Just got home from another inspiring meeting with Melissa G. Wilson at the Chicago Cultural Society. I am very excited to report that I have been asked to headline a series of books that seek to demonstrate contemporary relevance and life lessons through great works of literature to school kids across the country. The first book in the series will focus on William Shakespeare. Without getting into too much detail at the moment, I can say that this first book will take ten Shakespeare plays, break them down with plot and character overviews and quotes as a means of showing how these plays are still very relevant to today's society.
Through my training as a high school English teacher and my work earlier this year as a student teacher at the Al Raby School for Community and Development in Chicago's tough West Garfield Park neighborhood where I taught British literature to four classes of high school seniors, I have discovered that in order for kids to really appreciate literature in the classroom, they need to understand that these works are just as pertinent to their lives today as they were when originally written. While advances in technology, medicine, communication, etc have certainly improved our lives over the years, the fundamental factors of everyday life haven't changed. We still love, we still need acceptance, we are still confronted on a daily basis with issues of corruption, racism, anti-Semitism, and the challenges of living in a rapidly changing society. These are all themes common not only to Shakespeare but to Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Twain, Angelou, Achebe, Whitman, Thoreau, the Brontes, and Jane Austen, among so many others. Children need to recognize this in order to appreciate the value great literature provides. As educators, we need to be able to bridge this gap between perception and reality. This series aims to do so.
While this series is still in the early stages of development, our aim is to publish the initial Shakespeare book in early Spring of 2012. We have some great ideas and are excited to make this happen! We are also looking for sponsorship so if you or anyone you know are interested in taking part in this truly important and ground-breaking initiative, please let us know and check back frequently to either my blog here and/or Melissa G. Wilson's blogs at www.melissagwilson.com or www.networldingblog.com.
We are all about doing good, giving back to society, and working with children to help them realize their true potential and all of life's rich rewards. I can't wait to make this happen!
Another shout-out today to Melissa at Networlding and to all teachers, students, parents, organizations, and anyone who believes that in order to build a better tomorrow, we have to start with what we have today!
Ciao.
QUESTION OF THE DAY: "How can YOU make a difference in the lives of children today?"
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