*Picture book for preschoolers (However, this can be used with elementary students during a poetry unit.)
*Young boy as main character
*Rating: Red Sled is a clever book about a night time sled ride for a boy and his dad. Not to mention, there’s wonderfully bright illustrations!

Short, short summary: A sad lad and a sad dad take a red sled down a hill of freshly fallen snow one night. They have a ton of fun until–oops, crash! But falling in the snow is not so bad. When they go home to warm up, they are no longer sad, and now they are glad lad and glad dad. This book may sound simple, but it really is not! Patricia Thomas wrote Red Sled in the form of a chiasmus (ky-AZ-mus). This is a type of ancient writing. Here’s what she says in the back of her book: “This format creates a kind of mirror image, with thoughts, words, or even word sounds flowing toward a center point, then reversing to reflect that order as it reaches the end.” She, then, shows the reader in the author’s note the form of a chiasmus, using her Red Sled book. Very cool!

So, what do I do with this book?

1. The most obvious thing is to write a chiasmus, either as a whole class in a shared writing lesson or individually for older students. This will NOT be easy for anyone, so take your time, have fun, and play around with rhyme and the English language. Pick an easy, well-known, action-filled subject such as Patricia Thomas did.

2. Ask students to write or draw about a time when they went on a sled ride. If you live somewhere with no snow or sledding, then you can ask children to make up a story about sled riding, based on the book Red Sled.

3. This is a great book for oral reading, listening to rhymes, text patterns, and noticing the rhythm to language. Students could actually read this book with teachers because the text is large, or they could repeat after the teacher or parent. A really fun part to read with children is when the dad and boy are on the sled, and the text says, “Go! Go! No! No! Whoa! Whoa! Flip-flop stop.” Have fun with this book!

SOCIAL NETWORKING FOR AUTHORS: TWITTER, FACEBOOK, LINKEDIN AND MORE! by Margo L. Dill

START DATE: Monday, February 22, 2010

DURATION: 4 weeks

COURSE DESCRIPTION: This class will teach writers how to use Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and other social networking sites such as Shelfari or Jacket Flap (students’ choice) to network; to build a following of fans; to start working on a brand/image; and to promote books, articles, magazines, and blogs. Instead of using Facebook and Twitter to write about your fabulous dinner or disastrous day at the grocery store, you will learn to sell yourself and your writing!

WEEKS AT A GLANCE:

Week One: Facebook: We will discuss how to use Facebook to promote yourself and your writing. We will talk about posting links to your work, using status updates to promote writing, joining Facebook groups for writers, and even starting a Fan page for yourself or your work.

Assignment: Create a Facebook profile if you haven’t yet, complete your Facebook profile, make it scream writer!, join at least one writing group and become active!, and start promoting your writing with your Facebook page.

Week Two: Twitter: My favorite marketing tool ever is Twitter. Twitter can be used in so many ways as a writer—to promote your work, to follow writers and editors who provide useful information, to find other writers for support, and to discuss writing. You will learn how to do all of this and more on Twitter. You will be introduced to two Twitter tools—Tweetdeck and Hootsuite, and you will register yourself with Twellow.

Assignment: Create a Twitter profile if you haven’t yet. Make your Twitter profile scream writer! Start tweeting. Participate in a writers’ chat. Register with Twellow. Try out Tweetdeck or Hootsuite.

Week Three: LinkedIn: This week, we will talk about how to use LinkedIn as a writer. LinkedIn seems harder for people to figure out and use to market yourself, but there are ways through your status updates, by checking out your contacts’ contacts, by recommending others and having them recommend you, and by participating in LinkedIn groups.

Assignments: Create a LinkedIn profile and/or complete yours. Make it scream writer! Join a few LinkedIn groups. Find more contacts. Check out your contacts’ contacts and link to them.

Week Four: More Social Networking and Evaluation: The content in this week’s class will depend on the participants in the class. The instructor will do a survey to find out what people are most interested in learning about and trying out with guidance: Shelfari? JacketFlap? Digg? Students will also fill out a class evaluation.

Assignments: Try out one or two of the social networks that classmates are most interested in. Fill out the class evaluation.

Materials needed: a computer with Internet service, e-mail address, and ability to sign-up for free Google Account. You also must be willing to sign up for Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn accounts if you haven’t already.

COST: $100, which will include four weeks of instruction on how to use social networking as an author and one critique for each student of a social networking profile page—student’s choice.

Here are some nice things people said about me and my classes:

Margo is the Queen of Social Networking! As WOW! Women On Writing’s social networking manager, Margo implements and oversees our Twitter and Facebook accounts. She creates and organizes unique promotions and contests to build a following of loyal fans, and keeps them up to date with the latest developments from WOW!. Since she started promoting WOW! on social networks this past year, I’ve seen a tremendous rise in traffic to our site and a greater response to our promotions. She also created a multi-user system, so that our team members can post updates as well, which eliminates any confusion and harmonizes all of our sub-accounts. Most importantly, Margo has the finesse, knowledge, and creativity it takes to keep our fans interested and eager to participate. If you want to learn how to use social networks effectively, I highly recommend Margo as an instructor. ~ Angela Mackintosh, CEO WOW! Women On Writing

The best part of the class was Margo’s accessibility. No matter how trivial the question was, she got back to us with an answer quickly. ~ Pat, student from Margo’s children’s magazine writing online course

If you are interested in signing up, you can just go to this link: WOW! Women On Writing Classroom.

Here’s a book I recently read about social networking. I recommend it!