AUTHOR VISIT: DEVRI WALLS!

 Devri Walls came on Feb. 29th to speak to several English classes. We had a great time listening to her inspirations and how she became an author of fantasy books for young adults. I think the classes really enjoyed her talk, I know I did!

Mrs. Walls described the design process of her book covers and how she works with a Photoshop artist to come up with the branded covers of her book series. She also went over all the related careers in the book industry including book agents, copy editors, publicists, digital artists and photographers.  Mrs. Walls has a acting and musical background, and even though she wouldn't sing for us, she kept everyone's attention with her animated talk.  Mrs. Walls visited several high schools in the area that week.

During 1st and 4th blocks Mrs. Walls met with several student writers and went over their work. Here she sat with junior Elyssa Corbaley and goes over Elyssa's latest story. The students really got a lot out of her suggestions and comments. 

Devri admitted, "I really loved the way you altered the set up and let me sit down with the kids. I was so nervous at first but it worked beautifully and I have to say it was one of my favorite parts of the week. Hopefully the students enjoyed it as well." 

I hope we have the chance to have Devri Walls visit our school again.

AVID speaker: Mr. Bart Vandegrift

We has the privilege of hearing Mr. Bart Vandegrift, the Chelan County Court Commissioner today, for the AVID speaker of the week. Mr. Vandegrift has been an appointed judge for the juvenile and family court for the past 17 years. I really liked his words of wisdom that he presented today:

1. If you're not a genius, work harder.

2. Make friends with inspirational people.

3. Get out of your comfort zone.

4. READ READ READ 

(and no, I didn't pay him to say that!) He encouraged the students to read everything they enjoy and then try something new. Wow, I couldn't have said it better. 

We have an author coming!!

I have some exciting news: on February 29th Devri Walls, a YA fantasy author from Idaho, will be here to share with some of our English classes. I have purchased five of her books and they will be available after she speaks.

Here are her books. The Wings of Arian, Wings of Lomay, Wings of Tavea and Wings of Nestor are all in the Solus Series.  The Wizard's Heir is a stand alone title. I hope you get to hear her, she should be very interesting. She visited Quincy High School last year and they enjoyed her so much they invited her back this year. She added more high schools in our area on her tour. If you are a writer, be sure to speak to Mrs. Gemeinhart so you can be a part of a group of student writers who spend some time with Devri Walls.

The 5th Wave - Official Trailer #1 (Chloe Grace Moretz & Nick Robinson)

On Friday, January 22, 2016, the movie based on Rick Yancey's popular book, The 5th Wave, will be released and should be popular to CHS students as this book has been heavily checked out since we got our first copy in 2013. Watch the trailer for a glimpse of this tension filled movie:

The 5th Wave is also one of the Washington State Evergreen Teen Book Award nominees for this school year. If you read at least two of the nominees, you qualify to vote for your favorite. I predict The 5th Wave will be a big contender for this year's award. Watch for ballots in March to vote.

I discovered another fun website today: www.canva.com

In just a few minutes I created a fun card for you. This Christmas why don't you have some fun and make something for yourself or send you grandma something. I guarantee she'll like hearing from you!

Have a very Merry Christmas CHS!  Mrs. H.

Thanksgiving

I am so thankful today as I reflect on how blessed I am to be the teacher librarian at CHS! Last week I had the privilege to speak to the two AVID classes. I had a lot of fun thinking back to my high school years as I prepared my PowerPoint presentation. I was very grateful I still had my old high school yearbooks and had fun looking at all the photos and comments. Here's a few slides from my talk:

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If you want to hear more of what I had to say, just ask me and don't forget to buy a yearbook. 

You never know how you'll use those old photos in the future.

World Wide Web - Do you know what it first looked like?

Do you know what the very first page posted to the Web from the CERN lab in Switzerland in 1991 looked like? Take a peek and click the link below, you'll be surprised that some of the links still work!

 http://info.cern.ch/hypertext/WWW/TheProject.html

This is a a list of subjects one could find on the Web in its very early days:

 http://info.cern.ch/hypertext/DataSources/bySubject/Overview.html

You can find information what the web looks like now in real time at:  http://www.internetlivestats.com/ 

We've come a long way, but I wonder what is next?

For more information on the history of the web: 

http://webfoundation.org/about/vision/history-of-the-web/

Sir Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web in 1989