Maupin House's Blog

FASA Annual Summer Conference/Birthday Bash

2008-07-16T14:04:00.007-04:00

Come see us at the Florida Association of School Administrators (FASA) Conference / Birthday Bash in Naples! We'll be there July 17-20 at booth #122! Make sure to come say hello and check out all of our latest books!

National Staff Development Council Summer Conference

2008-07-11T11:50:00.003-04:00

Are you attending the NSDC Summer Conference in Orlando next week (July 13-16)? Then come visit Maupin House at booth #210!

Author Susan Koehler (Crafting Expository Papers; CraftPlus Daily Writing Lessons) will be presenting "A Community of Learners Creates a Schoolwide Writing Revolution." You can meet Susan at our booth after her presentation. She'll autograph books--including Crafting Expository Papers, part of the award-winning Crafting Series. So stop by booth #210, check out our titles, and learn about CraftPlus. We hope to see you there!

Open house at Maupin House

2008-07-03T17:05:00.003-04:00

Join us at our warehouse on Friday, August 15 from 4-6 p.m. and Saturday, August 16 from 9 a.m.-1 p.m. for a special sale and open house. We'll be offering discounts on our books, serving refreshments, and getting to know all of the wonderful teachers in the area. You can browse through all of our titles, tour the office, and leave with books in hand, ready for the start of school! So stop by and tell your friends!

Maupin House Publishing
2416 NW 71st Place
Gainesville, FL 32653
(800) 524-0634

Get free shipping in June!

2008-06-19T10:28:00.006-04:00

Subscribe to our monthly e-newsletter, and you'll receive a coupon code for free shipping for online orders placed in June. Each newsletter is packed with teaching tips, author profiles, new releases, and an online coupon code especially for subscribers. Just click here and type "subscribe" in the inquiry box. We'll get you signed up and send you the coupon code to use for the rest of the month with no limit!

Love our stuff?

2008-06-18T12:00:00.001-04:00

Tell Reading Rockets about your favorite Maupin House titles by clicking here and selecting "Books for Educators" from the drop-down menu!

The Crafting Series wins!

2008-06-10T09:22:00.003-04:00

The Crafting Series won the Association of Educational Publishers' Distinguished Achievement Award in the Professional Development category. The series includes the three teacher guides—Crafting Comparison Papers, Crafting Expository Papers, and Crafting Opinion and Persuasive Papers—and the three student writing wheels—Writing to Compare Wheel, Writing to Explain Wheel, and Writing for Opinion/Persuasion Wheel.

Library-a-Go-Go

2008-06-09T09:46:00.002-04:00

No, it's not the latest dance craze started by librarians across the nation. It's a book-dispensing machine available at certain Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) stations and shopping centers that holds about 400 popular books available for free to holders of library cards from the Contra Costa County Library. BART riders and shoppers can check out three books at a time and return them to the Library-a-Go-Go machines. Click here for an article and pictures.

Think of all the other high-traffic areas the Library-a-Go-Go machines could pop up...bus stops, airports, DMVs, even public bathrooms--you could read while you go-go!

Social networking

2008-05-30T17:13:00.003-04:00

Since you've probably heard this term thrown around a lot lately, we'll keep this brief: Check out Maupin House on Facebook and Twitter! Come post on our wall, follow our "tweets," and get some great teaching tips and resources while you're at it!

New digital poetry and story videos from Nile Stanley!

2008-05-19T12:39:00.005-04:00

Check out new digital poetry and story videos from Nile by clicking here! From PowerPoint presentations to videos of performances and songs, there's plenty of poetry here to start your summer off with a rhyme!

Another award finalist!

2008-05-15T09:47:00.006-04:00

Indiana Jones may be winning over moviegoers in a week, but we have our own winning indie here at Maupin House: The Middle School Writing Toolkit by Tim Clifford is a finalist in the 2008 Next Generation Indie Book Awards! Congratulations, Tim!

GoodSearch...and good for your school

2008-05-13T09:59:00.002-04:00

Earn money for your school by using Yahoo's GoodSearch. Every time you start a new search, GoodSearch donates money to a school of your choice (about one cent per search). If an entire school, district, or community gets on board, that could really add up!

