World Premiere of "Book Club Fights Back!"

Yesterday I gathered my readers in the library, presented them with their contributor's copies of the DVD and set up the TV to watch their Banned Books Week readings. Probably I should have done it by chapters rather than just pressed play, but on the whole it worked well. They giggled at the bloopers, enjoyed their own readings with "Oh, no, I'm AWFUL!" and were delighted at the opening credits, which I used to sandwich a test run Dylan had done without realising he was actually filming! 

Unfortunately the music was missing from the end credits and after making all those copies it's not worth fixing. Oh, well...

We had parent teacher night following, so I was able to chat to parents about it, only to find they already knew because their son or daughter had been pleased enough to tell them.

I will be showing bits of it at a staff meeting at some stage, if allowed. It will be nice to share a successful literacy activity with my colleagues! I had a lot of fun with it, and so did the students, while doing something important.

Editing "Book Club Fights Back"

I have to turn off and head for my mother's place shortly, but after a long evening spent on editing my book club movie last night I had to come back and do a little more today. I still have to add Emily's reading when i get back; I couldn't get it downloaded before I left, or the scene where my students all gave the finger to book bans crying, "Book bans suck!" For some reason the computer didn't recognise the card reader that it had happily recognised for all the other downloads from the camera, but the day I get back I will have a computer technician to consult, Tam, who is with us for another term or so.

I've done this before, with last year's Literature Circles movie (and I finally managed to download the last video to this year's Lit Circles movie), but I still have plenty to learn. For example, putting together the first set of credits and the first scene into a single chapter. I'm hoping that if I do Play All on the DVD it might work. The tune I chose to go with the opening credits also plays over a delightfully silly scene Dylan shot by accident, in which some of our Psychology students (also book clubbers) are on their laptops between the library shelves while Selena is choosing her reading and Dylan jokes that he is filming them before realising he actually IS filming, then another credits page which pays tribute to a certain space TV series, before the first reading. It works well and that scene was too good to put in the bloopers, but the chapters are separate.

I put the readings in a certain order, with individual books broken up, but also readings in order from the first three Twilight books - Natasha, Taylor and Braydon and three Harry Potter books - Caitlyn, myself and Dylan. Then there are the bloopers, readings that were messed up or interrupted - we did this in the school library and there were bells between periods, announcements over the PA and students coming out of the library's interactive whiteboard room, on their way to their next class. Finally, there is me doing the reading I put up on YouTube, in the DVD "extras" - and a final bunch of credits giving names and books they read. The final credits need some music to go with them, but it's a matter of finding something appropriate that fits within the length. The music may not be Creative Commons because it's not going on line, just in my library and given to the readers, so I have a bigger choice.

Anyway, it's been great fun and highly successful and I look forward to showing it in the library at lunchtime when we get back, and hopefully to staff at a staff meeting, as an example of how you can engage students. These were all enthusiastic readers, but I think I could find a way to use it to engage reluctant ones. I have a few in my Year 8 who might enjoy it.

Fingers crossed the finished product works as well as I think it will!

Celebrating Banned Books Week Around The Blogosphere

Want to win your very own banned book and help give the finger to book bans? There are two giveaways hosted by blogs I Am A Reader Not A Writer and I Read Banned Books. There are, so far, eighty blogs participating, giving you plenty of chance to win and all you have to do is visit them and sign up. I found this information and links to the above blogs on Bookhounds blog, here. Mary of Bookhounds is giving away a $10 gift voucher to the Book Depository, and also gives you a link to the lists of banned books and why they were banned.

As a matter of fact, I learned about Banned Books Week from Mary's site, so it's nice to see it here again.  I've learned a lot from book blogs and the YA book community are a great bunch.

See you on YouTube for the virtual readouts!

Banned Books Week Virtual Readout Posted!

