Summer reading... do you have suggestions for books we could read together?

[Connie Weber]

Hi Everyone,

Do you have suggestions for books that we might consider reading together? Have you read a book recently (or are you getting ready to read a book) that you'd enjoy discussing with others on Fireside?

Let's collect suggestions and then post them for a vote on a doodle poll. I think it'd be great fun to join together in some summer reading (or winter reading, for Ian in Tasmania)!

What do you say? Have a suggestion for a favorite book, one that will move us along in our thinking about education and learning?

[Connie Weber]

Ok, here's my reply, in picture form.

[Connie Weber]

These are the books that I'm plowing through, all together and overlapping, kind of a big personal review. My current book (and one of the best in the last year) is Hope and Despair in the American City: Why There are No Bad Schools in Raleigh, by Gerald Grant. It's making me re-frame school reform from a sociological standpoint.

Deborah Meier, author of In Schools We Trust, is my current hero in education. Her voice is like medicine to me.

The Brain and Learning is a really good collection of articles--we could talk so much about stuff from that book. The recent article I'm pondering is "Who Owns Intelligence" by Howard Gardener.


Turning Learning Right Side Up by Ackoff and Greenberg is radical, and refreshing.

The Twitter Book by O'Reilly and Milstein represents a plunge into a study of a tool that utterly overwhelms me. But according to the book I've done it all wrong anyway, so maybe I'll be able to restart in a way that's inviting, not overwhelming.

This set of books I've read and studied on my own and crave discussing with the group: Everything is Miscellaneous; Here Comes Everybody; Remix; True Enough. All are about "this new age" of information-sharing, the brand-new kinds of things that are happening now, cultural trends.

Global Achievement Gap is a book I think all teachers everywhere should read, just to be up on skills that are needed that may not have been "on the lists" in the past.

Creativity, Flow, Teaching for Understanding, Making Learning Whole, Five Minds for the Future, and The Disciplined Mind somehow form a set together. They're all about mindsets we need for astonishingly high levels of learning.


Do any of those sound interesting for discussion? Sure would love to have some talks going here about any of them. How about you--have any suggestions? Are you like me, craving booktalks right now? I'm a little envious of Laura who has that great Math History group discussion going--but it's outside my league! You know what they're discussing right now? "Theoretical Logic and the Problem of Fractions." Whew! Not up to that speed.

You know, I'd be happy with a discussion like this: The Tao of Pooh. A little simpler than the math history conversations, but still very relevant!

[Connie Weber]

How about this one:

The Horse Boy, by Rupert Isaacson.

Here's a review, by none other than Temple Grandin--

"Temple Grandin Reviews The Horse Boy: A Father's Quest to Heal His Son

Drawing from her own experience with autism and her distinguished career as an animal scientist, Temple Grandin has provided readers with extraordinary insight into how animals think, act, and feel. Her books include The Way I See It, and the national bestsellers, Thinking in Pictures, Animals in Translation, and Animals Make Us Human. We were eager to hear what Grandin thought about Rupert Isaacson and his family's quest to go to the ends of the earth to help their son. Read her exclusive Amazon guest review to find out.

This is a fascinating book. It is the tale of a family's journey to Mongolia with their five-year-old son who has autism. The family travels to the northern remote areas and lives with the nomads and herders away from the cities. I loved the descriptions of the nomad way of life, and that they were so accepting of a child with autism. Rowan loved baby animals and the people did not mind when he grabbed a baby goat and climbed into one of their beds with it. During the trip, Rowan developed improved language and behavior. He also had a magical connection with horses. There are many wonderful passages about Rowan’s exploits with a Mongolian horse named Blackie.

Rupert Isaacson was surprised at how accommodating the Mongolian people were. They tolerated Rowan's pushing, yelping, and joyful rushing about. At the end of the book the family get a rude awakening when a German tourist who was a psychologist disapproved of bringing a child with autism to a national park to view wild horses. I was interviewed by Rupert Isaacson before he wrote his book and we discussed perhaps the shamans and the healers in some traditional cultures had autistic traits. Their rituals with rhythmic chanting and repetitive movements have similarities to autistic "stims." When I was little, I went into a calm trance-like state when I rocked and dribbled sand through my hands.

Children with autism need to be exposed to lots of interesting things and new experiences in order to develop. One of the reasons the trip to Mongolia was so beneficial was that Rowan could explore lots of fascinating things such as horses, streams, plants, and animals in an environment that was QUIET. The Mongolian pastureland was a quiet environment free of the things that overload the sensory system of a child with autism. There were no florescent lights or constant noise and echoes. Some individuals with autism see the flicker of florescent lights which is like being in a disco with strobe lights. When I was a child, loud sounds hurt my ears.

Parents and teachers can duplicate the benefits of this trip without having to travel. Horseback riding is a great activity. Many parents have told me that their child spoke his/her first words on a horse. Activities that combine both rhythm and balancing such as horseback riding, sitting on a ball, or swinging help stabilize a disordered sensory system. There are lots of places you can take a child to explore nature such as parks, brooks or a field with tall grass. Children with autism need to be shown interesting things and encouraged to do new things. Everywhere Rowan went he was asked questions and encouraged to talk about the things he was looking at. You need to find QUIET, interesting places away from crowds of people, florescent lights, traffic, and noise, where you can engage the child and keep him tuned in. This is a great book and everyone who is interested in autism, animals or different cultures should read it. --Temple Grandin


anyone want to read this together? sounds really good...