Grant opportunities

2008-05-13T09:46:00.004-04:00

The May issue of Scholastic Administrator offers a round-up of eight grant opportunities. If you don't subscribe to the magazine, you can find the article online here.

Maupin House has also put together some information on grant writing and funding sources on our website. We hope teachers and administrators find this helpful and are inspired to write some successful grant applications. Good luck and, as always, if you have feedback on our grants page or anything else, please contact us through our website or blog.

The Apron Ladies at IRA

2008-05-08T09:27:00.007-04:00

More photos from IRA! Here are The Apron Ladies, Terri Heidger (left) and Beth Stevens (right), at the Maupin House booth and with literacy education professor/author Tim Rasinski.

The conference was a huge success and a lot of fun. Hope to see you at IRA West in Phoenix or IRA North Central in Minneapolis!

Work and play at IRA

2008-05-07T09:30:00.005-04:00

The annual IRA conference isn't over just yet, but Carol Baldwin, Maupin House author and "conference correspondent," has been kind enough to share some photos from her time in Atlanta.
From left to right, are Maupin House marketing coordinator Laura Lok, advertising coordinator Rita Beck, author Margriet Ruurs, publisher Julie Graddy, and author Carol Baldwin.

Wikibooks

2008-05-02T12:55:00.002-04:00

According to their webpage

Wikibooks is a Wikimedia community for creating a free library of educational textbooks that anyone can edit. Wikibooks began on July 10, 2003; since then Wikibooks has grown to include over 29,136 pages in a multitude of textbooks created by volunteers like you!

So go ahead and contribute to an online textbook...or just take advantage of some free content!

Meet our authors at IRA 2008

2008-05-01T10:06:00.007-04:00

The International Reading Association's (IRA) annual conference is May 4-8 in Atlanta, Georgia. Maupin House will be driving up, books in tow, so stop by our booth (#845) to buy our books and meet our wonderful authors. Here is a schedule of presentation times and signing times (at the Maupin House booth) for all of our authors at IRA. Click here to search the convention program for specific session titles and more information. It's going to be a great conference!

Nancy Boyles, author of That’s a GREAT Answer!, Hands-On Literacy Coaching, Constructing Meaning, AND Teaching Written Response to Text

Presenting at the pre-conference institute Monday, May 4: 9-5PM, Omni Hotel-International Ballroom D
Signing Monday, May 5: 1:30-2:30PM and Tuesday, May 6: 1-2PM

Carol Baldwin, author of Teaching the Story

Presenting Monday, May 5: 11AM-12PM, Room C306
Signing Monday, May 5: 12:30-1:30PM

Terri Heidger and Beth Stevens, authors of Become a Good Reader!

Signing Monday, May 5: 10:30-11:30PM and Tuesday, May 6: 9:30-10:30AM

Brod Bagert, author of Hormone Jungle AND Rainbows, Head Lice, and Pea-Green Tile

Performing at the Poetry Olio, Wednesday, May 7: 7:30-9:30PM, Omni Hotel-International Ballroom F
Signing Monday, May 5: 3:30-4:30PM; Tuesday, May 6: 10:30-11:30AM; and Wednesday, May 7: 10:30-11:30AM

Margriet Ruurs, author of The Power of Poems AND Virtual Maniac

Presenting Wednesday, May 7: 12:30-1:30PM, Room C308 and performing at the Poetry Olio, Wednesday, May 7: 7:30-9:30PM, Omni Hotel-International Ballroom F
Signing Monday, May 5: 2:30-3:30PM; Tuesday, May 6: 2:30-3:30PM;Wednesday, May 7: 2-3PM

Susan Nations, Mellissa Alonso, and Suzi Boyett. Nations and Alonso are the authors of Primary Literacy Centers AND More Primary Literacy Centers, and Boyett and Nations are the authors of So Much Stuff, So Little Space.