Okay, I have done it! I can never remember from time to time how to upload properly to YouTube, because when I just "share" in .mov format I get something that looks like a badly dubbed movie of the kind sent up in Attack Of The Killer Tomatoes, where the lips and the voice are just not in sync! There is a help page on YouTube, though, which says that YouTube really doesn't work well with .mov and suggests you save (share) it to Quicktime. I did this once, but saved it to the wrong format, for iPhone and iPod, but not for computer.  Whoops! Did it again, this time correctly, then clicked on Share, which had a YouTube option. And here it is! Why not watch it and have a go at doing your own? I will be happy to put in links from here if you let me know. If you don't have your own YouTube channel, you can set one up on the Banned Books Week web site. Don't be shy - if I can do it, middle aged and overweight, why not you?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4lnpRzvayms&feature=youtube_gdata_player

It's a bit longer than last year's, because this year, according to the criteria, you have to say why it was banned or challenged and, hopefully, why you chose it. I had to do my readout twice, because I want it up on the Banned Books Week channel as well as my own.

I chose the scene in Fahrenheit 451 where the hero, Montag, is called out on a job and sees a woman burn herself along with her books rather than give them up. This changes his life, although he was already thinking his life needed something more.

An interesting situation: many US film versions of books published elsewhere Americanise them. This one, written by the quintessentially American Ray Bradbury, was filmed by Francois Truffaut, with mainly British accents - Julie Christie, for example, played the wife and the landscape was very British. Oscar Werner played Montag, though not, of course, with a British accent. It was a long time before I realised the novel was written by an American ( I was in my teens when  I saw it, then read the book later). The edition I read for this was a 50th anniversary one, with an introduction by the author, who says the film version made some changes, but in the end, he realised Truffaut was right.

And yes, I know the cover is mirror-reflection, backwards. I still haven't worked out how to flip it, no matter what software I use. The reading is what counts.

My Choice For Banned Books Week

I have decided to read a sample from Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, a book about banning books which, in 2006, was challenged in Texas because of "discussion of being drunk, smoking cigarettes, violence, dirty talk, references to the Bible and using God's name in vain." It apparently went against the challenger's religious beliefs.

Well. Can't please everyone, can we? And I should point out that the hero, Montag, doesn't smoke, drink or talk dirty. He watches as his overdosed wife has her stomach pumped by technicians who stand around SMOKING while they do it, upset by their casual attitude. Reading the Bible is an act of rebellion on his part; he feels there must be something more to life than four walls talking at you, kids killing each other in speeding cars, talking about the latest TV show.

Re-reading it, I thought about how it reminded me, oddly, of some aspects of Brave New World, but also how much of it has come to be. Montag's boss, Beatty, tells him that it wasn't imposed, people just lost interest and the book burning firemen are there because, with houses fireproofed, it was a way for firemen to keep their jobs! English professors wander the countryside as tramps because no one was signing up for their courses any more.

How often do we hear, now, about kids' short attention spans? Even films have to be fast-moving to grab them. Some years ago I went back and re-viewed Zefirelli's exquisite Romeo And Juliet, which was big when I was growing up. Kids loved it because it actually starred real teenagers in the leads. And having seen the new, speeded-up(also wonderful) version, I concluded sadly that the Zefirelli version was just too slow for the current generation.

One thing that suggests to me that Fahrenheit 451 is set in an alternative universe is that Benjamin Fanklin is referred to, if only in fire brigade propaganda, as the first fireman instead of the founder of America's first public library.

It's also interesting to note that this is all happening  in the US- perhaps other countries still read? We'll never know, now that Ray Bradbury is gone.

I will put up a link to my readout when it's done.

Banned Books Week - Book Club Fights Back!

Today Book Club and I, and one of the staff, Faye, filmed readings from banned or challenged books. Dylan wanted a copy of his file so he could put it on YouTube, but otherwise the understanding was that the readings would go on to a DVD which will only be used at school. Of course, all my readers will get a copy of the DVD and hopefully I can show it to staff at a meeting.

The project was a huge success! I have never seen my students so excited about anything. I am not sure how I could have done this with kids who don't like reading, but I'll think of something. Meanwhile, they looked at a list I had prepared, of books, some of them classics, that have been challenged or banned over the years. I only chose some that we probably had in the library so that they were available to be read immediately. They read the list, exclaimed in amazement - "They BANNED Harry Potter?" - and sat down to work out what they should choose. I had readings from Harry Potter, Vampire Academy, Twilight, To Kill A Mockingbird, The Hunger Games, Anthony Horowitz's Alex Rider novel Snakehead and, from Faye, The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night-Time. That one is being studied by our Year 10 students, who love it. Faye didn't want her face to be seen("I'm too ugly today!") so Dylan had to film her with her face behind the book. She said she thought she knew which bit had probably caused the ban and made sure that was the part she read.

