I just finished reading a book that was hard to close. My mind is racing, and the blog fairies have shouted loud and clear, "THIS! WRITE ABOUT THIS!" I admit that it was the title alone that drew me in immediately. The Midnight Library by Matt Haig. Like many of you, 2020 has brought many challenges to me as well as many sleepless nights. Up way past midnight on most nights, and yes, missing my library, missing the chance to walk over to the new books section or the children's collection just to hold real books in my hands and to see what is new in the world of writing. I miss seeing my neighbors, old friends, former students, and the families of my students in the library. It's always been such an active and welcoming part of our community. So...when I opened my Kindle on one sleepless night this week and it suggested The Midnight Library to me, it was an impulse buy for sure!
This book was so much more than I had expected, both for me, and for the main character, Nora Seed. Nora is a girl living in the UK and having the worst year/worst life possible, in her opinion. As we meet her, she is contemplating suicide. The year 2020 has been so bad so far that I'm sure many of us can sympathize with her. Our curious natures as teachers and lifelong learners, though, must make us think ahead with some optimism. The killer hornets didn't get us over the summer as expected, right?
Nora enters an in-between life and death place called the Midnight Library, where time has stopped exactly at midnight. A quote from the book: "...within that library, the shelves go on forever. Every book provides a chance to try another life you could have lived. To see how things would be if you had made other choices...Would you have done anything different, if you had the chance to undo your regrets?" This stopped me right there in my tracks. The very book that I had finished before this was Jodi Picoult's new one, The Book of Two Ways. In this book, Dawn Edelstein survives a plane crash and decides to go back to a life she left fifteen years earlier rather than home to her husband and family. The book unfolds with each life playing out in alternating chapters. My new favorite Picoult, and I have read every one. The two last books that I chose to read were so similar in theme that it has caused me to think, as teachers do, in lesson plan terms. How can I use what I have learned here to inspire and instruct my students? You do that too, right?
This lesson-plan based thinking is what's allowed me to to continue my love of reading throughout my thirty-six year teaching career. How can I be a teacher who inspires a love of reading if I do not read myself? What? No time to read? What if you could find connections between what you are reading yourself, and what you are reading with your students? I did this with almost every book that was a whole class read, a read-aloud, or a lit circle (book club) selection that my third, fourth, or fifth graders experienced. My secret was to never reveal the title of the book I was actually reading as I wove stories from that book into the lessons I was teaching about a book made for kids. It was a real life lesson for text to text and text to world and probably text to self as well. A time that I remember the excitement being super high was when I was describing events and themes in Ready Player One as we explored science fiction choices for kids. Another great connection was between Hatchet by Gary Paulsen and Wild by Cheryl Strayed.
My lesson plan thought process tells me that that author Wendy Mass' Willow Falls book series, starting with 11 Birthdays (a Groundhog Day for kids) has a great connection to the last two books I read. The whole idea of living different realities and editing regrets could make for some pretty rich responses to reading, discussion, and eventually to writing of their own. The way that I would always present this to kids was through optimism though. Rather than editing regrets and living out different choices, what about looking forward to the kinds of lives they are imagining for themselves in the future? 2020 viewed in the rear view mirror as a blip in the radar, something they survived because, like you, they are strong, resourceful, and optimistic. Just a germ of an idea to get your lesson planning brain into gear!
I made several portfolio connections to this idea of looking forward with optimism to how each child's life might play out over the years to come. I did this through writing letters to future selves, considering the "past" while creating possible futures in their imaginations. If this idea of including some futuristic thinking in your language arts practice or portfolio collection, you might want to explore my "Letters to Future Me" distance learning resource. (Can certainly be used in your face to face classroom as well!)
These letters and poetry, with a little added art, make a beautiful stand-alone portfolio for the year or a great addition to whatever portfolio collection you already have in progress.
I hope this post has given you something to think about as you plan your lessons going forward, and I wish you the best ending that you dream of for 2020 along with optimism for 2021!
