2012 MELT

On MLK Day, teachers from the schools in my region (Minnesota River Valley) gathered to share our expertise and best practices. It was a busy day, filled with demonstrations of new technologies and a vision of where education is headed in this, the 21st Century. Most interesting, perhaps, was a demo where a science teacher created an etextbook in minutes, to be read online (e.g. over an iPad, which seem to be ubiquitous everywhere but my own home district). How interesting, then to hear three days later about Apple's foray into the same market.

Meanwhile, a teacher/speaker (yours truly) gave a presentation on the myriad of self-publishing options these days, from photo sites that let you create professional, modern scrapbooks to vanity presses, to online mentor publishers like lulu.com and createspace.com. Of course I began by sharing my own journey from idea to book-in-hand with the Super Power of the Day trilogy, complete with PowerPoint slideshow and lots of hands on show and tell.

My PLC group ended the day drinking mocha lattes and watching a flock of cardinals through the back windows of a local coffee shop. We rehashed the info of the day and speculated on the future of learning and storytelling. It is surely an exciting time for both.

Introducing Chase -- flying!

Here he is, the final version of Chase for the cover of Super Power of the Day: The Hero Chronicle Continues.

Thanks, Sean Tiffany.

Progress Update on Volume 2

You know how those cheesy Christmas movies distracted me in December? Well... Rereading my favorite middle grade novel series distracted me from finishing my work on volume 2 this past week. In case you are wondering...

The Thief
The Queen of Attolia
The King of Attolia 

I think I have a crush on the main character, Gen.

Despite the quite enjoyable distraction, some progress was made on SPOTD: The Hero Chronicle Continues. Sean and I are to the inking stage of the art for the cover, I've (almost) completed the back cover copy so Ryan can put the cover together, I met with Dr. Jared Slater to (SPOILER ALERT!) iron out the emergency room visit and some anatomical stuff for the invisibility chapter, and I reread the full text (editing and proofing).

I think volume two may be kids' favorite of the three volumes... We'll see!

The Best Christmas Present

Super Power of the Day
By Ann Wachtler
Reactions after reading from
Henry Johnsrud... Soon to be 10

The character that I'd most like to spend time with is Chase Cooper. He seemed the most like me. He likes baseball, video games, and seemed like a typical boy around my age. He has an annoying sister, but I have two. She makes him mad, then he hits her (or something like that...), and she runs off and tells on him...then he gets into trouble...just like me.

It did take me a while to get into the book. I prefer the super powers to come a little earlier. The main emotion I had was being sad when the book ended. I got so sucked into it that I kept the light on much longer than I was supposed to. I kept reading more and more to find out what was going to happen. It reminded me of "Harry Potter" because they both had some kind of special power. Chase and Harry use their super power for good purposes.

I think that the author wrote this book to entertain young readers, maybe more for boys, but girls too. The main character is someone who is really nice and would be the kind of friend I'd want. Parents and grandparents would agree. It's pretty creative and was probably fun to write. The author did good descriptions, like in the dream because I could get the picture in my head. There were a few words, like on the spelling tests, that I had no idea what they meant, but then the author told me. That was good.

I am excited to read the next book. I hope it comes out soon so I don't forget what the main idea is of this book.


Note from Ann:
Wow, Henry! I am flattered by your kind words and impressed with your writing ability. It was fun to write the book. I'm especially glad you like Chase. You even figured out the novel's biggest weakness (I cut and cut and cut the first 50 pages, but I just couldn't shrink it any further...). Watch the mail in January, because you will be one of the first people to read Super Power of the Day: The Hero Chronicle Continues...

Fourth Tuesday Book Club!

I was invited to be the guest at Montevideo's very own Fourth Tuesday Book Club last Monday night. The book club I usually attend, the Second Tuesday Book Club, was started by the same super-host, Esther Mills. It's best not to get too fancy with names when you are running FIVE book clubs!

In any case, I was delighted by the invitation. The ladies (and MC) were complimentary about the book, naming their favorite parts over and over. One former teacher had figured out my Montevideo inspiration for one of the students, and they all picked up on important moments that figure into the rising action and ultimate climax in volume 3. Quite satisfying for me!

The best best best part of the night was listening to a book report written by a young reader for his grandmother, who was in the club. I'll share it in my next post!

Volume 2: !!!!!

I just printed out a copy of the second volume of my trilogy, S.P.O.T.D.: The Hero Chronicle Continues, formatted in inDesign.

After using Microsoft Office products at work from dusk to dawn, it always frightens me to jump back into Adobe CS5 software. But here's what happens: I hesitantly open my desired file, mouse around a little, make a few clicks, and then forget to be scared.

Adobe products are intuitive in a different way than Microsoft Office. I find my biggest mental stumbles happen in moving back to Office and wanting it to do what inDesign can do. I have Word 2010, it MUST be able to do a simple thing like show me guidelines on a page. But I have no idea how to do such a simple thing... Why can't I just grab the ruler bar and drag it onto the page? Oh, yeah. It's Word.

Overall, I usually feel like I'm in the middle of that whole metaphorical "riding a bike" scenario when I use inDesign.

Chase Cooper, 2.0

Good gracious, but I am a Sean Tiffany fan.

He sent me a panel of about a dozen rough sketches for the cover image of Volume 2, and I was entirely stumped. In his adding movement to the character, Sean has granted Chase life!

I didn't know how I would ever select just one image, as more than half of them are good enough to be "the one."

But I did.

Here he is, roughly, Chase 2.0