Love is everywhere

Love Radio by Ebony LaDelle is a 2022 Michigan Notable Book and has earned starred reviews from both Publisher’s Weekly and Kirkus Review. This is LaDelle’s debut novel.  It is a young adult romance novel whose plot realistically depicts the social issues that both youth and their families experience in today’s America.  I consider this a romance/social issues book.

This is a story about Danielle, Dani, who is a senior in Detroit High School and Prince, also know as DJ LoveJones, who is a senior at the same high school.

This a contemporary story of Black kids in a Black high school in a Black city and they, as Publisher’s Weekly says, are teens giving love a chance.  Their romance is full of courtship, humor, appreciation for the ‘other’ and romantic sparks. Their lives are complicated – welcome to the real world.  LaDelle captures the essence of our contemporary culture, the wholesomeness of a budding young love, the working through the past, and embracing the real-life challenges and opportunities ahead.

Love is everywhere – it is blossoming between Dani and Prince, demonstrated in their families, in their respect for their cultures, for their city, and in their friend groups.

Moreover, there is a mom with Multiple Sclerosis, a bother with ADHD, a traumatic assault, dreams for after high school, journeys of learning about oneself in relationship with others, and the transition of entering a more mature stage of life.

Ebony LaDelle writes with an authentic voice.  All this love and all these realities of life are presented with genuine respect and appreciation!  I recommend this book!

My Literacy Journey

Dear Community,

In June, 1974 I earned my master’s degree in Reading Instruction from Michigan State University.  In 1956 I was in third grade and hadn’t learned to read.  My friends learned to read in kindergarten, first or second grade.  Not me though. I was frustrated, disheartened, embarrassed and drowning in self-doubt. I began acting out in the classroom.  I felt dumb.  I was deeply stuck in reading failure.  

My parents wanted to help. They saw me as a smart kid except for not being able to read. I could do math; I could follow and understand conversations at home and in class; I was curious. My parents hired a tutor for me which didn’t help much. My dad ran for a seat on the school board and won. I was a PRIVILIDGED, middle class white boy with a father on the school board. My parents were determined I would get the help I needed.

In the coming months, teachers worked with me one on one. I was a great listener and could remember what was discussed in class.  Teachers would read test questions to me and I would answer aloud. I began to settle down. By the time I got to high school there were no more weekly spelling tests to fail. I got some high school credits by being a teacher’s aide in a classroom with kids with very low IQ’s.  I survived with the help of teachers, by getting credit for being a teacher’s aide, and by avoiding classes I would drown in.  The school and I “found a way around my impairment”.  I performed well enough to pass from grade to grade as a non-reader.

In my junior year of high school (my dad was still on the school board) the principal stopped me in the hall and said she had found a way for me to be accepted to MSU without taking a college entrance exam.  MSU was promoting an early enrollment program to ensure that the freshmen class of 1966 would be a big one.  A new residence hall was opening and MSU needed more incoming freshmen. I was all in on the plan.  With the help of caring educators, an application was submitted for me my junior year and I was accepted!

The summer after high school graduation I went to Freshmen Orientation at MSU and had to take a placement exam.  I failed.  I was assigned to a no-credit Preparatory English class and had one term to learn to read or go home. In the fall of 1966 I found myself with a teacher who loved books, loved to read and wanted her students to love reading too. I told her I had real trouble reading words and sentences, let alone read a book.  She said reading was more than just words and sentences – it was about meaning. The book she assigned was Death Be Not Proud by John Gunther, a memoir about the decline and death of Gunther’s son, Johnny.  She said she believed I and others in the class would want to know about this father’s journey.  I shut down for a few days but realized that closing-up meant I would fail out of MSU.

I opened-up to the instructor as she was my only hope.  I struggled on the journey of putting together meaning from a book.  She believed I could do it and was very supportive.  She also taught me SQ3R, a study technique to use in my classes.  I read that book and a couple more. She launched me into the university.

College was hard for me. I still relied heavily on auditory learning and did okay. I student taught in a Detroit preschool and graduated in 1970 with a degree in elementary education. After serving two years as a conscious objector, I returned to graduate school at MSU to study reading instruction.

