Spellbinders is back with a new school year!
SPELLBINDERS is a blog created by me and two other authors, all current or previous school teachers who adore books and stories. We
have a once a week newsletter to help teachers, librarians and parents (and authors) develop a love of reading and books in their students and
children's lives.
I started SPELLBINDERS with Carolee Dean two years ago - and this year we are SO pleased to welcome Caroline Starr Rose who is joining us. Our first issue in its new format launched last week and I've copied it here below.
We will be posting every Monday. PLEASE go to the blog and become an official Follower! (We've love you forever.) Lots of teaching
tips, book buzz, ideas to help kids write, book club tips, plus special guests, giveaways, you name it! Don't miss us.
You can also receive SPELLBINDERS through a direct email every Monday morning, too. To get the direct email just click the link below that
says, "Join Our Mailing List." Ten seconds to add your email. Easy Peasy. And thank you! (We also love comments!)
October 3, 2011
A New Face for Spellbinders
Welcome
back to Spellbinders, the educational newsletter for teachers,
librarians, therapists and authors who are striving to inspire students
with literature and to create lifelong readers!
This
year we have two exciting changes. First of all, we are proud to
introduce a new columnist, Caroline Starr Rose, who will be hosting Classroom Connections.
Caroline is a previous middle school language arts and social
studies teacher with a wealth of experience connecting kids with books.
Her first book, MAY B. (Schwartz and Wade/ Random House Children's
Books), debuts January 2012. It's a novel in verse about a young girl
who travels miles from home to help out on a neighbor's homestead only
to be abandoned there in the middle of the harsh prairie winter.
It's already received a Kirkus starred review!
Our
second big change is that Spellbinders will be moving to a weekly
format. We all lead busy lives and rather than overwhelming our readers
with three columns and a feature article all at once, we will be
presenting one per week each Monday. Our schedule will be:
Week One: Feature Article
Week Two: Carolee and the Secret Language of Stories
Week Three: Kimberley's Book Buzz
Week Four: Caroline's Classroom Connections
Week Five: Special Edition - This month on October 31st we will explore Kim's new ghost thriller Circle of Secrets with Q&A and TREATS (aka: giveaways).
In addition to our newsletter, the same columns will appear on our blog at our Spellbinders Blog. Be sure to add us to your favorites at home if you would rather read us there.
See you next week with The Secret Language of Stories. We are looking forward to a great year!
A
special note to those of you who have generously been forwarding our
newsletter to your entire school - Please use the button at the bottom
of this page marked Forward this email to send to your list. If you forward through your email server, you may inadvertantly get unsubscribed. It's a quirky feature of Constant Contact. Sorry about any inconvenience.
Another option is to follow us on Twitter in which case the newsletter will come right to the phone.
Join Our Mailing List!
Meet the Spellbinders
Kimberley
Griffiths Little is the recipient of the Southwest Book Award, The
Whitney Award for Best Youth Novel of 2010, and the author of the highly
acclaimed, The Healing Spell and Circle of Secrets, published by Scholastic Press. Look for her books at the Scholastic Book Fairs, as well
as
two more forthcoming novels in 2012 and 2013. She lives on a dirt
road in a small town by the Rio Grande with her husband, a robotics
engineer and their three sons. Kimberley is a favorite speaker at
schools around the country, presenting "The Creative Diary", a highly
successful writing
workshop and has been a speaker at many conferences. Please visit her website to download free Teacher's Guides and Book Club Guides.
Carolee
Dean has made numerous appearances as a guest poet/author at schools,
libraries, poetry events, and teacher/library conferences. She holds a
bachelor's degree in music therapy and a master's degree in
communicative disorders, and she has spent over a decade working in the
public schools as a
speech-language
pathologist. Her first novel, Comfort,was nominated as a Best Book
for Young Adults, was named the Best YA Novel of 2002 by the Texas
Institute of Letters, and was on the TAYSHAS (Texas Library
Association) reading list. She conducts teacher trainings on inspiring
reluctant writers including "The Secret Language of Stories" and
"Random
Acts of Haiku."
To find teacher's guides, writing activities, and information about author visits, go to www.caroleedean.com.
Caroline
Starr Rose spent her childhood in the deserts of Saudi Arabia and New
Mexico, camping at the Red Sea in one and eating red chile in the
other. She's taught English and social studies to upper elementary and
middle-school students in New Mexico, Florida, Virginia, and
Louisiana. Back in New
Mexico, Caroline now writes middle-grade novels and picture books full time.
