If you have read the book, 1984, by George Orwell, you may remember some unpleasantness that went on in Room 101. Well, Room 101 at the South Padre Island Convention Center was quite pleasant when Araceli Chapa-Leija, from Mission Collegiate High School (MCHS) and Margie Longoria from Mission High School (MHS) co-presented at the Region One Education Service Center Fall Media Conference recently. The MCHS English teacher and MHS librarian presented, Diving into Diversity: Diverse Books for Today’s Young Adults.
In their presentation, they shared ideas and titles of diverse books that could be used as paired reading with many of the books read today in English classes. Diverse books are a good way to introduce classics as well as a good way to entice reluctant readers. With many of the books, the topics are straight from recent headlines, making the novels more relevant and interesting to students.
The duo illustrated the teamwork between the librarian and the teacher. Until this school year, MCHS was located on the MHS campus and so these two worked together quite a bit over the last several years.