Languages Books

As a first grade teacher I used this book as an intervention tool with my ELL students last year. It helped with voacbulary as well as phonics. The activities are hands on and we were able to create several games using the lessons as well. I recommend this book to anyone in the primary grades. It is great as an intervention tool, large group activity or as a center.

This book is great! There are many word activities to choose from, which I find very helpful and a time saver!

This concept keeps kids interested. They want to figure out the little words and the big words created by the letters, so it's an excellent one for phonics. If you already use Open Court, it would be a good supplement. There is some prep time involved in writing and cutting the letters, unless you're smarter than me and use die-cut letters from a bulletin board!!

This book is wonderful for primary grades as well as ESL classes. It's interactive and the kids love it. We use it every morning when we enter the "Wonderful World of Words." There is also a Making Big Words for intermediate grades! I definitely recommend it!

This is the best spelling book I have seen. I am a homeschooling mom of 2 boys (9 & 8) and this is the easiest method and they enjoy it too!

Excellent resource. Lots of great ideas, easily adaptable to various grade levels and abilities.

A very comprehensive book for those who are interested in using literature circles to boost their students' interest in reading and speaking skills. It can surely help you to gain a very good understanding of what literature circles are and the "tips" provided after the description of every lesson are quite helpful. However, the lessons described in the book are for first language learners and you will need make adaptations if you want to use the ideas with your EFL students.

If you are a teacher like me, or if you are forming a literature group, this book is an excellent resource. It will help you work with students to ensure that they have organized and productive literature cirlce discussions.

This book is a useful tool if you plan to introduce literature circles into your classroom. It is an easy read, something that one can use as a reference as well as a lesson-planning tool. The way the book is written and organized allows me to use the individual lesson plans with my own literature, whether using novels, short stories or poetry. Having never used literature circles before and being a little skeptical, I am very pleased with this book's ability to explain the benefit and realistic purpose of using them in a high school classroom. The authors have definitely done their research and answer all the questions teachers have regarding the reality of using these circles. I am convinced and am looking forward to implementing them in my own classroom.

The premise behind this book is great. I was hoping to have some instant lessons to use with my fourth grade students. While some of the lessons are adaptable to that age, the activities are really designed for high school classes.

Provides great background information and explanation for using the notebook and lesson ideas. Yet, it's still easy to go straight to the lesson ideas without reading the rest of that other stuff. I bought this along with A Writer's Notebook by Ralph Fletcher, and I liked this book more for helping me teach.

I have been using writer's notebooks with my students for years and always struggled with integrating them into the entire language arts curriculum. This book has several hands on strategies which illustrate ways to use the students' own writing to teach a variety of writing skills. There is also a very helpful chapter on assessing the notebook. One of the most helpful books on the subject I have seen!

This book was a quick and easy read that easliy lent itself to great lesson plans for the whole school year. I highly recommend this book if you are a first time writing teacher, or a novice writing teacher.

This is not one of those books that will collect dust on a shelf. It will be read and reread many times! It is a great resource for any teacher of writing! Thank you Aimee Buckler! This book contains a wealth of organized and practical strategies that will add to any writing program. Buckler gives teachers easy to model tools to pass on to their students. She gives many examples from literature that can be used as springboards for specific areas. I will never look at notebooks the same! What an inspirational addition to my teaching library!

I am torn by this book- the first half was full of ideas and lessons that I felt would help me improve writing instruction. The second half was not, at least for me. The writing is brillant and down-to-earth. Buckner has good ideas and great real world lessons.

The downside for me was the amount of time it would take for me to do everything- the ideas work best for self-contained teachers.

Do I recommend this book? Absolutely.

We are big Doctor Seuss fans and are attempting to get the entire collection for our daughter. Like the book, just too similar to Fox in Socks. Nothing but tongue twisters and no real story.
Great to have if your trying to collect all Dr Seuss books. If completing the collection is not important to you, I would only chose this if you don't already have Fox in Socks

Great book for my 1st grader, he loves the rhyming words throughout.