We even had a Year 7 student who said,"How wonderful!" and joined in. My Year 8 student Robert went to his locker to fetch a Robert Harris book, which was well-loved, judging by its battered state. I didn't hear his reading as I had to go check out a library book, but I overheard someone say "My God, no wonder it was banned!" Well, I'm not his mother and she is okay with it, as far as I know.

Dylan took over the filming, only stopping to get Selena to film him reading from Harry Potter And The Half-blood Prince. Selena was halfway through her reading of Snakehead(she read the entire Alex Rider series, followed by  Charlie Higson's Young James Bond and Gabrielle Lord's Conspiracy 365 series... For such a mild-mannered young woman, she is amazingly keen on action-adventure!) when the camera battery ran out and we had to recharge it. There were three more readings to do at that stage and while Dylan, Selena and Ryan were going to be there, Kristen had to go to her Foods class, so I promised to come and fetch her when the camera was running again. In the event, she changed her mind, as she was not feeling well and had substantial work to do in class, so I did a reading instead, from Harry Potter And The Chamber of Secrets. I am sure I can film her early next term if she's up to it, because nothing is actually  going on YouTube except Dylan's file and maybe mine; these holidays I will edit it in iMovie and I can simply add a scene for her before I finish and burn it to DVD. Thando was reading while I was off in Kristen's class, so I have no idea what she read, but it should be a nice surprise. Paige may not have been at school today and will perhaps want to add to the film when she returns; I can film her if/when I do Kristen.

 Taylor made a mistake and stopped, waving her arms in frustration; I might keep those bits for a blooper reel. Brittany, like Faye, read with the book held up to cover her face, while her little brother Braydon, a true camera ham, read with his face showing, of course.

After the holidays, the first Book Club event will be a premiere screening of what Dylan wants to call "Book Club Fights Back". He suggested we have a group scene with all the readers giving the finger to censorship. Perhaps, if time, but not on YouTube, I'm afraid - I'm not allowed!

This is one of my National Year of Reading events. It's nice to be able to do something, even after my budget has run out, and I am very lucky to have such wonderful young men and women in my class and my library.

Banned Books Week - Book Club Fights Back!

Today Book Club and I, and one of the staff, Faye, filmed readings from banned or challenged books. Dylan wanted a copy of his file so he could put it on YouTube, but otherwise the understanding was that the readings would go on to a DVD which will only be used at school. Of course, all my readers will get a copy of the DVD and hopefully I can show it to staff at a meeting.

The project was a huge success! I have never seen my students so excited about anything. I am not sure how I could have done this with kids who don't like reading, but I'll think of something. Meanwhile, they looked at a list I had prepared, of books, some of them classics, that have been challenged or banned over the years. I only chose some that we probably had in the library so that they were available to be read immediately. They read the list, exclaimed in amazement - "They BANNED Harry Potter?" - and sat down to work out what they should choose. I had readings from Harry Potter, Vampire Academy, Twilight, To Kill A Mockingbird, The Hunger Games, Anthony Horowitz's Alex Rider novel Snakehead and, from Faye, The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night-Time. That one is being studied by our Year 10 students, who love it. Faye didn't want her face to be seen("I'm too ugly today!") so Dylan had to film her with her face behind the book. She said she thought she knew which bit had probably caused the ban and made sure that was the part she read.

We even had a Year 7 student who said,"How wonderful!" and joined in. My Year 8 student Robert went to his locker to fetch a Robert Harris book, which was well-loved, judging by its battered state. I didn't hear his reading as I had to go check out a library book, but I overheard someone say "My God, no wonder it was banned!" Well, I'm not his mother and she is okay with it, as far as I know.

