I'm a bit tardy again this week with these websites. But I wanted to put together an extra special list this week (how's that for an excuse!). This week will highlight *lots* of Language Arts and Literature resources, focusing on sites that particularly interactive or contain resources that would support those found in your school libraries. I would also refer you back to a previous Wednesday Website about Kids and Young Adults Publishing On-line as a component to this week's list.

I often start my searches with a resource like Kathy Schrock's Guide for Educators. This is a directory, as opposed to a Search Engine, and is therefore organized by topic by *real* people instead of by computerized robots. In this case, Kathy is a school librarian. Her link to Literature and Language Arts will lead you to a wealth of resources:

One link on this page will lead you to Ask an Young Adult Author at the Internet Public Library. This takes you to a short biography of several authors, a link to their main homepages (if available) and then a form to fill out if you have a question. A great idea and there are several places on the Net to do similar things. Answers are either posted on-line or sent to the student/class via email.

Another such site is called Invite an Author to your School. This site looks like it support by cyber and actual visitation by authors to classrooms.

The Children's Literature Web Guide has tons of authors listed. Many have email addresses and places to contact writers for correspondance (assuming they are still alive, that is!).

And sites developed by authors for the classroom, like Aaron Shephard's Reader's Theatre website.

There are also several interesting literature resources to find text:

Tales of Wonder is an archive of folk tales from around the world.

The English Server at CMU is a huge resource of and about fiction for older students.

Indigenous People's Literature is a great and huge resource.

If you are doing Shakespeare, the entire texts can be found on-line and searched by keyword.

There are also links to these great resources for teachers for book reviews and classroom activities:

Here is something called Cyber Guides -- on-line resources to use while reading a book. I haven't heard any reviews of this one, but it does have the support of Pacific Bell's Knowledge Network, which is a good sign. I also noted that all of these guides are in "testing" stage and you are encouraged to send feedback or suggestions.

More sites for educators include the Multicultural Book Review for K-12. You can submit your own reviews too.

Carol Hurst's Children's Literature Site also has reviews and activity suggestions.

Moving from Kathy Schrock, these are some sites that I've visited and others which came from a list forwarded by Jim Culbertson. Jim forwards resources from the Tech.life section of the Philadelphia Inquirer to all of us here at the Fund. An article on K-12 resources is published there by Joyce Kasman Valenza, a local school librarian, every Thursday.

The Reading Rainbow page is a great one. It's got information about the TV show and resources to match the programming as well as descriptions and activity suggestoins for the books. But it also have writing and illustrator contests for kids. Some great kid writing and reading available here. And the third contest is now -- "Reading Rainbow's third annual "Young Writer's and Illustrators Awards Contest!" Entries will be accepted from January to April 1997. The national contest, which attracted more than 60,000 entries last year from students in grades K-3, is designed to encourage children to write and illustrate their own stories."

The Stage Hands Puppet page is for younger kids to make and use puppets. My favorite is the scrap puppet site with suggestions from other kids on how to make them with materials you find around the home.

And another puppet resource I ran into, Japan Puppet Atlas, has a ton of stuff about Japanese puppetry of all kinds that would be of more interest to older kids (like me!). Much of it is in english and japanese and it's fascinating.

Kay Vandergrift Special Interest page "This home page is intended as a means of sharing ideas and information with students and with others interested in youth literature, genre fiction, women's studies, and related topics." Some really interesting stuff here for teachers.

The Children's Literature Homepage is a newsletter that has resources for parents to work with kids. Find links to on-line resources here and get a peek of upcoming issues of their newsletter.

And, for more experimental readers/writers (definitely for older kids!), there are resources such as Bohemian Ink about experimental literature and poetry.

As usual, I'd love feedback on what you find, how you use it, and what you think! Thanks. Have a great week/end.

Christina