English Teachers Chat

Yesterday I released my Best Books of 2021 . Today I return with my best YA books of 2021. All these books were published this year and worth all your attention. I hope you find sometime to read and love. If you want an easy one page printable, click here . 1. Love is a Revolution by Renee Watson I could go on and on about how much I love this book. It manages to capture teenage love and teenage apathy like none other. It’s in a class all its own this year (it also appeared on my best books of the year overall). So many books are trying to be so grand, but sometimes the most intimate stories are the most important ones. This is why I read YA fiction. 2. Off the Record by Camryn Garrett If they decided to turn Harvey Weinstein’s story, serial rapist and atrocious human being, into a YA novel, it would be this. But the book is so much more as you meet Josie, an aspiring journalist, who is thrown into the adult world. These are books that teens need, but everyone will be better for readin...

Well... it's that time of the year again. As of this writing (and still 10 days to go), I've finished 164 books. A record for me. But I'm here to tell you what made my top 10 adult books for the year (hopefully within the week I will publish my top 10 YA books). If you would like a one page printable copy, click here . So without further ado, here's the list.  1. The Prophets by Robert Jones Jr.  The Prophets isn’t just the best written book of 2021, it might be the best written book of the millennium. Beautifully written but also heart breaking, this genre bending novel recalls Morrison at almost every turn, and in the process tells one of the most gorgeous and heart breaking love stories of all time. This is the story we need in 2021. A true reckoning of our past. 2. Bewilderment by Richard Powers After The Overstory, all attention is on Richard Powers. But Bewilderment is so different. Rather than a sprawling narrative, we’re given something far more intimate. A stor...

In this episode of English Teachers Chat, I talk to four educators to take a closer look at surviving, what they wish we knew and how Covid-19 affected the state of education. Thank you to my special guests: Adam Pease , Libo Valencia , Rachel Rosen and James May. Music this episode was sourced from io and Bensound royalty free music. The opening and closing music is Garden Music composed by Kevin Macleod and the interlude music is Better Days by Benjamin Tessot. Tails32x · ETC Episode 5 - Surviving the Surf Zone Daniel Valentin teaches English 9, Humanities, and American Dream at Horace Greeley High School. He is currently reading Floaters by Martin Espada and is listening to The Sentence by Louside Erdrich . He wants his students to feel empowered through books. Follow him on Twitter  @DanielJValentin

Yesterday during a discussion (as a 9th grade teacher), I chatted with a few10th grade teachers. This year all 10th grade teachers are teaching Just Mercy  by Bryan Stevenson. One of the teachers said, "it's a hard read, the kids really struggled." It's probably been half a decade since I read Stevenson's novel, but I do remember moments that the text is mired in legal language. Another teacher remarked, "well... they need to become discernible readers and figure out what is essential to the story and what's not." Discernible readers? 10th graders? Who are these 10th grade discernible readers?  A larger discussion unfolded about close reading and now to navigate a tricky text. The four of us kibitzed about the successes and failures in each of our classrooms. The conversation naturally steered towards close reading. But what became quickly evident: when we talked about close reading, the four of us were talking about entirely different concepts. It...

Just last week I posted my 2021 Young Adult Summer Reading Guide , but we're back this week with the adult contemporary version. Like the YA version, in order to be eligible for the list, the book needed to be published in 2021. This list offers a wide variety. When I think of summer, I do think of lighter more "exciting" reads (if I can use such a nebulous term). That said, there are some heavy hitters on here, so be sure to read the descriptions. All these books are amazing in their own right. So find something (or several things) to enjoy this summer. And if you're checking this list on June 21st 2021, be sure to head over to Barnes and Nobles which is offering many of these books at 50% off! If you'd like a one page printable list, click here .  So without further ado: 1. Malibu Rising by Taylor Jenkins Reid Malibu Rising is quintessential summer reading. Celebrities, rock stars, gossip, love affairs and bad decisions, Reid’s newest novel is framed by litera...

It's that time of the year again. Summer reading (and a preview of some of my year's favorite books)! Reading shouldn't feel like a chore. This should be a time to engage with texts that YOU want to engage with. As I finish book number 90 (Instructions for Dancing by Nicola Yoon), here's my top 10 picks this year. Just some quick details about this list. All books on this list are 2021. Additionally, this is the YA list; my adult list will be out early next week. So seek and find something that works just for you! (If you want a one page printable list, click here! ) 1. Off the Record by Camryn Garrett In Garrett’s brilliant new novel, Josie is a high school journalist with the opportunity to go on a press tour and write a profile piece on an up and coming actor. But as she starts to do interviews, it’s clear that the director is a “Harvey Weinstein” type with exceedingly questionable behavior. Will Josie confront the issue, and will she come to her own reckoning with ...

This is part two of my four part series Becoming a FITT Reader. Be sure to read Volume 1: Frequency here .  Reading is a skill. It's developed over time like our palate. It's like learning to distinguish deep umami flavors or appreciating a fine red wine. Too difficult texts creates non-readers in the same way a person new to sushi might totally scoff at a dragon roll over the more palatable California roll.  I, like I'm sure many other people, experienced an English class where the text was too difficult, too long, and too beyond my comprehension. In short: too intense. As a freshman in high school, I faked my way through readings of Great Expectations , and I also remember exclusively reading SparkNotes the time Dr. Cotter assigned the entirety of Dante's Inferno  for the next class a mere two days away in undergrad.  Ultimately, intensity in reading comes in four forms: text complexity, length, concept and content. What It (Sometimes) Looks Like There ar...