by Phil | Feb 13, 2020 | Memories
A High Five For Dad, A High Five For Glenn Burke My dad will never read my new middle grade novel, A High Five for Glenn Burke. Even if he does, he won’t remember it. He has dementia. I said goodbye to my dad last summer on July 16. Well, I said goodbye to a...
by Phil | Dec 12, 2019 | Memories
A High Five For Andrew Clements Thank you, Andrew Clements. Like thousands of other classroom teachers over the past twenty plus years, I shared the novel Frindle by Andrew Clements with my students. In class 6-413 at the West Farms School in the Bronx in the...
by Phil | Jun 20, 2016 | Education, Ideas, Memories
The Teacher and the Rock Star For those of you that know me, you know Wonder by RJ Palacio is one of my favorite middle grade novels. It’s a book every elementary school kid should read or should have read before middle school. One of my favorite lines from Wonder...
by Phil | Nov 30, 2015 | Cool Finds, Ideas, Memories, Social
A WHOLE NEW BALLGAME is for Erin. Erin is Erin Murphy. Erin’s my agent. In the acknowledgments, I wrote: The words — “listening to the music of the moment” and “our name is our virtue” — are from Jason Mraz’s,...
by Phil | Sep 23, 2015 | Books, Education, Ideas, Memories
MARVELOUS CORNELIUS is a modern day folktale. If you teach folktales in your classroom or library, please consider using this text. Here are some of the ways that MARVELOUS CORNELIUS fits the criteria: Generally speaking, folktales are short stories or legends that...
by Phil | Aug 25, 2015 | Cool Finds, Ideas, Memories
Several weeks back, we placed a difficult post on social media about our rescue dog Cleveland, who we had adopted four months earlier: “Sadly, we’re dealing with an unfortunate situation with Cleveland. She’s a beautiful animal — gentle as can...
