Yoo Kyung Sung, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM, Junko Sakoi, Tucson Unified School District, Tucson, AZ
A few years ago, Yoo Kyung and I (Junko) worked with Mr. Wilson’s 8th graders in Tucson Unified School District (TUSD), Tucson, AZ. We shared with them Blended (2018) by Sharon M. Draper through its audiobook and printed text. Blended is a contemporary realistic fiction story of Isabella, a biracial 11-year-old girl, with a Black father and White mother. Isabella’s parents are divorcing and having a new family. One week is Dad’s Week, where she spends her week at her dad’s place with his girlfriend and her son in a fancy big house. Alternatively she spends her week at her mom’s (Mom’s Week) with her mom and her boyfriend in a small, not fancy house. Switching houses, nicknames (i.e. mom calls her Izzy and dad calls her Isabella), and school backpacks every week make Isabella feel stuck between the two lives and ripped in two. At school and in public spaces, she faces racial violence, discrimination, and police-involved shooting. Going through all of these, Isabella begins to think of who she is and how her identity, parents’ divorce, and racism impacts her life and relationships with families and schoolmates. (Watch the Blended book trailer here.)
The audiobook is read by the author, Sharon M. Draper, and the story is narrated by Isabella, the 11-year-old protagonist. While the length of each chapter is short, some of the social messages that Blended depicts, such as school violence and racial tensions, are not light. We shared this story because we wanted to see how the 8th graders would respond to this contemporary story that is relevant today and their reading experiences with its printed text (320 page, 77 chapters) paired with the audiobook (5 hours 42 minutes). We thought the availability of printed texts and the audiobook for alternative reading experiences would motivate the students to keep reading and listening to the story. Through this unique reading practice, we also wanted the students who identified themselves as “not a reader” to have a positive experience with reading a book and gain confidence as a reader.
Literacy Engagements Activities with Printed Texts and Audiobook
The 8th graders read and listened to Blended, then had discussions and worked on literacy engagements for six weeks. Three to four sessions were taken per week and one session took around one hour. During story time, students took notes. Taking notes helped students to concentrate on listening to the audiobook. They jotted down powerful words or quotes, questions, and thoughts. After that, they journaled using the notes and had a whole group discussion. The study guide shared by Sharon M. Draper led us through the critical discussions. The students also worked on several literacy engagements such as Written Conversation (Short, 2017) and Mock Twitter, which we modified the Written Conversation format.
The image on the left is a note and the image on the right is a journal written by Adelina (pseudonyms). She jotted down initial thoughts and questions by sketching and writing in the note while listening to chapters 5-8 and reading chapters 9-10. Then, Adelina synthesized the note in her journal using narrative techniques, which seemed to generate ideas and further questions.
Below is a Mock Twitter. Students wrote or sketched their responses in 140 characters on sticky notes and added the notes to the timeline as if tweeting. This allowed them to do peer reviews and reflections. They read each other’s sticky notes and added (retweeted) to others’ posts. For example, one posted, “I wonder if Izzy will feel like an outsider when her mom and John Mark [her boyfriend] get married.” The other responded to this post by writing, “[Do you think] [Are] Izzy’s parents actually gonna take her feelings into consideration?” Their posts (conversations) continued as if on a twitter timeline. This twitter board was displayed on the classroom wall so that students were able to read others’ posts and reflect on the story and that facilitated dynamic transactions.
As our lessons continued, the 8th graders got used to this reading format – listening to the chapters and then reading the printed text. Class discussions, Written Conversation, and Mock Twitter facilitated them to make personal connections to Isabella’s life experiences and the current social issues such as racism and police-involved shooting events happening in the local, nation-wide, and global contexts. Further, these increased their reading engagements as well. Many of the students, including struggling readers, asked us, “Can I read more chapters?” We thought it was a positive sign. All students, including the students who have never finished a chapter book before, read and listened to all the chapters and finished the book.
Reference
Short, G. K. (2017). Written conversation: Strategies to encourage dialogue. Retrieved from https://coe.arizona.edu/sites/default/files/strategies-encourge-dialogue.pdf
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- Themes: Blended, Junko Sakoi, Sharon Draper, Yoo Kyung Sung
- Descriptors: Books & Resources, WOW Currents