The story does not end there. I learned to read because I was disciplined but never enjoyed it. Reading was hard for me.  In 1973 when my fiancé realized I never read for pleasure she asked if I would read a book she picked out for me – just because she asked.  Fueled by young love, I said yes.  She handed me Five Smooth Stones by Ann Fairbairn, an 853-page love story about an interracial couple on a collage campus. I gasped at the number of pages but began reading and discussing the book with my fiancé as I read it. I loved it.

I went on to teach third and first grades, ensuring that every child in my classroom learned to read!  

I earned my doctorate in Educational Leadership in 2002. I have been so fortunate to have been an elementary school teacher, principal, and superintendent in a 32-year public education career. I was an adjunct instructor at MSU for over three decades, teaching graduate courses in literacy and leadership development.  And now as a retiree, I enjoy spending time every day . . . reading. 

Jerry Jennings

The Bridge Home

The Bridge Home by Parma Venkatraman is a book I highly recommend for kids 10 and older and I especially recommend it to be read aloud by a parent, loved one, and/or teacher.  There is so very much to discuss in the novel.  It is contemporary and set in Chennai. 

India has many homeless people and, for someone from America, an astounding number of homeless children who must fend for themselves to live. This is a story of four homeless children. And it is told with thoughtful and genuine honesty.  Such a setting and topics could easily make one think this book could be ‘too much’ for kids.  The Kirkus Review says it is a, “A blisteringly beautiful book. For young people 10 to 14.”  Common Sense Media gives it an +A for educational value. Publisher’s Weekly says it is an, “exquisitely narrated novel set in Chennai, India.” And that, “this is a poignant portrait of love, sacrifice, and chosen family in the midst of poverty. Ages 10–up.” 

I found the characters to be believable and very well developed.  The plot to be appropriate and compelling.  This is a story of serious loss and triumph.  It is realistic,the char are based on real people.  It is a story of poverty and anguish – it is also a story of growth, opportunity and hope. 

I have been to Chennai, as well as Coimbatore and Delhi in India and have been very fortunate to visit Shanti Ashram just outside of Coimbatore for five days. My first hand experience in India, though brief, gives me clear perspective of the enormity of the challenges of poverty within the country and the reality of healthy services offered by, the character in the story, Celina Aunty.  The five days I spent visiting Shanti Ashram allowed me to witness the solid, compassionate, helpful, loving services that are an important part of the story of India today. 

A Summer of Silk Moths

I really enjoyed reading and thinking about Margaret Willey’s YA book: A Summer of Silk Moths.

Life is a complicated journey. This story reflects: loss, confusion, discord, family truths/untruths/unknowns as well as caring, focused energy and growth. Pete, and Nora, both in high school, are the main characters among many other equally authentically believable individuals covering three generations. Many, and certainly the teenagers, are finding their way – in developing an understanding about others and self as well as with the past.

With these engaged characters, Willey crafts thought provoking, realistic journeys. The story is influenced by the pace of nature. With specific focus on metamorphosis: Both with insects and humans. Moths and the potentially multiple metaphors they elicit, are woven into this literary work of art. I found the young people’s growing in their awareness and insights and thus, in part embracing, the natural energy of life’s many transitions – as metamorphic.

I appreciate that the tempo and structure of the story leads you to and through the characters’ lives with genuine frustrations, forgiveness, love, misunderstandings, riskiness, and acceptance. Not in a neatly wrapped package. More authentic – real world.

A Summer of Silk Moths by Margaret Willey, originally published in 2009 by Flux, A Division of Llewellyn Worldwide and republished by Reclamation Press, in 2018, it is a read rich in believable intriguing characters living out the entanglements of the past to create new possibilities for the future.

Other favorite books of mine that Willey authored include: The Bigger Book of Lydia (1983), Four Secrets (2012), The Melinda Zone (1993), and Saving Lenny (1990). All of these works legitimately present YA topics in an artful, accessible, richly human and memorable fashion. If you like A Summer of Silk Moths you may want to check out the above titles.

Transformative Conversations can lead to Adapting and Co-creation

People engaging in conversations where transformation has the potential of occurring are people who can help form adaptive interactions.  Adaptive responses to the status quo can help create futures focused on the common good.  Yes, the word “can” is used because there is no assurance that the common good will be the shared focus.

