Announcement! Drumroll Please...

So it's been a little quiet around here but only because I've been working on a super top-secret project that somehow turned into two super top-secret projects. I've been waiting until they were all done to share them with you, my faithful readers.

As a direct result of my participation in Armchair BEA, especially the Blogger Development and Blogger Ethics strands, I have re-branded my blog and moved it to Wordpress.

If you can no longer stand the suspense, click here.  If you are interested in my motives, keep reading.

After discussing issues of plagiarism, especially as they pertain to web image copyrights and memes and features, I felt compelled to overhaul my blog so that all images and features were totally original.  (A quick Google search proved that I was not as clever as I thought when coming up with feature names.)  Also, I've been dissatisfied with my blog's layout.  I've been through three on Blogger since I started blogging - all free templates - but none of them ever felt quite right.  They were not a reflection of who I am as a reader, writer, and blogger.  However, I am also not a graphic or web designer.  Another quick Google search introduced me to PicMonkey - a free, easy to use photo editing tool, which allowed me to create my own original blog banner and labels.

After cleaning house and sprucing the place up, I felt it was time to take the next step and move the whole shebang over to Wordpress, which I did with relative ease.  What took so long was updating each link in each post to link to my new Wordpress site and adding labels and changing feature names throughout.  I also had to tweak my blog name just a little bit, so I could get the URL I wanted.  I am now at Matched Manuscripts: Reviews and Recommendations: matchedmanuscripts.wordpress.com.  The premise of matching readers with texts based on mood, setting, and experiences remains.  As part of the new move, I have also joined Twitter.  You can follow me @matchedmscripts.

BUT, I'm finally done, and apparently, the changes and move were not all for naught.  I recently showed my new site to my husband, and he responded, unprompted, "It looks like you."  So, if you were wondering what I look like in blog form, apparently this is it.

My new blog banner

My new review label

Label identifying posts part of the
Sarah Dessen Re-Read Challenge hosted by I Eat Words

Label identifying posts part of my Scripted Stanzas feature
(previously Scribbled Verses) - original fiction, poetry,
and memoir penned by me

Label identifying posts as part of my Traces of Text feature
(originally Flashback Fridays) - posts revisiting texts and
bookish events that have impacted me

While in the midst of this project, I attended a Leadership Seminar hosted by The Delta Kappa Gamma, an organization for educators.  I was inspired to begin a feature dedicated to education detailing teaching strategies I am using, projects I am working on, and conferences I am attending.  My current blog, Matched, sometimes felt like it had two identities, book blog and educational blog, which meant I wasn't always reaching my target audience.  Therefore, I began a feature solely devoted to educational matters, Incombustible Classrooms: Igniting Educators Across the Community, and moved my posts about teaching matters from Matched there.  Look for a recap of the DKG Leadership Seminar soon!

Pop on over the new site to see my Top Ten Five Books of 2013 (so far), and I hope you like the new look and feel.  I am very, very happy with it.  Please make sure, though, that you update your blog feed with the URL for the new site, matchedmanuscripts.wordpress.com, since after this post I will no longer be posting to Blogger.  Blogger was a great platform for a beginning blogger, but I feel Wordpress will really help my blog grow more.

I hope to see you over at Matched Manuscripts and on Twitter!  Thanks!

Armchair BEA: Wrap-Up

Design by Emily @ Emily's Reading Room

Round-Up

This was my first year participating in Armchair BEA, and I had a great time!  I consider it a personal accomplishment that I posted in response to at least one of the prompts every day.  I credit this feat to having two choices per day.  If I wasn't feeling one topic, I usually had plenty to say about the other.  I also liked the discussion on blogging habits in general.  It was nice to have an opportunity to voice some of my concerns about my blogging habits and to see what others are doing that make them successful.

Day One: Introductory Post
Day Two: Blogger Development
Day Three: Literary Fiction
Day Four: Blogger Ethics
Day Five: Children's/Young Adult Literature

Check before you upload.

Through Armchair BEA, I engaged in some thought-provoking conversations and learned a lot. In fact, as a direct result of my participation in the ethics chat, I am currently re-vamping my use of images on the site to be more ethical.  Ignorance is no excuse!  These two sites are very informative:

Nose Graze: Why You Shouldn't Use Book Cover Images Straight From Goodreads (technical advice about bandwith stealing)
Oh, Chrys!: Ethics in Blogging (common sense advice for bloggers)

New Follower Shout-Outs

I also found a lot of great new blogs to follow including:

Tattooed Books
Badass Book Reviews
Chapter Break
The Hollow Cupboards
The Novel Hermit

Look to the Future

Since this was my first year participating in Armchair BEA, I don't have any suggestions for improvement.  Everything seemed to click along pretty fluidly to me.  The link-up process was easy, but I do have to echo some other bloggers' concerns that it was quite a few posts to wade through every day if you had the time.  I don't know if there's a way to streamline the links - especially because I wouldn't want to lose the inclusive nature of the event - but it was hard to choose which blogs to visit!  I felt like I was playing a blind game of pin-the-tail on the donkey sometimes, but it paid off as evidenced by my new follower shout-outs above.  Overall, I hope to keep the momentum I cultivated by participating in Armchair BEA, and I am already looking forward to next year!