This book captures literary genius in the form of childish tongue twisters. It proves to be an excellent practice of diction and reading rhythm while providing extreme entertainment for the little listener. The love of words is the beginning of all great literary accomplishment, and this child's book is a step in the right direction.

This book was one of my husbands favorites when he was growing up, and now that we are expecting a child he wanted our son to have the same experience. He was so excited when it arrived that he read it to me as a bedtime story. The riddles start out easy, but by the end of the book your tongue is so twisted it's hard to say anything!! It's a lot of fun and we really look forward to hearing our son try to say these riddles when he learns to speak.

This is a really fun book to read. However, you REALLY have to pay attention to the words or you will mess them up. If you love tongue twisters, this is the book for you. It also is great for young readers, but they may become frustrated with some of the words. It's fun for little ones to listen to and to see how fast you can say these phrases. When you hear "faster, faster," well, you know you're encouraging reading in your child. A very fun book - I recommend it.

This book is a MAINSTAY in my reference library. Though I do only limited back-end development in the applications I work on, this is the first book I look for when I need to be pointed in the right direction. I highly recommend it!

I bought this book as a complete Oracle novice, transitioning from Microsoft T-SQL to PL/SQL. I was worried about the transition being difficult until I read this book.

It is one of those very rare books that presents advanced concepts in a context understandable by users of all experience levels. The author often throws in tips about Oracle PL/SQL quirks to watch out for, as well as some very applicable information about how Oracle works internally.

I've since become more comfortable with PL/SQL, and the book also serves as a great reference. I highly encourage you to read this book straight through.

I recommend this well-written book to anybody wanting to learn PL/SQL, as well as anyone needing a great reference.

Although the information was accurate and useful, I think the strength of this book was it's clear and logical presentation. It is easy to read and very helpful. For example, I needed to know how to dynamically build the "where" clause for select statements and his chapter on DBMS_SQL gave me the tools to accomplish my task at work.

This is definitely an excellent book. No one should rank it less than 5 stars just because it was published in 1996. Please do some research before talk. Actually, Scott Urman has wrote a book, "Oracle8 PL/SQL Programming", which was published in 1997. Buy this one if you want to learn PL/SQL 8.0.

Oracle 8 is out and in this book it only covers to Oracle 7. It is a very well written book. It is a valuable reference however it was published in 1996. Still looking for Oracle SQL Plus 8.0 AND the PL/SQL Programming. I hope the author steps up to the plate and updates his work.

Great historical book of the middle east telling the every day life of families life during war which you never hear in the news or history books and very historically correct. The region now is still very much this way and its not too mushy of a romance so great for men to read also.

Don't expect this love story to go where you think. Amin Maalouf unfolds a tale of hopes, joys and disappointments, in which the deserving stumble and fall, the undeserving rise up - or is it the other way around? Just when you are ready to catch your breath, his story line diverts you down a different path. The narrative within a narrative shows how the human will can struggle against overwhelming odds. The tribulations of star-crossed Muslim-Jewish lovers - Ossyane and Clara - keep the drama on edge, right to the very end.

This is the third novel of Amin Maalouf which I have completed, first was Samarkand and second Leo the African , I cannot really rank them may be because there is no comparison and all of them are written in different historical perspectives.
Ports of call is a love story of Ossyane, an ottoman muslim by blood, born in Beirut and Clara a jew both of them meet in France in second world war days at a comrades home and this single meeting becomes a cornerstone for their marriage which takes place much later, they live together for a very brief period and then live for decades with new drawn boundaries between them, to meet again only. I read this novel continuously to complete it but then at last ten pages I left it for one more day because I did not want to finish this beautiful story so quickly.
It is one more very well written novel by Amin Maalouf.

When I bought this book I was sure that Amin Maalouf wasn't going to be able to write something as good as "Leo Africanus"; I was wrong!!! Even though these two books are totally different, the author managed to make something brilliant out of a love story.
The author wrote the story in a really simple and exciting way; He permits the reader to imagine everything in a clear and perfect way.