Ron Heifetz, Alexander Grashow, and Marty Linsky in their book: The Practice of Adaptive Leadership: Tools and Tactics for Changing Your Organization and the World (2009) write about adaptive leadership.  Their definition: Adaptive leadership is the practice of mobilizing people to tackle tough challenges and thrive (page 14) sounds like the kind of leadership many of us might want to experience

Lipton and Wellman suggest ‘mobilizing people’ by focusing on developing “rich, meaningful collaboration (which) is both complex and challenging. Three compelling reasons for meeting these demands (of mobilizing people) include:

1. The lone genius is a myth. Significant studies are no longer produced by a lone genius like Einstein or Darwin. The group is the unit of work. Insight and innovation emerge from interdependent thinking.
2. The most interesting mysteries lie at the intersection of minds. Novel solutions are necessary to address increasingly complex problems. The collective imagination is more expansive than any individual vision.

3. Accountability grows out of co-creation. Collaborative construction of understanding around data, problems, and plans inspires commitment to action. A greater degree of participation in the genesis of decisions produces a greater likelihood of follow-through.

Each of us has to ask ourselves questions like the ones below to insure that we are will to engage across differences to attempt to further the common good. 

It is worth our effort to begin and continue a journey toward developing our abilities to work well (very well) with people who are different from us?

Is the challenge of being intentional about connecting mind-to-mind worth accepting or is the time invested in listening, learning about, and appreciating those who think differently just too big of an investment?  

Can we adapt and grow across differences or are the stakes so very high that we each should be focusing ourselves as individuals and like-minded- groups on being winners and let the losers loose and forget this “common good” focus?

Creating Communities of Thought by Laura Lipton and Brice Wellman in The Power of the Social Brain: Teaching, Learning and Interdependent Thinking by Arthur L. Costa and Pat Wilson O’Leary, 2013, Teacher’s College Press

You and I Cannot be Bystanders

White Fragility by Robin DiAngelo is not ‘light’ reading.  It is serious. It is important. It is provocative. It voices to an American reality.  It speaks to White Fragility.

Reading it and thinking about the many ways DiAngelo challenges the status quo of how white people, me included, walk through our society – is like signing up for an intense workshop on why it is so hard for white people to talk about racism and how white people can do the work (on ourselves) to breakout of our fragility.

I see this book as an invitation. It provides an opportunity for white people to embrace what will likely be, a long growth journey toward self-understanding and significant behavior change.  This book is not sugar coated.  It is not soft.  It presents a real American dilemma that may not be easy to either comprehend and/or act on.  Yet, for white Americans, there is work to be done to move toward the dream of a “more perfect union”.  DiAngelo presents the realities of all the racism and superiority we white people have internalized.

I recommend this book. I also recommend that you read, as much as is possible, with a non-argumentative mind.  We adults have to be prepared to be changed by the experiences of reading and thinking about stimuli that comes our way or that we seek out.  I am encouraging you to seek out this book.

This book might lead you to want to retreat and stop reading.  Readers might be challenged by emotions such as anger, fear and guilt and by wanting to argue with the author and/or abandon the learning opportunity that engaging with this content provides.  DiAngelo is attempting to provoke positive societal change.  In this book, she examines the forces that prevent white Americans from confronting racism.  I encourage the reader to remain in a ‘learner mode’ throughout the read.

I believe that to be impacted by this book you and I need to be willing to be generative in our understanding of ourselves.  We need to believe that each of us is a ‘work in progress’ and that our society is also a ‘work in progress’ – and that by engaging in the work we can make things better:  we can participate in non-defensive, meaningful and productive dialogue, we can genuinely become non-fragile, we can demonstrate our vulnerability, curiosity and humility, and we can interrupt privilege-protecting comfort and internalized superiority.

As a white person, I have internalized the messages of our society. DiAngelo asserts that white people have internalized fragility around race.  We know there is racial inequality in America.  We often don’t see any way we could be playing a role in perpetuating that problem.  We believe that since we are not racists nor do we intentionally use our whiteness as privilege – therefore, we are not benefiting from any white-norm-centered patterns in in our society.

