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This is the final installment of an interview with Spanish instructor Terra Trofort. I asked her how time-pressed parents can increase communication with teachers. She gave me these four tips:

1. “Ask what material is being presented in the classroom, then reinforce that material,” she says. “For example, if your children have vocabulary or “sight” words that they’re learning, point them out at home. Label objects so children can associate the appropriate spelling word with that item.”

2. “Get to know your school or public librarian. He or she can help you find books that are appropriate for your child’s reading level.”

3. “Check out your child’s teacher’s web site, if there is one. A lot of communication is available to parents online.”

4. The last tip is probably the most obvious. “Make it a point,” says Trofort. Communicating with your child’s teacher, and helping your child become a great reader, are things that you have to make a priority. By doing so, you could be helping your little one develop a lifelong love of books!

At Chipper Kids, we focus on making reading fun, but many children are learning the fundamentals of reading in not one, but two languages. Could a bilingual education help your child enjoy reading more? I recently asked Terra Trofort, Executive Director of Lingual Kids, LLC, to weigh in. Her company provides foreign language instruction (primarily Spanish) to young students. Trofort says that children who learn the principles of a secondary language often become better readers all around. Here’s the first of a two part interview:

I understand that Lingual Kids specializes in Spanish instruction. What’s unique about teaching Spanish compared to teaching another language?
Trofort: One thing I love about Spanish is that it’s phonetic. Once you learn the sounds, particularly the vowel sounds, you can look at practically any Spanish word and figure out how to pronounce it.

What if a parent knows only one language? How can they help?
Trofort: Read to your child! Even if you read to them in their primary language only, it often becomes easier for your child to learn a second language because they have a point of reference. They understand letters, they know that each letter has a sound, and they know that these letters and sounds create words (that have meaning). The child who reads often already has a grasp of the concept of language and how words work.

What can parents do to make reading time more meaningful?
Trofort: One good idea I’ve learned is to choose a book and focus on that one book for an entire week. It doesn’t have to be too long, but lengthy enough to have a good story line. Throughout the week, ask questions about the story. This helps your child build up their comprehension as they remember the story from one night to the next. It really helps you connect with your child as you’re helping them read.

Next week, Terra will share her ideas for how time-pressed parents can increase parent/teacher communication.

It’s not every day that you get first-hand advice from the leader of a school.

I recently interviewed Tamika Brundidge, director of the Destiny Day School in Atlanta, Georgia. She talked about how to make reading fun for young kids, and she also discussed the best way to communicate with teachers. Here’s our Q&A:

1. What can a time-pressed parent do to make story time meaningful?

“Make reading an anytime, anywhere activity. It doesn’t matter if you’re at the grocery store, doctor’s office, or even riding in a car,” says Brundidge.

So how do you ‘read’ in the car? “Purchase books on audio,” she says. Parents can even record themselves reading audio storybooks to make the experience more personable. Whatever you decide, just set aside 10 minutes out of the day to read to your child.

2. What type of picture books are your students enjoying this year?
The students at the Destiny Day School enjoy “create-your-own” books, “mysterious books” that allow students to make guesses or assumptions, and “interactive books” that encourage children to repeat tongue twisters, rhyming words, or repetitive phrases. They are also enjoying “wordless books” that tell a story using the books’ illustrations combined with the child’s imagination.

3. What are some tips to get a slow reader excited (and not frustrated) about beginner books?
Brundidge suggests the following:
• Allow children to create their own story books
• Ask open ended questions to prep the child as he or she goes through the book
• Try to partner the student with a more advanced reader
• Create activities associated with the book (ie, plan a garden visit to supplement Counting in the Crazy Garden)

5. How should parents communicate with their child’s teacher?
“Partner with the teacher,” says Brundidge. This means being open to the teacher’s suggestions for your child. Don’t forget to ask about your child’s strengths and weaknesses, as well as his or her interests, in the classroom. Let the teacher work with you to provide the best learning experiences for your early reader.

Kurt Vonnegut wasn't the first author who dabbled in an invented religion as a way of expounding his character's (and his own) operational beliefs. In Cat's Cradle Vonnegut laid out Bokononism, a mash-up of various Eastern philosophies as expounded by a double-speaking guru encamped in the Caribbean paradise of San Lorenzo whose hymnal was composed of calypsos. The second chapter in the book

Jacqueline Woodson
Putnam 2007

I've been floundering with this book for over a week now, trying to figure out what exactly it is I want to say. Twice now my attempts to review the book have quickly become examinations of the 1970's and why it feels like we're seeing more books set during that time and what, if any, relation all this has on our current political landscapes and whether younger readers really want to read about all this as "period" reading.

At it's simplest the story come from the wrong-side-of-the-tracks family. A boy with long hair transfers mid-year to the new school on the bad side of town, literally on the wrong side of the tracks. Being the new kid, the odd fish, makes him the easy target for the bullies and because he looks white and the other students are a rainbow of browns he is instantly viewed with suspicion. The Jesus Boy, nicknamed because of his hair and serenity in the face of his non-violent approach to life, causes unease because some of the kids begin to wonder if he isn't Jesus come back to test their faith. When finally pushed to the edge by Trevor, the class bully, JB finally lets lose a verbal assault that disarms Trevor but proves JB is like the rest of them, capable of cruelty and anger. JB's secret is that he was adopted by black parents who moved across the tracks because life wasn't any easier for them on the other side. Kids are egalitarian in their cruelty.

The story is told from the point of view of Frannie who, along with her deaf brother Sean, give us another perspective on being outsiders. Frannie doesn't feel she fits in with those around her who are more deeply connected to their church, and her brother Sean makes a connection between his deafness being a separate world that keeps disconnected. Frannie wants to believe as her friends do but she sees too many contradictions to settle her rational mind; Sean knows that no matter which side of the tracks he lives on he'll always be an outsider to the hearing world, a world he can never be a part of unlike his sister who can travel in his world through sign language.

The title comes from Frannie's book-long inquiry into a poem by Emily Dickinson which begins with the line "Hope is a thing with feathers." Indeed, it makes me wonder what Woodson herself hopes for both within the book and without.

Setting the story in the 1970's allows for a certain distancing from the idea of a segregated society, but the the ideas that lie beneath are as real today as they might have been 30 years ago. Somewhere between then and now American society has recreated new divisions and seems desperate to reclaim old one. Politics, religion and even music have moved to their respective sides of the track and don't take kindly to outsiders attempting to pass or blend in.

So why go there? Are we seeing an increase of writers who came of age during those times who feel the resonance so strongly with our current climate? The 70's are equally alive in Barbara Kerley's Greetings From Planet Earth so I'm wondering if this is a trend or a blip or just coincidence.

This perhaps moves outside the parameters of the review, but sometimes the universe sends a message and you have to puzzle it out the best you can. For a very long time now I've been wondering what to make of my particular generation, a shoulder generation who are alternately claimed as being either the tail end of the Boomers or the front end of Generation X. To my knowledge this generation is not formally recognized by marketers or the media and my experience has been that those born between 1958 and 1963 have a general sense of feeling left out. It was while I was at my wife's graduation ceremony this week that I had another old idea brought back to the surface. It was under the guise of referring to a graduating class as a karass, a term invented by Kurt Vonnegut, taken from Cat's Cradle (published in 1963 coincidentally), which is defined as "a team that do[es] God's Will without ever discovering what they are doing."

I'm beginning to feel as if my karass is making itself known in children's literature.