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Have your students read at least one of Gennifer's books before she visits your school. |
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2. |
Give Gennifer a quick rundown of what your students have been working on in their history and language arts classes. |
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Have a student or a team of students introduce Gennifer. |
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Make certain your students have questions prepared. |
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Set up the room so there is an aisle for students to quickly move to the front of the room. Gennifer’s presentations have a lot of audience participation. |
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Make certain Gennifer is as close to the students as possible. It is hard to make a connection when the students are in another zip code. |
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Teachers are absolutely the most powerful influence on students there ever has been or ever will be. When teachers are excited about the author and her books, students will be excited about the author visit. |
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8. |
Consider a writing contest. The contest winners will receive tickets to a writers’ lunch with Gennifer. |
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9. |
Create an all-school read. The best way to get the most out of a school visit is to do an all-school read of one of Gennifer’s books. If the teachers, the librarian, the principal, the janitors, the office staff, and all of the kids (4th grade and up) all read the same book, the school goes electric. Everybody has a stake in the school visit. Everyone has questions. The school explodes with discussions about the book, ideas the book generates, a quest for research driven by the book, opinions about characters, discussions of themes and comparisons with other books. This is an intense educational and community-building experience that is often the highpoint of the school year for students and faculty alike. |
