National Curriculum Standards

That's very interesting, and kind of scary. Thanks for sharing, Judy.

I need to take a non-fiction workshop. I don't feel qualified to write non-fiction.

I got 10 year olds understanding the concept of proper university level hypothesis testing... and even designing decent experiments. I also got some 7 year olds understanding the particle model. But both required visual and interactive aids (like the running around pretending to be a gas molecule model of particle theory)

MsJudy said:

Well, anybody can research just about anything and become an expert. The really hard part is explaining it in a way spaced-out seven-year-olds can understand. That's a real gift!

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That surprises me. I thought it'd be like adult non-fiction, where you have to have qualifications in whatever it is.

Good to know. You've given us fiction writers a new challenge to pursue.

I don't think I'm up to that. I can't even figure out how to write a non-rhyming PB. My brain simply shuts down.

But it does make sense. I think kids that age love factual books, so to get them to read more, they need a wide variety of contemporary books.

Keep writing fiction.

Non-fiction? Non-fiction is just as much fiction as fiction, in some cases even more fictional.

I have read a handful of non-fiction books in my undergraduate career for my degree and they are written just like fiction books, just the information is factual. There is no difference. Non-fiction isn't just all science books and history books we read in high school.

The non-fiction books I have read were about a murderer and then a collection of non-fiction stories and a few others I can't remember off the top of my head. But they were just as descriptive as any fiction book, again, the only difference being they were based on real events.

I will admit though you can't just kind of write a non-fiction book, it requires a commitment so you can make sure you interview enough.

My husband is a teacher, and this year his school is going heavy on the writing aspect of NCS. Honestly, I think it's a joke to have teachers who do not write well at all teaching writing. Most teacher writing (newsletter, emails, etc.) that I've seen is godawful, wordy, redundant, disorganized and reveals barely a passing familiarity with concepts like subject-verb agreement.

For a while I was posting over in Office Party the horrid email missives my daughter's 8th grade honors English teacher sent us. Here's one:

Edline Grades up to date again today! What ever they did for HW, in class-make up went on the computer!! Mockingbird Chs 16 & 17 will be added Tues. HW Read Mockingbird Ch 18-22 (4 ch) create 3 ?'s & 5 vocab total from these chs. DUE TUES. 5/31! I passed out sheet for chs 23-25 to work ahead! Again students are encouraged to read ahead/finish the book! Plan on having the book completed by next Friday and watch the movie Tues. 6/7th & Wed. 6/8th!
**Bay County Public Librarian visited our classrm today and shared information about their Summer Reading Program and the latest & greatest materials the Public Library has to offer-great resource to be productive June, July & August during those lazy summer days
Enjoy the Holiday week-end!!

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Yeah, she's going to teach those kids how to be great writers.

I wondering though .. just what percentage of the market is dependant upon school purchases, particularly new orders. There might be a short term surge (hmmm ... another future killing incentive?) in a small segment of the market. How many NEW books were you issued in school? How many NEW books were in your school library?

PorterStarrByrd said:

I wondering though .. just what percentage of the market is dependant upon school purchases, particularly new orders. There might be a short term surge (hmmm ... another future killing incentive?) in a small segment of the market. How many NEW books were you issued in school? How many NEW books were in your school library?

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They make us buy the kids' books ourselves. The school might supply a handful for the poorest kids, if they're lucky. The teacher probably buys those herself. That's been our experience, anyway.

The teachers have to buy the books? Seriously? I never knew that. I know our teachers do buy books, but I thought they were reimbursed or something.

I know when we have our book fair, the teachers all fill out wish lists, and some of us purchase books for the teachers that way. But I didn't know they weren't funded for book purchases.

PorterStarrByrd said:

How many NEW books were you issued in school? How many NEW books were in your school library?

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Times have changed, though. In many elementary schools, reading is taught not with the old "basal readers", but with leveled books. These aren't typically a part of the actual school library, nor are they the property of individual teachers. In the schools I've taught in, there is a centralized spot where bins of leveled book sets are kept. Kids go through LOTS and LOTS of them in a year. They are small, paperback books, so they get worn out and need frequent replacing. Kids take them home and lose them and... yeah. These are the books that will go from 90% to 50% fiction, and it will probably be supplemented by a shift in focus for school library budgets, too.

Some kids will thrive on an increase in nonfiction--my sons would have.

I would have hated it.

I'm all for more non-fiction, honestly. I love to read children's non-fiction (and historical fiction, too). I'm just the sort of person who is always checking for better sources, and more sources, to the point where I never get to the actual writing.

sissybaby said:

The teachers have to buy the books? Seriously? I never knew that. I know our teachers do buy books, but I thought they were reimbursed or something.

I know when we have our book fair, the teachers all fill out wish lists, and some of us purchase books for the teachers that way. But I didn't know they weren't funded for book purchases.

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Teachers in all areas, in all sorts of districts, both poor and rich and in-between buy lots of stuff for their classes. I used to go in at least three days out of five with big canvas bags full of 'stuff.' I taught science and would literally make 3-4 trips back and forth to the car on days I needed ice. (Not until late in my career did I have a prep room with a refrigerator in it.) I brought in items for labs; posters; books; cleaning supplies. I purchased materials to make individual slates. I bought markers, crayons, colored paper, foil paper, paper cups and plates, plastic bag, wax, and was always buying boxes of kitchen matches and paraffin candles for various experiments. (The list is endless when it comes to supplies for labs. I bought and maintained an aquarium, too.) I purchased a lot of my classroom's basic lab supplies, most of which I left behind when I retired. I even bought a TV, VCR/DVD player and huge metal cart when I got fed up sharing the one broken one allotted the science department.

The last five years I taught we finally had decent lab equipment and smart boards and lots of high-tech equipment, but for over 30 years I spent at least 1K a year on materials. It drove my husband crazy, but he often went with me on shopping sprees to buy 'stuff.'

And I wasn't the only one. The English staff pretty much bought all the paperbacks and other books they kept in their classroom libraries. I saw SS teachers always purchasing maps and some teachers bought their own copying machines and supplies of paper.

And I taught in an upper-middle class small town.

Sorry, off topic ...