Is it “book talk” or “booktalk”? They both work for me, and this site has it both ways.

Digital Booktalk is a collection of short videos that can serve as booktalks or as prereading (pre-reading?) activities for a class, a literature circle, or even a book club. Here are some examples:

• Counterfeit Son by Elaine Marie Alphin
• Nickle and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich
• The Pearl by John Steinbeck

The videos are a joint project involving the Educational Technology Program in the College of Education, the Department of Digital Media in the College of Arts and Humanities — both at the University of Central Florida — and Orange County Public Schools in Orlando.

Teachers can use the existing videos from the web. Those who are willing to create a free account, though, can also have students produce a digital booktalk. The curriculum tab includes discussion of how a digital booktalk differs from a book trailer. Scroll down to find both a quick guide to producing booktalks and a 3-6 week curriculum entitled “UB the Director.” Follow other tabs to find more information, including instructions on making your students’ work available to others via this site.

This site keeps its feet on the ground — it doesn’t get carried away with the razzle-dazzle of technology nor is it mired in literary analysis. It embraces an expanding canon while acknowledging the value of the traditional one and is designed for students and for teachers.

I see a lot of potential here!

FILM (Finding Inspiration in Literature & Movies) is a movie curricula program for young people promoting literacy, activity-based learning and service.

The program was created in 2004 by Heartland Truly Moving Pictures and the National Collaboration for Youth . Its focus is the development and distribution of free curricula based on Truly Moving Picture award-winning films to channel positive messages and life-affirming themes into the minds and lives of youth.

The curricula are designed in conjunction with movie studios and youth educators to get youth reading and watching quality content, provoke thought and exploration of pertinent themes and issues, and inspire participation in theme-based activities and service projects.

Guides are currently available for 20 movies, including the following:

• Prince Caspian
• Because of Winn-Dixie
• Happy Feet
• Freedom Writers
• Ratatouille

The guides are rich with activities emphasizing literacy skills, character development, and community service/activity.

Special thanks to Terri at Learning is For Everyone!

Traci Gardner of ReadWriteThink sends the following:

I wanted to share our collection of out-of-school activities, organized by age groups, at www.readwritethink.org/. You’ll find specific activities like going on a sound hike, creating a photoblog entry, and composing a first resume. The site also has online, interactive materials, like a crossword puzzles tool and another for creating comic strips.

This year, the website features two new podcast series, Chatting About Books and Text Messages. Host Emily Manning chats with kids, parents, and teachers about the best in children’s literature for ages 4 through 11 on the Chatting About Books podcasts. Discussions include reading tips and fun activities to do with children before, during, and after reading.

Text Messages podcasts provide book recommendations that adults can pass along to preteen and teen readers. Each episode features one in-depth recommendation plus suggestions of several other related books, audiobooks, or films that will engage and excite teen readers. The first podcast in the series explores American Born Chinese, a book that tells its story in words and pictures and that made Amazon’s editors choice list in 2006.

The site includes a “Share this Site” link that leads to a PDF flyer you can print and send home with students to encourage them to read, write, and think during the summer months.

When a parent is deployed overseas, reading a bedtime story becomes problematic. Teachers have known for years that having parents read to their children goes as far as anything a teacher can do to support early literacy. And both parents and children cherish the time spent together with a good story. When duty calls now, technology can assist:

Even though service members at Camp Eggers, Afghanistan, are separated from their families by thousands of miles, they still can read to their kids.

Thanks to the efforts of one noncommissioned officer assigned to the Office of Military Cooperation-Afghanistan, more than 200 parents deployed in support of Operation Enduring Freedom have done so over the past four months.

The “Read To Your Kids” program was established in late November by Army Reserve Master Sgt. D. Keith Johnson from the OMCA public affairs office as a way to bring deployed troops closer to their loved ones while they are away from home. On March 18, Johnson reached a new milestone as he completed his 200th taping.

Read the entire article.

This program is supported by Any Soldier and by United Through Reading.

Special thanks to Jamie Wheeler for the heads up on this one!

Here’s another terrific resource: Loud Lit.

The site features audio files of children’s lit, short stories, poems, novels, even a little nonfiction. All texts are in the public domain; here are some samples:

• “Rapunzel”
• “The Raven”
• “To Build a Fire”
• The Gettysburg Address
• Heart of Darkness

Listening to audio files can help all students appreciate literature. Sometimes listening to a clip of just a few minutes can help with comprehension or with understanding an author’s tone. This can serve as scaffolding or as enrichment, as pre-reading or post-reading.

And your students could produce them, too. What a terrific experience that would be for them!

Thanks — again! — to Kevin Jarrett of ncs-tech.com!

Zach is 5 and is learning to read. He points at a picture in a zoo book and says, “Look, Mama, it’s a frickin’ elephant!”

Mom takes a deep breath and asks, “What did you call it?”

“It’s a frickin’ Elephant, Mama! It says so right under the picture!”

and so it does …

“A f r i c a n Elephant”

The last big factory in my small town shut its doors 10 days ago, and yesterday would have been the end of everyone’s built-up vacation time. As of today, January 1, all of those workers are unemployed and, in this town, have very limited prospects.

I can’t help thinking of Vance McMurray (not, of course, his real name). When I first started teaching here — let’s just say it was during the Carter administration, OK? — Vance was in my freshman remedial class. I was still green, and almost nothing was known about learning disabilities or dyslexia. Vance was 15, still in 9th grade, and couldn’t read much above a third-grade level. It was my job to teach him to read better.

Vance was a likeable guy, but he had never been successful in school and couldn’t be bothered to put much into it now. Time and again he blew off my encouragement (and my homework). He had his life planned out:

Me: Vance, c’mon, give this a try. How are you going to get a job if you can’t read?
Vance: When I turn 16, I’m gonna quit school. My uncle will get me on at the factory, and I’ll be making $12.00 an hour. I’ll make more than you do!

That’s what happened, too. He got that job and held it until last week. Now he’s in his early 40s, probably has a family, still can’t read. He will try to get by with odd jobs, trimming trees or laying carpet until the new auto manufacturing plant opens a year and half from now in a town about an hour from here. He will apply there and probably won’t be able to pass their literacy test.

We have a local Adult Education program and a literacy program; both have been in place for years. They have some success stories, of course, but not as many as needed. The factory is providing some job retraining, and the regional community college has opened a few classrooms in a building that used to be another factory.

I’m not blaming the factory for pleasing its stockholders with outsourcing. I’m not blaming Vance or myself for his inability to read. But it’s going to be a very challenging time for the McMurray family — and others like them — as the vulture of illiteracy circles overhead.