piece as a whole?
Just wondering,
Cynthia
Cynthia Grady
Head Librarian
Sidwell Friends Middle School
3825 Wisconsin Ave. NW
Washington, DC 20016
(202) 537 - 8157
gradyc_at_sidwell.edu
Received on Fri 08 Oct 2010 08:32:19 AM CDT