DiAngelo is a white person.  She is presenting a case for how White Fragility keeps us from having meaningful cross-racial dialogue. She asserts that White Fragility keeps us from authentically facing racism.

To move society forward in confronting racism you and I cannot be bystanders.  We need to be prepared to be changed by conversations, reading, reflection, and other stimuli.  We need to consider ourselves as ‘not finished’ with our learning.

If you and I are truly open to that, then we may become a force of generative growth for confronting racism and white superiority in our culture.  This is going to be long, messy and challenging work for each of us.  I say, for the common good, it is worth doing.

Harbor Me

We all need “harboring”.

Jacqueline Woodson’s new book, Harbor Me, is about six very different middle school students and their teacher’s idea that they, the students, should have an hour a week to talk privately about what is important to them, in their lives and in their life’s journey.  I recommend this book for anyone.  It is a timely read.  This story sheds light on the value of community and the reality that each of us, of any age, is a work in progress.  Woodson is an expert at her craft.

The teacher is hoping that the students will listen and dialogue in ways that may be more authentic than might normally happen in school.  We, the reader, sense that the teacher sees this as a way for the kids to learn about themselves, about themselves with others and about each person’s own potential for growth.

I do not mean to trivialize the barriers between people, of any age, these days.  There are many.  And, those obstacles are difficult to encounter and work through.  I do see the value of people coming together, over time, across differences and having dialogue with sincere listening.

Listening to each other with the desire to gain an appreciation for and an informed awareness of others is, from my observation, uncommon.  The concept of growing our empathy, sensitivity and concern for others seems to be a series of ‘muscles’ we – all of us – could be much more intentional about growing.  Furthermore, such growth would be helpful to us to – learn about ourselves, about ourselves with others.  Reading Harbor Me might give us all a reminder of the positives that can come from linking with others.

 

 

Dreams Deferred and Dreams Being Actualized

I recommend this book.  I appreciate contemporary YA realistic fiction that tackles the complexities of our times.

With genuine voice Patrick Flores-Scott has woven together the story of Teodoro, his siblings, the challenges of a brother coming home from a war zone with post-traumatic stress disorder, a childhood friend becoming his first love, his ambivalence about school achievement reconsidered, family strength and strife, a road trip, and economic hardship.

This is a story of dreams deferred and dreams being actualized.  It is a story of the serious challenges that many families and individuals face.  Teodoro has to find the energy for forward movement when the status quo seems to have him locked in place.  His brother must also secure a healthy path into the future.  It is a hopeful story.  It is not a sugar coated tale.

American Road Trip is journey of falling in love, responding to PTSD, friendship and family energy.

As a person who worked in public schools for over 30 years, I find the way Flores-Scott presents issues around school and schooling to be on target.

It is fast moving and full of life.  Flores-Scott is storyteller.

American Road Trip by Patrick Flores-Scott, 2018, Henry Holt and Company

It Is Time To Read or Reread ‘The Other Side of the Mountain’

Alex Kotlowitz tells the story of a Benton Harbor teenager who died in 1991. The book is The Other Side of the River: A Story of Two Towns, a Death, and America’s   Dilemma. The two towns are St. Joseph and Benton Harbor, Michigan. The death is that of an African American 18 year old, Eric McGinnis.  The dilemma is the racial divide that was and is present in America.

The challenges of Benton Harbor were and are real to me, to our state and to our country.  I to read this book when it came out in 1998 and I have just read it again a couple of weeks ago.   Twenty years later this is still a reflection of the racial divide that is present.

Kotlowitz is a master of bringing reality into focus.  I felt that way the first and second I read The Other Side of the River.  The focus does not diminish the profound complexity of this American dilemma.  The reality of this being so contemporary as well as historical is stunning.  We have so very much work to do. There continue to be too many racial divides.

I highly recommend this book. It will get you thinking.  I hope it will also influence people to embrace our very real challenges as we work together to end this American Dilemma.

Thanksgiving 2018: An Invitation

The concept of a national day of thankfulness is something I see value in.  I believe that a basic frame for living our lives is thankfulness.   And I believe we American’s have room to grow in our authentic thankfulness.   The Thanksgiving holiday can be a time to explore and understand the myths of the ‘first Thanksgiving’ while growing our new knowledge of the American experience.

