Author Visits

I love spring in the Cedar Valley for a variety of reasons. Aside from it being the end of winter and the beginning of nice weather, it is also the time of year when I have an opportunity to hear a few childrens authors speak.  This past week I was able to listen to Sarah Weeks and Gordon Korman. 

Sarah Weeks is the author of many books - more than I even knew- including one of my favorites, So B. It.  Her presentation consisted of slides from her personal life, experiences she had, and humor.  I have yet to read her Oggie Cooder series, but will soon.  Oggie, the character in her book, is a master at charving (chewing and carving) things out of cheese.  As Weeks showed slides of children charving states out of cheese, an idea began to hatch in my own brain.  As my fourth graders finish up the Power Points they are working on and researching their states, I am planning on challenging them to charve their own state out of a piece of cheese. I predict they will enjoy this tremendously.

I was able to hear Gordon Korman yesterday along with my fifth grade students.  It is always exciting to meet an author and to watch students get their first opportunity to meet an author, too.  Korman spoke for almost an hour, taking time to answer students' questions at the end of his presentation.  Remarkable to me is that Korman was first published at the age of thirteen!  He continues to write books for middle grade students. I am in the middle of Schooled right now, a novel about a home-schooled student, Capricorn, who finds himself flung into the regular school scene when his grandma is injured and cannot take care of him. 

Both of these authors were interesting and funny.