Presenting Wednesday, May 7: 2-4:45PM, Room B202
Signing Thursday, May 8: 9-10AM

Connie Campbell Dierking, author of Teaching Early Writing and Reading Together, Literature Models to Teach Expository Writing, Teaching Writing Skills with Children's Literature, AND Growing Up Writing

Presenting Thursday, May 8: 1-2PM, Room B207
Signing Thursday, May 8: 2:30-3:30PM

El Día de los Niños/El Día de los Libros

2008-04-30T09:52:00.004-04:00

Today is El Día de los Niños/El Día de los Libros (Children's Day/Book Day)! The Publishing Latino Voices for America Task Force (PLVA) and the Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC), a division of the American Library Association (ALA), have partnered to create a recommended reading list of children’s books in both English and Spanish. The list is aimed at readers from infancy to 14 years of age and is available online at www.getcaughtreading.org.

And what better way to "get caught reading" than to read a Caught'ya! A Caught'ya, created by veteran teacher Jane Bell Kiester, is a sentence or two of an ongoing, funny story that teachers put on the blackboard or overhead four or five times a week. Each sentence contains a vocabulary word and is laced with grammatical and mechanical errors. Students write the Caught'ya as correctly as they can while the teacher walks around the room, giving individual, positive feedback to as many children as possible. Then the teacher and students check the Caught'ya sentences together, using proofreading symbols to mark errors as they review reasons for the changes. You can email Maupin House (caughtya@maupinhouse.com) for free student sentences from Caught'ya, Caught'ya Again, Giggles in the Middle, and The Chortling Bard.

Latino Books Month

2008-04-30T09:27:00.006-04:00

The Association of American Publishers (AAP) has designated May 2008 as the fifth annual “Latino Books Month.” During the month-long celebration, booksellers, librarians, and others in the book industry will encourage people in their communities to read books by and for Latinos, in both English and Spanish.

The AAP Task Force on Publishing Latino Voices for America (PLVA) has created a Latino Books Month Resource Kit, which will include:

Latino Books Summer Reading List with recommended books for adults and children, in English and Spanish
A Publishing Latino Voices Brochure, which includes a sampling of titles by and for Latinos published by AAP member publishing companies.
Get Caught Reading/¡Ajá, leyendo! posters featuring celebrities including Gloria Estefan, Maya and Miguel, Jorge Ramos, Dora the Explorer, Jenna Bush, Mauricio Islas, and others.
A “how-to” sheet on starting a Spanish-language reading group within a community.
Contact information for booking Latino authors for author appearances.

The resource kits are currently available to booksellers, librarians, educators, and others who wish to promote a love of reading among Latinos in their communities. Those interested in a Latino Books Month resource kit should email Katie Ly at the Association of American Publishers kly@publishers.org or visit the AAP Booth at BookExpo America, Thursday, May 29 – Sunday, June 1 (Booth #4129). (AAP press release, April 15, 2008)

If you are looking for some professional resources that work especially well for English language learners or just want to celebrate Latino Books Month by integrating some Spanish into your class, check out Flip for Comprehension, winner of the Learning Magazine 2008 Teachers’ Choice Award for the Classroom, and its Spanish translation, Dar la Vuelta a la Comprensión, both by Emily Cayuso. You can also view our list of other ELL-friendly titles by clicking here.

Poem in your pocket

2008-04-25T16:55:00.003-04:00

National Poetry Month was started by the Academy of American Poets. According to Whitney Hallberg, Managing Editor of ForeWord Magazine:

This year, special attention is being given to Poem in your Pocket Day.

"There is a simple premise to Poem In Your Pocket Day," National Poetry Month coordinator Elaine Bleakney told FTW. "Select a poem you love and carry it with you in your pocket to share with friends, family, and co-workers on April 17. The project puts in action the power of the poem to both transport a reader and be transported by one. "

Pocket-sized poems are available for download online. Poets.org also has poems specially formatted to fit the screens of handheld devices.

Writing poetry, a great way to celebrate National Poetry Month, has been found to be therapeutic and a great outlet for creativity. But even those who aren't poetically inclined can write a poem with help from family and friends. Ask each person to contribute words that can be compiled into a poem. Poets.org offers a formula. The staffers at ForeWord magazine created this instant classic:

A corny eunuch percolates velveteen blossoms of splodgy, tropical discoveries embarrassing the flamboyant nightingales who saunter past.

"Punt" says the egg, who is really a fulcrum and one that cross dresses in his esoteric and fragmented sleeps.

