Dear WinkWorld Readers,
Sometimes it feels like I live in two different worlds: My town friends and my country friends. Sometimes these two groups like different stories, but I just try to share whatever might have value for someone, somewhere. In this WinkWorld, I share two different stories. Below please meet my Storyteller mama and babies, which was a surprise gift to me a few years ago. Thanks, Marje Kaiser!
The storyteller brings you the following two stories.
First, look what just came in the mail, unexpectedly.
As many of my former adult students could tell you, one of my great joys in being a professor is that I love to share my books, er,… and I hate to share my books. I share when I see that a student might connect with a particular book, and I mostly get the books returned in a timely fashion. But, sometimes one of my books ends up forgotten on an obscure bookshelf, under a couch, or with a stack of children’s book somewhere. This seems to happen, when I need that book for a specific reason or person. Of course, I do not know where the book is. Years pass.
However, a couple of times a year, I get a surprise package in the mail, when a former student (now teacher) finds one of my books and mails it to me. All of the happy memories of that student and that class come flooding back to me. This is exactly what happened yesterday, when a book mailed from Wyoming showed up in our mail. Thank you, Mandy White. I remember you so well: a quiet, engaged, active student. You were such a curious, wonderful learner. And, thank you for your work as a teacher! We appreciate you.
Mandy, I no longer need this book; do you want it back? If not, someone else want it? I will mail it to you. It’s good to keep books moving. What good do they do on my bookshelf?
On to the second story. . . and, this story is specifically for another former student, now teacher, Deb Harrison. I hope you like the story, too. The original story was in my first book, published in 1997. I no longer have the page proofs of that book, so it is not readily available for online reading. Here is a copy of what my first book looks like today.
I remember that day when the UPS guy delivered a copy of my first book to the ranch. Of course, I was thrilled. Standing outside in the wind, he looked at me and asked: “Is it a cookbook?” Nope, Critical Pedagogy: Notes from the Real World is not a cookbook. However, I did add a fudge recipe, to a later book, The Power of Story, and it amazes me how many positive critiques, I have had about that recipe. . ..
Back To The Little Red Book about Critical Pedagogy
I prefer some of the original stories in the first edition better than those same stories in later editions, when various editors asked me to cut back here and there, and add other stories. I sort of felt that some of the stories lost their pizzazz with too much edit work.
However, in the 3rd edition, pictured below, I did find a fairly good copy of an original story.
Deb, be sure to read until you come to the part of “Hooked on Books” by Fader and McNeil.
