The cost of thirty two books, including titles such as On The Road, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, and Into the Wild, purchased from Barnes and Noble is $512, including shipping and <a target="new" href="http://www.donorschoose.org/html/fulfillment.htm" onclick="g_openWindow('http://www.donorschoose.org/html/fulfillment.htm', 300, 800, 'fulfillwindow');return false;">fulfillment</a>.
Hello there! I am a Literature teacher at Cross Cultural Environmental Leadership (XCEL) Academy, a charter school in San Francisco. Our school has been teaching "at-risk" students in a successful learning environment for 3 years.
I believe that it is important to teach students to know their hearts and use their minds well. We prepare them to live productive, socially useful, and personally satisfying lives with an academic program that stresses intellectual development and social involvement in our society. I have developed a strong curriculum that places great importance on learning how to learn, reason, question, and investigate.
Each day in my Literature class we have time for independent reading. This is a time when I tell my students, "It's okay to pick up and put down twenty books until you find one that you will really enjoy reading." I've learned that the secret is to provide enough choices for students and to know students well enough to help them find that one book that they will finish. I've witnessed my students take off and read book after book when provided with a protected space that is quiet and filled with reading. When this happens, the reading vibe in the room is so contagious that students influence each other to read and even reluctant readers become page-turners! Independent reading has the potential to give students a personalized path to explore literature and expression. If students are engaged in their reading and care about their books, their enthusiasm drives their work and pushes them further as readers.
Our school does not have the funds and resources to create a library, and our classroom library looks depleted. Many of the students in my class have already raided the shelves and need new adventures! In their words, "Miss, our classroom library needs BOOKS!" As a class we discussed and chose novels that we can explore together. The kids are truly excited about their choices and are looking forward to sharing their experiences with one another. One student even commented to me, "It will be so cool to see a classmate sign out a book that I chose for the library!"
To complete this project and continue construction of our library, my two literature classes (50 students) would like 2 copies of the following books:
"China Boy"
"Life is Funny"
"On the Road"
"One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest"
"Finding my Voice"
"Bad Boy"
"The Autobiography of Malcolm X"
"The Lovely Bones"
"Lucky"
"Into the Wild"
"The Five People you Meet in Heaven"
"The Color of Water"
"Girl, Interrupted"
"A Child Called It"
"Neverwhere"
"Bodega Dreams"
"Monster"
Every Literature classroom needs a library...thank you for helping make ours a reality!
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As a teacher-founded nonprofit, we're trusted by thousands of teachers and supporters across the country. This classroom request for funding was created by Ms. Russo and reviewed by the DonorsChoose team.