This is the most outstanding of all the Maalouf novels I have read- and I must tell you I read almost all. This is probably also because the novel starts at my birthplace Adana, a southern town in Turkey. The novel is loaded with overflowing emotions. Not only I read it once every year but also I have gifted it at least 3-4 times.

This was definitely a well-done book. Very clear, concise, and with lots of examples. As a fiction author, however, I found it lacking in any kind of examples or tips and was disappointed for this reason. Perhaps the subtitle should more accurately read: The ground rules for creating promotional pieces that sell non-fiction books. Or perhaps in Dawn's next book she could address that issue.

Stop me if you've heard this one before. After months--and sometimes years--of dedicated writing, rewriting, and rewriting some more, you've finally finished that manuscript and even found a publisher. Lo and behold, you discover the real work has just begun.

Once upon a lovely time, publishers--the really big ones, anyway--took charge of marketing and promoting new books. As the author, you might be expected to make a few public appearances, but the publisher handled little things like setting up venues and contacting the media.

But enough with the fairy tales. These days, author's are shouldering more and more of the promotional (and financial) load of getting their books to market.

Was that last paragraph enough to make you quake in your comfy slippers? Relax. This just might be a fairy tale after all, because here comes the hero riding to your rescue. (Or perhaps author Dawn Josephson is more akin to a fairy godmother.)

Putting It On Paper: The Ground Rules for Creating Promotional Pieces That Sell Books is the first book in The Ground Rules Series and a great starting point.

Once you pick up this handy guidebook, you won't want to put it down. Chapter by chapter, Josephson walks you through all the elements of book promotion, from writing press releases to drafting catalogue sheets and everything in between. She supplements each chapter with real-world samples, frequently asked question (and corresponding answers), and a summary of key points. Josephson manages to cover a lot of ground (rules) in one slim volume without ever seeming over-whelming. Carolyn Howard-Johnson's excellent book The Frugal Book Promoter, by comparison, is far longer and thus more detailed. Both books have value, and both belong in any serious author's resource library. However, the novice book promoter might find Putting It On Paper less intimidating as a starting point.

Whether you've written one book or twenty (or even if you're still dreaming of that first completed manuscript), do yourself a favour and invest in your own copy of Putting It On Paper. You won't be sorry.

Dawn Josephson has written one of the most useful "how-to" books I've read in my quest to learn how to market my own books.

She gives lots of examples of cover letters, press releases, "sell-sheets" (I had no idea what that was!), and supplementary materials such as bookmarks, post cards and counter cards (I was pretty uninformed about these, too).

Obviously I needed help, and thanks to this book, help is at hand.

Thank you Dawn!

"If I had more time, I would have written less." ~Mark Twain

Dawn Josephson interviewed book reviewers and buyers from major distribution houses to find out which press kits get a positive response. The promotional pieces you use help to get your book noticed and create an inviting space where the reviewer can view comments, interviews, extra details and maybe even customized bookmarks with a matching business card.

If you have written your book and it is being published, media kits may then be created for The Media, Book Distributors and Individual Bookstores. Dawn Joesephson encourages authors to create customized professional pieces.

You can choose from a cover letter, press release, mock book review, author bio, sell sheet, catalog sheet, a chachki (give-away) item and article. By dividing the seemingly daunting job of putting a press kit together into easy-to-follow steps, the process is much less complicated.

Should you send a book out with every media kit?
How many articles should I include?
Why does personalization impress?

Authors will especially enjoy the Frequently Asked Questions and Key Points that help to keep the project at hand on focus. A Day in the Life of an Editor (or reviewer) gives insight into how much time editors really have to read books and write reviews. Reviewers might enjoy reading about the Basic Anatomy of a Book Review.

A well-thought out media packet can truly impress a book reviewer and give them the needed all-encompassing impression of your work. This gives a reviewer a good first impression of who the author is, what their mission is in life and how they want their work presented.