According to the Smithsonian: “The Thanksgiving myth has done so much damage and harm to the cultural self-esteem of generations of Indian people by perpetuating negative and harmful images to both young Indian and non-Indian minds. There are so many things wrong with the happy celebration that takes place in elementary schools and its association to American Indian culture; compromised integrity, stereotyping, and cultural misappropriation are three examples.”

I like to think that being reminded of the ‘Thanksgivings myth’ has the potential to lead a continuation or beginning of an authentic learning journey around this holiday.  Thanksgiving can be an opportunity to learn more about the complexities of the American Indian story.  It may spur a deep dive in the intricacies and realities of current and  past history.

There many available resources you might tap to assist you on a learning journey.  Here are a couple of resources I recommend (knowing that any and all resources have their strengths and their limits).   I see both of these offerings to be valuable for their authentic focus and depth. Each is told in the first person. Each is a glimpse of the Native American experience.

On to the invitations: For teachers, young adults, and adults I recommend Brian “BB” Melendez’s podcast: Coffee With an Indian.  And for teachers, parents and young adults (12 to 17), especially boys, I recommend the book: If I Ever Get Out of Here by Eric Gansworth.

Both of these recommendations are examples of material that I see as straight forward and not sanitized to down play or remove the realities of life.  I like that.  I know some might find either or both of these a little “raw”.  Life is more than a little “raw” for many.

Melendez writes on the Coffee With an Indian web site, that this “is a tribal-social-podcast-platform for all things uniquely indigenous. Basically, we get ridiculously caffeinated—then, from a (raw) tribal perspective, intelligently assess everything! Our mission is to stimulate constructive introspection within all communities, by supporting forward thinking spaces for all people.”

Melendez captures listeners with his authentic voice and non-manicured story.  It is his story, his life, and he tells it to you as your “resident Indian”.  He is a Northern / Southern Paiute – Western Shoshone.  Listeners will come to known him, his circle, his challenges, his triumphs and his journey.  The depth and honesty of his story will draw you in. He wants to stimulate thought. He does that.   He has my brain focusing on the complexity of and humanity’s connection to Native American issues.  I am grateful for that. I invite you to start with episode 1 and listen to his journey.

If I Ever Get Out of Here is a novel about Lewis, who is a Native American seventh grader who lives on a native American reservation in New York state.  The story takes place in the 1970s Lewis loves the Beatles and Paul McCarthy and he doesn’t have any friends. He is in the academic advanced track at school and there are no other Indians in his class.  Being in this Middle School is the first time he is experiencing a non-reservation school.  It is not easy to get used to the social isolation he experiences from his classmates.

A new boy, George, who lives on the military base, shows up in his class. They have similar interests and over time become friends.  It is a realistic story filled with strong characters.  The serious issues of bullying and cultural difference are a big part of this story.  Lewis does not let George learn about his life on the reservation.  On the other hand, George invites Lewis to his house and Lewis begins to learn about George’s family, their life and some of what it means to be a transient family due to the reality that George’s father  can be reassigned to a new location at any time.

The bullying Lewis experiences leads to Lewis and, as time goes on, George responding.  The tension and drama are real and the stakes are important.

I recommend this book because it is a good story for middle or high schoolers.  And I see it as being a great catalyst for family discussions.  This is the kind of novel that both the parent and the teen might want to read at the same time and discuss together.

The potential discussion topics might include: reservation life, Indian boarding schools, bullying, the Beatles, children with a career military parent, friendship, parenting, the varying status of students within a school and so many more possibilities.

The author, Gansworth, is an enrolled citizen of the Onondaga Nation; however, he grew up in the Tuscarora Nation as a descendant of one of two Onondaga women present among the Tuscarora at the foundation of the nation in the 18th century.

These two recommendations of – Coffee With an Indian and If I Ever Get Out of Here – are only possible places to start.  You can ask your local librarian for others material and/or you can create internet searches to find sources you would like to investigate.

Happy Thanksgiving 2018 and may this be a good time to learn more about the complexities of the American experience