This manual delivers valuable alternative strategies to improve reading skills, emphasizing enjoyment.
A teacher-developed guide offers insights and exercises for those who struggle to read and seek to improve.
“Willingness to read is key,” according to McJacobs. Those who struggle with reading, who stumble on words, who are tripped up by phonetics, and who have been drilled with lessons about precision rather than comprehension often lack this willingness. These individuals likely want to read, but the impediments destroy the enthusiasm needed for them to try. The four components of the author’s “Read Through It Strategy” seek to rekindle that lost spark of excitement. They encourage readers to ignore “positive errors,” like mispronunciation, when general ideas are still comprehended; to be aware of “eyestops,” or the muscular movements of the eye when reading; to focus on “idea units,” or the images words and phrases conjure rather than their individual components; and, finally, to utilize “cycle reading” to increase speed and skill. The last acknowledges reading as a skill and teaches the eye muscles to move fluently through simple exercises, meant to be done daily and presented with short, straightforward directions. The text offers tips about what kind of reading to select for practicing (usually middle-grade books) as well as ways to track progress. These are provided mostly as suggestions, as the book emphasizes personal control over practice to increase pleasure. McJacobs developed his strategy while working with students in alternative schools, noting that for many, avoiding reading came not from a lack of interest but rather from a natural frustration with the physical process. After looking critically at his own struggles to read and utilizing anecdotal evidence from his pupils, he created the “Read Through It Strategy.” Though no guarantees of success are supplied, these tips, tricks, and exercises focus on accessibility. The volume emphasizes regular, short practice over intensive study and distills its whole process into only nine pages, followed by thorough but simple outlines. Most of the guide’s ideas and foundation are presented in easy-to-digest terms and procedures. But some of the more complex aspects of fluency, particularly the work’s often repetitive but vague explanations of “idea units,” could be more streamlined for those not approaching the text from a teacher’s point of view.
This manual delivers valuable alternative strategies to improve reading skills, emphasizing enjoyment.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 978-1-5255-7750-5
Page Count: 75
Publisher: FriesenPress
Review Posted Online: Feb. 8, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.
The veteran actor, comedian, and banjo player teams up with the acclaimed illustrator to create a unique book of cartoons that communicates their personalities.
Martin, also a prolific author, has always been intrigued by the cartoons strewn throughout the pages of the New Yorker. So when he was presented with the opportunity to work with Bliss, who has been a staff cartoonist at the magazine since 1997, he seized the moment. “The idea of a one-panel image with or without a caption mystified me,” he writes. “I felt like, yeah, sometimes I’m funny, but there are these other weird freaks who are actually funny.” Once the duo agreed to work together, they established their creative process, which consisted of working forward and backward: “Forwards was me conceiving of several cartoon images and captions, and Harry would select his favorites; backwards was Harry sending me sketched or fully drawn cartoons for dialogue or banners.” Sometimes, he writes, “the perfect joke occurs two seconds before deadline.” There are several cartoons depicting this method, including a humorous multipanel piece highlighting their first meeting called “They Meet,” in which Martin thinks to himself, “He’ll never be able to translate my delicate and finely honed droll notions.” In the next panel, Bliss thinks, “I’m sure he won’t understand that the comic art form is way more subtle than his blunt-force humor.” The team collaborated for a year and created 150 cartoons featuring an array of topics, “from dogs and cats to outer space and art museums.” A witty creation of a bovine family sitting down to a gourmet meal and one of Dumbo getting his comeuppance highlight the duo’s comedic talent. What also makes this project successful is the team’s keen understanding of human behavior as viewed through their unconventional comedic minds.
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.Pub Date: Nov. 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-26289-9
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2020
PERSPECTIVES
An ebullient nature lover’s paean to birds.
A charming bird journey with the bestselling author.
In his introduction to Tan’s “nature journal,” David Allen Sibley, the acclaimed ornithologist, nails the spirit of this book: a “collection of delightfully quirky, thoughtful, and personal observations of birds in sketches and words.” For years, Tan has looked out on her California backyard “paradise”—oaks, periwinkle vines, birch, Japanese maple, fuchsia shrubs—observing more than 60 species of birds, and she fashions her findings into delightful and approachable journal excerpts, accompanied by her gorgeous color sketches. As the entries—“a record of my life”—move along, the author becomes more adept at identifying and capturing them with words and pencils. Her first entry is September 16, 2017: Shortly after putting up hummingbird feeders, one of the tiny, delicate creatures landed on her hand and fed. “We have a relationship,” she writes. “I am in love.” By August 2018, her backyard “has become a menagerie of fledglings…all learning to fly.” Day by day, she has continued to learn more about the birds, their activities, and how she should relate to them; she also admits mistakes when they occur. In December 2018, she was excited to observe a Townsend’s Warbler—“Omigod! It’s looking at me. Displeased expression.” Battling pesky squirrels, Tan deployed Hot Pepper Suet to keep them away, and she deterred crows by hanging a fake one upside down. The author also declared war on outdoor cats when she learned they kill more than 1 billion birds per year. In May 2019, she notes that she spends $250 per month on beetle larvae. In June 2019, she confesses “spending more hours a day staring at birds than writing. How can I not?” Her last entry, on December 15, 2022, celebrates when an eating bird pauses, “looks and acknowledges I am there.”
An ebullient nature lover’s paean to birds.Pub Date: April 23, 2024
ISBN: 9780593536131
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2024
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