~The Rebecca Review

Reviewed by Bette Daoust, Ph.D. for Reader Views (5/06)

I have read many books that explain what to do when submitting letters, proposals, and documents to prospects, media sources, and others. I have always had to slog through bountiful text to get to the meat of the book and to find something I could actually use. Too often the writer confuses knowledge with practicality. Therefore tips and how to's are often lost in the abundance of explanations. These explanations are often missing good examples and real life scenarios that help the reader apply the knowledge therein.

In "Putting It On Paper," Dawn Josephson gets right down to brass tacks so to speak. She spells out everything you need to know without overwhelming the reader. Her practical tips are spoonfed to the reader to enhance understanding. Each tip is backed by ground rules and frequently asked questions. Each of these components lead the reader to a better understanding of the point and make it applicable to real life situations. Through her examples and samples, the reader is left with no question about how to apply their new knowledge. If you do not want to read the whole book, read all the ground rules! This book is an excellent source for putting together a press kit, introductory letter, and types of other promotional pieces that sell books. A definite must read!

I absolutly love this book! It provides you with so many creative ideas and incorportes the skills that you are trying to teach your students. I teach 3rd grade and my students love it when I pull this book off the shelf. I also absolutly love her Dynamite Writing Ideas book. It was very helpful with getting organized and creating a writers workbook with the students, although my kids call them their author books. They really have found a love of writing with these skills and the way that they are presented!

As a writing teacher, I am looking for practical ideas not philosophies. This book is nothing but terrific. It has immediate lessons and handouts. Every 4th-8th grade teacher needs this book.

This book is great! I love the plays the kids can act out and also the way the lessons are laid out makes it easy to teach and for the kids to understand. The activities are fun and my class doesn't moan and groan when I do activities from this book!

This is a great book for any teacher. It gives great ideas for teaching writing in an exciting way! I recommend Melissa's other books as well.

After borrowing this book from a colleague, I decided I had to have my own copy. It's a resource I keep going back to each year. My sixth graders love the activities, which are fun and easy to follow. Melissa Forney knows how to motivate students to improve their writing.

THis story is classic. I use this book so much that I have to retire my old copy and replace it with a new one every couple of years. It is a fabulous vehicle for storywriting in the primary classroom.

I have been reading Pat Hutchins books to children for many years. They are wonderful!! Rosie's Walk is a great book for sound effects! As Rosie goes obliviously on her walk,the fox encounters all sorts of sound effect producing trials. Great fun!

We have the board book edition, and I have to admit, I didn't think my 2-year old was going to like it when I first flipped through it. There didn't seem to be much to it --- no eye-catching illustrations and not much text. Shows how much I know... My daughter loves it. The story is less about Rosie the hen and more about the fox --- what happens to it from page to page. It is truly a sequential story and shows cause-and-effect: on one page you see the fox leaping towards Rosie, who is walking past the pond. On the next page, you see the fox in the pond. Your toddler will make the connection on her own: "Uh-oh. Fox fall in water."

My absolute FAVORITE book as a child! Simple, clever, and humorous all at the same time. GREAT for children starting to read! A+

We fell for this after watching the scholastic dvd series. It's on the Chicka Chicka Boom Boom video and we're hooked - love the detailed pictures and watching where thefox is headed.

I love this book and this is a perfect source of good learning of idiom for a small price its comes with. Perfect choice of gift for people that would love to read

Can anyone tell me what this book says about the idiom, "the calm before the storm"?

The graphic desciption and origin of the idiom are excellent. The explanation of the idiom is written in simple English that my 5 year old understands and loves. She read half of the book in one sitting. It's like a joke book to her. She was having a good time by herself. (She reads on a 3rd grade level.) I even learned a few things. It's a must have resource like a special dictionary that will also help to expand vocabulary. I now want all of the author's books.

I absolutely love this book. I am a teacher and this book really helped my students in 7th grade learn what idioms are. They really enjoyed learning about where the idioms came from.

Fairly good source for origins of idioms. Not all are here, but many. Some "conjecture" as to origin on many, but they do seem logical. A good over-all (particularly sufficient for elementary level) resource & nice leisure reading.