Dylan took over the filming, only stopping to get Selena to film him reading from Harry Potter And The Half-blood Prince. Selena was halfway through her reading of Snakehead(she read the entire Alex Rider series, followed by  Charlie Higson's Young James Bond and Gabrielle Lord's Conspiracy 365 series... For such a mild-mannered young woman, she is amazingly keen on action-adventure!) when the camera battery ran out and we had to recharge it. There were three more readings to do at that stage and while Dylan, Selena and Ryan were going to be there, Kristen had to go to her Foods class, so I promised to come and fetch her when the camera was running again. In the event, she changed her mind, as she was not feeling well and had substantial work to do in class, so I did a reading instead, from Harry Potter And The Chamber of Secrets. I am sure I can film her early next term if she's up to it, because nothing is actually  going on YouTube except Dylan's file and maybe mine; these holidays I will edit it in iMovie and I can simply add a scene for her before I finish and burn it to DVD. Thando was reading while I was off in Kristen's class, so I have no idea what she read, but it should be a nice surprise. Paige may not have been at school today and will perhaps want to add to the film when she returns; I can film her if/when I do Kristen.

 Taylor made a mistake and stopped, waving her arms in frustration; I might keep those bits for a blooper reel. Brittany, like Faye, read with the book held up to cover her face, while her little brother Braydon, a true camera ham, read with his face showing, of course.

After the holidays, the first Book Club event will be an opening screening of what Dylan wants to call "Book Club Fights Back". He suggested we have a group scene with all the readers giving the finger to censorship. Perhaps, if time, but not on YouTube, I'm afraid - I'm not allowed!

This is one of my National Year of Reading events. It's nice to be able to do something, even after my budget has run out, and I am very lucky to have such wonderful young men and women in my class and my library.

Banned Books Week 2012 - September 30 to October 6

This year is the 30th anniversary of Banned Books Week, the annual celebration of books that have been banned or challenged in some way. The lists of books banned or challenged in the US over the last several years is here  at the ALA web site if you'd like to take a look and if, perhaps, you want to take part in the virtual readout on YouTube , there's a link to the actual Banned Books Week web site where you can find instructions on what to do.

Some of you may remember that last year at this time I did a virtual readout from To Kill A Mockingbird. I haven't yet decided which beloved book I will choose this time, but this year I'm hoping to get students and perhaps even staff involved.

Our Year 10 students are currently reading The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night-time by Mark Haddon. They simply love it and those I talked to were shocked to hear it's a challenged book elsewhere in the world. Some have expressed interest in my project, which will involve filming them for a library DVD; as I am not allowed to put them up on the Net, they can do that themselves, with the files I will give them. Meanwhile, I've also spoken to some of the younger students. Brittany, Taylor and Paige are all keen to be involved, reading something from Twilight, The Hunger Games and Vampire Academy. Kim, a Year 7 student, has also asked if she can have a go. I am hoping to get some of my Year 8 class involved, but we will see who turns up on Thursday, my first chance to get out the camera for them. It will have to be finished by Friday, because Banned Books Week is on during term break and those who want to do the virtual readout will need to take the files home.

It's amazing what is on the lists of books that somebody, somewhere, has believed should come off the library shelves - often somebody who hasn't actually read it. Harry Potter's enemies, for example, are often people who haven't read the books. Classics such as Brave New World, To Kill A Mockingbird,  Huckleberry Finn are up there with books that probably aren't that wonderful but haven't been put there for being badly written, just for saying something that the objectors don't want said.

These books are banned or challenged in the US, but some have been banned here too, if on a small scale.  Harry Potter has enemies here, too, but I was once confronted by a teacher who objected to a fantasy novel whose cover featured one of those babes in a chain mail bikini. I agreed that the cover was woeful and the woman in the picture would be horribly uncomfortable,  but the novel itself  featured a woman warrior and it was rather absurd to object to it on the basis of "equal opportunity". And no, she hadn't read it.

My friend Natalie Prior's picture  book The Paw was banned in some schools because the heroine was a cat burglar and this implied that crime pays. The fact that she was a Robin Hood figure who robbed wealthy organisations to give to the poor was not of interest to the objectors. I like to think it led to more sales for the book.

At my own school, a mother objected to Tim Winton's Lockie Leonard, which was a class text, because the young hero, who was growing up like his readers, had a wet dream. Yet it's a wonderful book and one of our staff had a word with the mother, who was a reasonable person in general, and she withdrew her objection.

I will be putting a link up here to my own virtual readout when it's up on YouTube. Why not do your own and let me know? I will be pleased to add your link too.

Come on, let's celebrate our favourite books and give the finger to censorship!