Paul Engle once said, "Poetry is ordinary language raised to the Nth power. Poetry is boned with ideas, nerved and blooded with emotions, all held together by the delicate, tough skin of words."

Celebrate this ages-old art form with book displays, readings, workshops, or any of the thirty ideas at Poets.org.

Poetry Month happenings

2008-04-25T12:38:00.005-04:00

Thanks to Maupin House author Carol Baldwin for passing along this wonderful opportunity for K-12 teachers:

Former U.S. Poet Laureate Robert Pinsky, in cooperation with the Boston University School of Education, is accepting applications from teachers and teacher/administrator teams across grade level for a remarkable week of poetry in Boston, July 14-18. Participants will read and discuss poems with renowned practitioners of the art, five award-winning American poets. Past faculty include Frank Bidart, Mark Doty, Louise Gluck and Heather McHugh. Teachers will work in groups to develop lesson plans to share with each other and bring back to their classrooms.

Visit the Favorite Poem Project website to learn more, or to download an application.

For more poetry-related activities and resources this month and every month, check out NCTE's recent blog posts on poetry here and here.

Authors on TV!

2008-04-18T09:34:00.004-04:00

Our authors continually make us proud. They work hard and they teach hard, yet they make it all look so easy. Terri Heidger and Beth Stevens, authors of Become a Good Reader: Six Simple Steps, are getting some much deserved recognition on their local Sarasota TV station.

Focus on the middle

2008-04-02T17:01:00.004-04:00

High schoolers earned a "D" on a quiz testing their knowledge of literature and history and administered by Common Core, a nonpartisan group that advocates for more focus on liberal arts education. This Education Week article highlights even more about students' "lack of critical content knowledge."

But it seems like middle school is really where the focus needs to be, according to another article in Educational Week.

More than a decade after a prominent group of middle-grades reformers set out to infuse higher academic standards into what critics deemed the touchy-feely world of middle schools, many teachers are still grappling with ways to motivate students to excel intellectually while helping them adapt to the dramatic physical and emotional changes that come with puberty.

That mix of rigor, relevance, and responsiveness, experts say, is crucial for guiding students, particularly those most at risk of dropping out, on the path to high school graduation and later success. Too many schools serving 6th through 9th graders, however, have yet to find the right prescription for keeping those youngsters engaged at a time when their growing curiosity, independence, and need for the acceptance of their peers may lead them to act out or zone out in school.

Writing is of particular concern and importance. Can most middle schoolers craft a clear, succinct, well-organized essay or narrative? Then how will they get through college application essays and the SAT writing test?

It's not a completely hopeless situation, and there are some teaching techniques we know to be effective. For example, writing is best taught through models--models of great writing from both fiction and non-fiction books.

Maupin House embraces this philosophy throughout many of our writing books, as well as in our CraftPlus Writing Curriculum program. Now we're introducing something especially for struggling sixth graders...

The Sixth-Grade Language Arts Course Recovery Summer Program provides 80 hours of on-level, balanced literacy, daily instruction for interventional language-arts summer school. Paced instruction for writing workshop engages struggling sixth-grade writers. Students practice Target-Skills®-based writing after reading short fiction and non-fiction selections, then learn how to “go inside” their reading to practice text response, vocabulary, and convention skills. The program:

Links reading selections with writing, conventions, and reading-response practice.
Integrates writing instruction for key non-fiction genres using writing workshop and the writing process.
Builds writing competency with focused daily writing practice.
Provides intensive daily practice for short- and long-answer written response.
Embeds daily practice with vocabulary and convention and grammar skills.
Motivates students with engaging and varied writing experiences.
Documents progress with formative and summative assessments.

Winners' circle: part two

2008-04-02T16:44:00.005-04:00

The Association of Educational Publishers has chosen two Maupin House products as finalists for its Distinguished Achievement Awards.

That’s a GREAT Answer! Teaching Literature Response to K-3, ELL, and Struggling Readers by Nancy Boyles and the Crafting Series, which includes three teacher guides and three student writing wheels for comparison, expository, and opinion/persuasive writing.

The Association of Educational Publishers’ Distinguished Achievement Awards recognize the year's most outstanding materials in the field of teaching and learning. These awards honor the top products within the categories of Curriculum, Periodicals, and Professional Development. That’s a GREAT Answer! is a finalist in the Professional Development category, and the Crafting Series is a finalist in the Curriculum category.

