Education YouTuber & Blogger | English Studies PhD

Tag: Children’s Literature

New Year, New Reading Challenge: 40 Book Prompts to Inspire My Reading in 2018

 

Last year, I completed the Ultimate PopSugar Reading Challenge 2017 with one day to spare. I actually read about ten books during the first half of my winter break in order to reach that goal. I’m hoping not to cut it so close this year. For 2018, I’ve designed my reading challenge as part of my Christmas gift to my brother. He had challenged himself to read 12 books last year, I challenged him to do 40 with me instead, and he ended up at 30 (here’s his list from 2017). As he wanted to try again this year, I created reading prompts that have connections to each of us, along with more general prompts that can inspire us to branch out from our usual genres and topics. A few of the prompts were inspired by challenges I saw online while creating the list. So, without further ado, here’s the “Romero Sibling Reading Challenge of 2018.”

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Time to Head Over to the Theater? Movie Review #1: Disney/Pixar’s Coco

This week is finals week here at Illinois State University. The children’s literature folks in our program tend to get together at least once a month to catch up and relax after weeks of work and personal responsibilities. Last Friday, a few members of our group decided to head to the theater before dinner. The movie we went to watch, of course, was Coco. As ChLit readers, viewers, and scholars, it’s hardly surprising that so many of us were interested in checking out this new children’s movie that has received such great reviews from most people who have watched it (the movie has a 97% score on Rotten Tomatoes). I’ve broken down my review into three parts, just like with my book reviews. I do include major spoilers in this review (especially in the “viewer” section), so if you don’t want to know about any major plot points yet, I suggest coming back once you’ve watched the movie.

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PopSugar Reading Challenge 2017: An Update with Star Ratings and One Line Reviews

 

If today’s featured photo looks familiar, it’s because I used it a few months ago for my reading challenge post. I’ve decided to share an update on my progress, as there are only about two-and-a-half months left to complete the challenge. While I have updated the original post with the books I’ve read since I began, in this post, I’ll provide my star ratings of each book along with a one line review. If you need another book for your TBR list, perhaps this list will inspire you. I’ve listed the books in order of how many stars I gave each book. The last two books are still in progress, which is why I’ve put them at the end with no star ratings (yet). I’ll update this post as I continue reading more books.

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Looking for a Classic Read? Book Review #2: The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster

The majority of my recent blog posts have focused on school-related topics. As such, I thought this week was the perfect time for another book review. There’s still some pedagogical considerations in this post, but I’m hoping that this review inspires teachers and non-teachers alike to give this children’s classic a chance, if they haven’t already done so. My last review was for a very new and trendy YA novel, but today’s is all about one of my favorite children’s novels: The Phantom Tollbooth. I won’t say this book is perfect, as it isn’t (see: colonization origin-story for the secondary world). However, just because a book has its issues, doesn’t mean it’s not worth a read. This motto is definitely the case for Phantom.

So, if you’re a lover of fantasy novels, allegories, puns, or educational tales, click on the link below to…

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