Awards

Last week in class we got to quickly overview all the different types of literature awards. I had no idea there were so many awards for all the different types of literature. I knew that there were book awards for African American literature, but I didn't even think about there being awards for Middle East literature, Asian-Pacific American literature to just name a few. After learning about all these different awards I understand why I had never heard of them before. There isn't a lot of information or publicity for these awards. My group was assigned the Middle East award and when we researched we could hardly find any information about the award except for a small paragraph rattling off general information. The website that we did find had all the books that had won the award from the past and when one of our group members went to the library none of the books she found had a seal or any recognition that it had won the award. Our assigned award wasn't the only award that was like this. I was surprised that there weren't seals for these awards that were put on the book. I think that these awards are important because it points out exceptionally good work for these different groups of literature, but most of them end up being pointless if these awards aren't recognized on the book or in the inside covers of the book. No one will even know that these are good books to read or have in your classroom just by going to the library. Obviously teachers and readers should do research on the literature they are reading, but if you are just browsing the library you would be more likely to read a book if it had won an award. So I personally think that these awards should get more publicity and have recognition on there books. I learned a lot this week in just about an hour I had no idea there were so many awards and I am looking forward to reading books from each of the different categories.

Bronx Masquerade

This past week I got to the pleasure to read "Bronx Masquerade" by Nikki Grimes. It was a refreshing novel to read. The poems that followed each character's feelings really broke up the readings and made the book read much faster. I did however think that focusing on 18 different characters was too much for me to handle. I found myself forgetting who was who. Sometimes characters were mentioned and then not revisited to later on and I thought they were completely new characters. So I had to write down every new character with a little description so I could keep everyone straight. Also the amount of characters made me wonder why the author focused on some of the characters more than the others. She started to talk about one character, but then not really elaborate on them except for one poem by that certain character. Also I felt that some characters were developed more than others and I would like to know why she chose those certain characters to develop more instead of the others. I thought all the poems were very well written and it made me wish I could express my feelings and thoughts as eloquently as the students did. I felt all emotions and events that a teenager might experience in high school were touched on, which made the novel relatable to almost anyone. I found myself going back to my high school years and relating to a character or two. Some issues that the students were dealing with were very deep and sometimes taboo to talk about, such as losing a parent to an Overdose. Obviously these issues are out there and I think it is important to talk about them and to let the children who are experiencing these issues to know they aren't alone. Besides the confusing characters overall I really enjoyed this book and it definitely didn't feel like homework when I was reading this novel.