Winners' circle: part one

2008-04-02T16:21:00.007-04:00

Maupin House Publishing is proud to announce that Hormone Jungle: Coming of Age in Middle School by Brod Bagert has won the International Reading Association’s Young Adults’ Choices Award.

Young Adults’ Choices is an annual project of the International Reading Association. Each year approximately 4,500 students in grades 7 to 12 from different regions of the United States select 30 titles from new books donated by North American publishers.

The goals of the lists are to: provide middle and secondary school students with an opportunity to voice their opinions about the books written for them; develop an annual annotated reading list of new books that young adults enjoy reading; and assist teachers, librarians, booksellers, parents, and others in finding books that will encourage young readers.

Young Adult Choices’ annotated list is printed in the November Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy.

About the Book

Hormone Jungle combines poetry and narrative in a scrapbook format with original, color artwork created by middle schoolers. From best friends and crushes to underarm hair and an all-out battle-of-the-sexes poetry war, Bagert chronicles the humor and angst of middle-school students while inspiring readers to become poets themselves. Last year, Hormone Jungle won the Association of Educational Publishers’ Distinguished Achievement Award and the Independent Publisher Gold Book Award.

About the Author
Brod Bagert’s poetry captures a myriad of voices that speaks to adults and children alike. He is the author of eleven books of poetry, including Maupin House’s Rainbows, Head Lice, and Pea-Green Tile, a collection of poems written in the voice of the classroom teacher, and Dial’s Giant Children, which was nominated for the 2005 K-3 Children’s Choice Award.

Indie publishing: part two

2008-03-12T17:44:00.013-04:00

It's time for the second installment of our indie publishing series!

Printing terminology isn't unique to indie publishers and, in fact, it can confuse any publisher. So, let's take a look at some of the lingo that comes up in the process of printing a book. (Check out http://www.printindustry.com/printing-terms.html for more definitions.)

Web press: A press that prints from rolls of paper and then cuts it into sheets of paper.
Sheetfed press: A press that prints sheets of paper, as compared to a web press.
Offset printing: A printing technique that transfers ink from a plate to a blanket to paper instead of directly from plate to paper.
Spine: Back or binding edge of a publication.
Perfect binding: To bind sheets that have been ground at the spine and are held to the cover by glue. Also called adhesive bind, cut-back bind, glue bind, paper bind, patent bind, perfecting bind, soft bind and soft cover.
Saddle stitch binding: To bind by stapling sheets together where they fold at the spine, as compared to side stitch. Also called pamphlet stitch, saddle wire and stitch bind.
Spiral binding: To bind using a spiral of continuous wire or plastic looped through holes. Also called coil bind.
Signature: A printed sheet folded at least once, possibly many times, to become part of a book, magazine or other publication.
Specifications: A complete and precise written description of features of a printing job such as type size and leading, paper grade and quantity, printing or binding method. Abbreviated specs.
Trim size: The size of the printed material in its finished stage (e.g., the finished trim size is 5 1\2" x 8 1\2").
Bleed: Printing that extends to the edge of a sheet or page after trimming.
Die cut: To cut irregular shapes in paper or paperboard using a die (a device for cutting, scoring, stamping, embossing and debossing).
Digital proofs: Page proofs produced through electronic memory transferred onto paper via laser or ink-jet.
Ghosting: (1) Phenomenon of a faint image appearing on a printed sheet where it was not intended to appear. Chemical ghosting refers to the transfer of the faint image from the front of one sheet to the back of another sheet. Mechanical ghosting refers to the faint image appearing as a repeat of an image on the same side of the sheet. (2) Phenomenon of printed image appearing too light because of ink starvation.
PPI: Pages per inch. The number of pages contained in a one-inch stack of paper.
Lay-flat binding: Method of perfect binding that allows a publication to lie fully open. (Also known as Lay-flat perfect binding.)

The Internet is great for deciphering some of this jargon, but a good printer rep is invaluable in helping you determine what's best for your printed book and pocketbook. Thank you to the wonderful printers that help Maupin House do what we do!