Graphic Novel Friday: To The Heart of the Storm by Will Eisner

This Friday's selection is Will Eisner's To The Heart of the Storm.
As I've delved more and more into graphic novels/comics, Will Eisner is one of the persons we need to know. Read more about him here. Also, this week, Booklist featured their Top 10 Graphic Novels for Youth in their newsletter. You can check it out here. I'm happy to report that our library has a majority of the items listed. And this week's Read Alert from Booklist showcases graphic novels.

What Caught My Eye: The continuing war in Afghanistan, Iraq, the Oscar win for the Hurt Locker, and next week's run of HBO's the Pacific, plus the fact that a lot of our kids pick up this book and read it during their free periods, really made me want to pick up this book.

Why I Couldn't Put It Down: This is 206 pages of a very engaging autobiographical story. This book covers the gambit - coming of age, tolerance, prejudice, anti-semitism, immigrant life, assimulation. You also gain a sense of Eisner's contribution to the genre, going beyond the superhero tales, to something "real."

Who Would I Recommend This To: Those interested in war stories, Will Eisner and those who have read Maus. It is really a remarkable story.

Graphic Novel Friday: Hatter M: Mad with Wonder v.2 by Frank Beddor

"Love is Merely Madness" - William Shakespeare

Today's GNF selection is Volume 2 of the Hatter M Series (a spinoff (sorry I'm not quite sure what the right word is...) of the Looking Glass Wars series by Frank Beddor. This comic was written by Frank Beddor and Liz Cavalier and art is by Sami Makkonen.

What Caught My Eye: First, I read the Looking Glass Wars and listened to the audio of Seeing Red so I was alread a fan of the series. I really love the character of Hatter Madigan with all his millinery glory and our students are real fans of this series as well so I thought I should add it to the collection since we are trying to build up our graphic novel collection.

Why I Didn't Put It Down: Like I mentioned above, it's Hatter Madigan!!! He is Alyss Hart's, the young heroine of the LGW series, bodyguard. In the book, she falls into the "real" world and Hatter follows her. In volume 2 of this spinoff, he is continuing his quest to find Alyss and is following "the glow" that represents intense imagination that Alyss would possibly being giving off if he found her. It is civil war in the United States and Hatter must maneuver his way through this alternate world where he, of course, is faced with challenges that prevent him from staying on the path of finding Alyss Hart. There is so much action in this graphic novel that you really cannot put it down. Sam Makkonen's images are intense and dark just like the story. The scenes feel like they are taking place behind a dust cloud (this is a good thing for this type of story). Also, there is an interesting amount of civil war references that I did not really expect.

Who Would I Recommend This To: To those of us who really enjoy the Looking Glass series as well as someone looking for a good action packed comic series to read. Also, more mature middle school readers who aren't too shocked by comic violence. It's intense and for me, not too graphic. At one point, Hatter gets stabbed but it wasn't as graphic as other GN's that I've read. Again, if you are worried about how your community would react, take a look at your local comic shop first before adding it to your colleciton.

Graphic Novel Friday : "The Runaways-dead end kids"

This is so late but today was very busy at work. We have grades due, comments to right, helping students finish projects and prep for finals, plus, I had to substitute and did not have that much time to sit in front of my computer.

I ordered a number of graphic novels for the library that have been on a number of YALSA, Booklist, and Publisher Weekly lists and this was one of them. Plus, I heard from my friend, RAPatton, that this was a good series. So, this Friday's graphic novel pick is The Runaways: Dead End Kids by Joss Whedon, Michael Ryan and Christina Strain. Published by Marvel. ISBN: 978-0-7851-2853-3.

In this comic, the kids have made a deal with one of the most evil villains in New York City, a deal that they will regret. In order to escape, the end up jumping back in time, to a time where unions were beginning to form, where kids still worked in factories and married, and where there were other "Wonders." The runaways have also traveled to a time where different factions of those wonders are close to war. Though these other groups are trying to manipulate them for each groups purpose, the runaways stay true to the family. The story moves quickly and is filled with really amazing images that you would expect from Marvel. The different styles that separate each chapter compliment each other well though they are strikingly different. The pages devoted to each chapter are softer and less stylized than the main sections of each chapter which adds to the transitions in the story.

I was not disappointed by this series. All the recommendations were worth it. I would say that this is not for children but appropriate for middle and high school. I am happy that it is now part of our collection. Even if we don't own every part of this series, at least students who like graphic novels will be able to read it and have an introduction to this series.

Models Inc. = Comic for Girls

I am actually really excited about this. Why? Because I love Project Runway but I especially love Tim Gunn. I should go to Secret Headquarters and see if they will order it for me. I'll read about Tim Gunn fighting crimes against fashion any day

clipped from marvel.com What was the cause for his visit? Did it have anything to do with the comic that he'll be featured in early next month, Models Inc.? Did it have anything to do with "Project Runway," the enormously popular fashion design reality show he co-hosts with Heidi Klum? Did he share any style tips? Did he tell the folks at Marvel to "Make it work?"

Why we need to teach students 21st century skills

Today's comic from xkcd reminded me of how it is the 21st century and times have changed. It is not like I am super old or anything but a lot of changes have occurred in regards to technology, government, teaching, life and I started thinking about the ongoing challenge of convincing great teachers that it is important to teach or expose students to the tools available for them on the world wide web.

And then I read this quote from my Good Earth tea bag:

"We cannot always build the future for our youth, but we can build our youth for the future." - Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882-1945)

On Friday, one teacher became very passionate about why he does not want to let go of the techniques he uses to teach his students. He talked about how he wants to "perpetuate" some of the skills from his past. (The day before, the head librarian, made a comment, which I am not even sure was about and he claimed that I said it. He was really adamant about wanting to perpetuate the way he was taught and teaches. He commented about how that comment made it sound like "the past" was detrimental. Then he was all up in my space and in my face and I just ignored him.) However, I think he missed the point of our conversation. No one said anything about not teaching "old" skills, like close readings or face-to-face discussions about books or labs, we were just discussing how there are new tools out there that students need to be aware of and where they can practice these same skills only in a different environment, an online one.

My cohort, Ambookgeek, is one of the individuals in charge of our Moodle site and is also on the edtech committee, and is presenting to our fellow teachers about why we need to prepare our students for the future. As a blogger and user of various web 2.0 tools, I understand what he will be discussing but I feel as if he will be presenting to a hostile group. There still seems to be 2 camps - (1) willing to use these tools, who see their value and (2) those who do not see the point of them. At times, I notice the eye-rolls, the comments made in the hallways, the loud sighs, "oh oh..web 2.0 again." However, I think feeling that way will be detrimental to our students. Students are not prepared for the type of thinking, collaboration and other skills that using these tools helps develop. These are skills that they practice in an enclosed classroom environment but with the read/write web, they can take it outside of the classroom to a wider and more diverse audience.

During the course of the discussion on Friday, that teacher commented that he saw more value in face-to-face conversations and why do you need to have a forum when students can do it when they are in the hallways walking to class. We kept mentioning that we were not devaluing that interaction but now there are other ways to interact that students are already using. Instructors/teachers/librarians also need to ask the question, "how are we preparing students for the future?" Yes, they are learning these core subjects but what about utilizing these new tools and exposing them to how to be better citizens offline and online?

I think, it will be an interesting meeting because (1) some of the teachers feel that it will only add to their work load and (2) they do not see the point and in talking to some of them, do not even seem willing to try these things out.

Not all the teachers are like this so there is hope. I was showing my friend "Clipmarks" and he was thinking it would be a great tool to use for his science classes. I will have to show him an example from LibGuides: Next Generation Research Tools page.