A BOOK by ME at the Iowa Reading Association Annual Conference

Deb Bowen, A BOOK by ME

Chris Green, Retired Teacher, North Scott School District

Clark Glotz, Executive Director of Iowa Reading Association

Deb and Cassie Bowen along with Teacher Chris Green, a History Day champion of education and writing coach for A BOOK by ME, attended this conference as presenters and exhibitors.

All teachers present were given one book from the series to be used in their classrooms compliments of Whitey's Ice Cream.

Many stopped by the booth giving examples of stories they would like to tell from their own communities. It was exciting to hear the possible stories for either the Holocaust or Human Rights series.

If teachers reading this newsletter are considering using A BOOK by ME for next school year, these are the simple steps to necessary to take:

1. Brainstorm how to use this writing project in your area (possibly put an article in the newspaper asking for WWII stories, call the VA, DAV, a local nursing home for suggestions on stories, etc.)

2. Choose your subject and interview (teacher or volunteer writes a page and half biography (approximately 500 words) before student writes children's book)

3. Register your writing project online at www.abookbyme.com

4. Review writer's guidelines on the same web address

5. Download the free coloring book as a sample project

6. Complete the book project and submit as spelled out on website (both a hard copy of the book project and a scanned copy on disc).

Note: The Grout Museum in Waterloo has hundreds of oral histories of WWII soldiers on file. This may be a tool your class could use for a project.