Armchair BEA: Children's/Young Adult Literature

Design by Emily @ Emily's Reading Room

So, anybody else totally freaked out about posting after reading all the responses to the ethics prompt yesterday?

Actually, I really enjoyed reading bloggers' various thoughts about blogging ethically and tips for doing so.  In fact, I found answers to all my questions about image copyrights that I asked in my post.

Today for Armchair BEA we are discussing a topic near and dear to my heart: Children's and YA Literature.  Anyone who is a regular follower of this blog knows that I am huge supporter of YA Literature and that I even teach it in my banned books themed ENG 111 course.  Before explaining why, I do think it's important to attempt to define the parameters that dictate literature as "Children's," "Young Adult," and even that very new genre of "New Adult."

Children's Literature: These are the books you learned to read with.  The ones you grew up on, sometimes featuring your favorite cartoon characters, but always teaching you a lesson about how to share or make friends or respect mom and dad.  The best children's literature is an interactive, sensory tool for learning with great images and short words and sentences that children can use as building blocks in their own vocabulary.  The protagonists in typical children's literature are often children themselves, usually ranging from ages 3 or 4 to 10.  These characters illustrate typical childhood quandaries like welcoming a new sibling, attending school for the first time, and taking on responsibilities around the house.  Some of my favorite children's books are as follows:

Digby and Kate by Barbara Baker
Chick Chicka Boom Boom by Bill Martin Jr. (Author), John Archambault (Author), Lois Ehlert (Illustrator)
Donald Says Thumbs Down by Nancy Evans Cooney (Author), Maxie Chambliss (Author)
Purple, Green, and Yellow by Robert Munsch and Helene Desputeaux
The Monster at the End of This Book by Jon Stone (Author), Michael Smollin (Illustrator) (really any Little Golden Book ever)

Young Adult Literature: Young adult literature addresses the time of transition most readers find themselves in from ages 11-18 or 19.  This is often a time of dramatic flux and change for readers, and YA literature shows readers they are not alone or strange for the way they are feeling as their bodies change or when they begin high school, lose friends, get new ones, fight with their parents, and experience their first relationship.  It's intense, and I am such a champion of YA literature because it refuses to sugar-coat this very difficult but life-changing time in a person's life.  The protagonists are often pre-teens and teenagers themselves although some books told from the perspective of an adult as he/she reminisces on his/her teen years have also been adopted by the YA community.  If we're getting really technical, we could probably breakdown generic YA literature into pre-teen and late teen.  Pre-teen YA deals with puberty, think Judy Blume, and junior high.  Late teen YA deals more so with issues of agency, authority, and independence as a teen begins to establish his/her self as a person separate from his/her parents and is introduced to sexual, social, and ethical quandaries. Some of my favorite YA books can be found all over this blog, but if pressed, I highly recommend anything by:

Judy Blume
Laurie Halse Anderson
Sarah Dessen
Ellen Hopkins

New Adult: This is a relatively new genre of literature that has actually been around a while but has typically been shelved with adult literature.  This genre focuses on characters in their early twenties.  They are typically college-aged and therefore experiencing another world of flux as they attempt to transition from a world of few responsibilities to one of many in terms of careers, bills, and serious relationships.  I freely admit I have not read much of what I would consider NA literature, preferring to spend my time with the young adults.  However, a series I believe falls into this category retrospectively is Megan McCafferty's Sloppy Firsts.  After I read the first book in the series, I went to the bookstore to purchase the next one.  I scoured the YA section with no luck.  I finally found Second Helpings in the adult section.  Like many of us in our twenties, Jessica Darling was straddling the gap between not-quite-teen and not-quite-adult.  At the very least, I am glad these books have a home.

So why do I read mostly YA literature when I am a person firmly in the New Adult category?  I'm married with two degrees, a steady job, and all of the responsibilities those attributes entail.  I've written several times before on this blog that YA literature is valuable to me for two reasons.

1. It can teach readers important lessons about life and their role in it.
2. YA literature is characterized by a hope born of personal agency.

As I wrote before, YA literature refuses to shy away from uncomfortable, but very realistic, issues most teens experience today such as abuse in all its forms, depression, suicide, peer pressure, and loss.  Readers need to be introduced to characters that they can relate to, whose feelings match the intensity of their feelings.  YA literature becomes a safe haven for expression of your deepest fears and secrets when you feel as if you can't share them with anyone else.  The characters become your outlet and touch stone - a safe middle ground for articulating the often confusing mass of emotions that rain down on you in your teen years. Although these stories often deal with heavy issues, they always offer a beacon of hope.  Unlike most adult literature where the characters seem stuck in the same tired cycle with little to no hope of ever moving forward, most YA literature teaches readers that they can overcome any obstacle placed in front of them by showing them characters that do just that.  It inspires self-confidence.   

I hope to flesh out my understanding of YA literature along with its significance and more recommendations in the YA LibGuide I plan to construct this summer.  It will look very similar to the one I created on banned books last summer.  I will keep you all apprised of my progress.