Website
Blog
have a once a week newsletter to help teachers, librarians and parents (and authors) develop a love of reading and books in their students and
children's lives.
I started SPELLBINDERS with Carolee Dean two years ago - and this year we are SO pleased to welcome Caroline Starr Rose who is joining us. Our first issue in its new format launched last week and I've copied it here below.
We will be posting every Monday. PLEASE go to the blog and become an official Follower! (We've love you forever.) Lots of teaching
tips, book buzz, ideas to help kids write, book club tips, plus special guests, giveaways, you name it! Don't miss us.
You can also receive SPELLBINDERS through a direct email every Monday morning, too. To get the direct email just click the link below that
says, "Join Our Mailing List." Ten seconds to add your email. Easy Peasy. And thank you! (We also love comments!)
October 3, 2011
A New Face for Spellbinders
Welcome
back to Spellbinders, the educational newsletter for teachers,
librarians, therapists and authors who are striving to inspire students
with literature and to create lifelong readers!
This
year we have two exciting changes. First of all, we are proud to
introduce a new columnist, Caroline Starr Rose, who will be hosting Classroom Connections.
Caroline is a previous middle school language arts and social
studies teacher with a wealth of experience connecting kids with books.
Her first book, MAY B. (Schwartz and Wade/ Random House Children's
Books), debuts January 2012. It's a novel in verse about a young girl
who travels miles from home to help out on a neighbor's homestead only
to be abandoned there in the middle of the harsh prairie winter.
It's already received a Kirkus starred review!
Our
second big change is that Spellbinders will be moving to a weekly
format. We all lead busy lives and rather than overwhelming our readers
with three columns and a feature article all at once, we will be
presenting one per week each Monday. Our schedule will be:
Week One: Feature Article
Week Two: Carolee and the Secret Language of Stories
Week Three: Kimberley's Book Buzz
Week Four: Caroline's Classroom Connections
Week Five: Special Edition - This month on October 31st we will explore Kim's new ghost thriller Circle of Secrets with Q&A and TREATS (aka: giveaways).
In addition to our newsletter, the same columns will appear on our blog at our Spellbinders Blog. Be sure to add us to your favorites at home if you would rather read us there.
See you next week with The Secret Language of Stories. We are looking forward to a great year!
A
special note to those of you who have generously been forwarding our
newsletter to your entire school - Please use the button at the bottom
of this page marked Forward this email to send to your list. If you forward through your email server, you may inadvertantly get unsubscribed. It's a quirky feature of Constant Contact. Sorry about any inconvenience.
Another option is to follow us on Twitter in which case the newsletter will come right to the phone.
Join Our Mailing List!
Meet the Spellbinders
Kimberley
Griffiths Little is the recipient of the Southwest Book Award, The
Whitney Award for Best Youth Novel of 2010, and the author of the highly
acclaimed, The Healing Spell and Circle of Secrets, published by Scholastic Press. Look for her books at the Scholastic Book Fairs, as well
as
two more forthcoming novels in 2012 and 2013. She lives on a dirt
road in a small town by the Rio Grande with her husband, a robotics
engineer and their three sons. Kimberley is a favorite speaker at
schools around the country, presenting "The Creative Diary", a highly
successful writing
workshop and has been a speaker at many conferences. Please visit her website to download free Teacher's Guides and Book Club Guides.
Carolee
Dean has made numerous appearances as a guest poet/author at schools,
libraries, poetry events, and teacher/library conferences. She holds a
bachelor's degree in music therapy and a master's degree in
communicative disorders, and she has spent over a decade working in the
public schools as a
speech-language
pathologist. Her first novel, Comfort,was nominated as a Best Book
for Young Adults, was named the Best YA Novel of 2002 by the Texas
Institute of Letters, and was on the TAYSHAS (Texas Library
Association) reading list. She conducts teacher trainings on inspiring
reluctant writers including "The Secret Language of Stories" and
"Random
Acts of Haiku."
To find teacher's guides, writing activities, and information about author visits, go to www.caroleedean.com.
Caroline
Starr Rose spent her childhood in the deserts of Saudi Arabia and New
Mexico, camping at the Red Sea in one and eating red chile in the
other. She's taught English and social studies to upper elementary and
middle-school students in New Mexico, Florida, Virginia, and
Louisiana. Back in New
Mexico, Caroline now writes middle-grade novels and picture books full time.
Website
Blog