Mind Change by Susan Greenfield

Mind Change is subtitled “How Digital Technologies Are Leaving Their Mark on Our Brains” and author Lady Greenfield, a neuroscientist and member of the House of Lords, stands up to conventional views.  Much like the early advocates of climate change theories asked about uncertain causality, she proposes that social networks, video games, and surfing the net are all impacting us in unexplored ways. Lady Greenfield asks, for example, whether there might be a direct causal link between screen time and reduction in empathy. Mind Change contains over sixty pages of notes and a list for further reading with two dozen other texts on this subject.

Her chapters on social networks explore the possible implications on identity and relationships while the section on video games deals with potential impact on attention, addiction and aggression.  As an educator reading Mind Change, I appreciated that someone was raising the issue of “profound implications for the Digital Natives and their ability to research information on the Internet, and more widely still for learning in general and thus overall success in life.” I was surprised to see some rather negative reviews from sources such as The Economist and Wall Street Journal. Yes, the evidence cited may be tentative, but at least this book is an attempt to promote discussion. I wish those reviewers had more opportunities to work with young people and see the amount of time they spend with screens, how they struggle to form keyword searches and to make connections between ideas and with each other.  

If you are intrigued by the debates between researchers such as danah boyd (It’s Complicated), Nicholas Carr (The Shallows), Clifford Nass (The Man who Lied to his Laptop), Clay Shirkey (Cognitive Surplus), or Sherry Turkle (Alone Together), pick up Mind Change for another piece in an important and evolving puzzle.

I Can Hear You Whisper by Lydia Denworth

I originally started reading I Can Hear You Whisper because I thought some of our students might be interested in this book as a non-fiction reading selection.  I was fascinated by Denworth’s description of the discovery and reaction to her son’s hearing loss. A science journalist herself, Denworth interviewed numerous experts, including neuroscientists, language specialists, and educators.

This is a book about hearing, but it is also about listening, speaking and reading – with a chapter on the reading brain which stresses the value of rhyme and poetry to develop reading skills and presents research on how hearing and dyslexia may by intertwined. Denworth provides numerous references to past and current research while being very forthright in explaining the various perspectives regarding choices like sign language and use of cochlear implants. She includes scientific findings and language, but also is a talented enough writer to succinctly describe issues related to hearing in memorable, easy to understand ways:

-- “Speech production is a motor skill like kicking a ball or picking up a raisin. We don’t think of it that way …”

-- “When you speak or sing, you hear yourself in two ways: through air conduction and bone conduction.  The recorded sound of your voice sounds unnatural to you because only airborne sound is picked up by the microphone and you are used to hearing both.”

-- A startling statistic?   “95 percent of deaf and hard-of-hearing children are … born to hearing parents …”  

Says Dentworth, “I realized that my son might have a cultural identity – should he choose to embrace it – that I could come to appreciate, but I could never truly share.”  This book deserves wide readership, and will be especially valuable to families with members who are deaf or who have experienced hearing loss.

Update: 7/23/2015:  A new study shows ways to use hearing tests to predict literacy.Full academic study, "Auditory Processing in Noise" is published in PLOS Biology.

Shadow Scale by Rachel Hartman

Shadow Scale is book two in the Seraphina series by Rachel Hartman, although it can be read as a stand-alone tale. Are you ready for a hero’s journey? Then settle in with this lengthy (608 pages!) new addition featuring half-dragon Seraphina and friends.  The book comes complete with a map, cast of characters and glossary.  Called magical and enchanting, this sequel received starred reviews from Booklist, Kirkus, and Publishers Weekly.  The basic story centers around Seraphina’s efforts to stop war and to find other half-dragons, like herself. At times, it does seem repetitive, but will definitely appeal to fans of young adult fantasy stories. 

Hartman’s debut novel, Seraphina, won numerous awards, including being named a School Library Journal Best Book of the Year and being listed in the ALA-YALSA Top Ten Best Fiction for Young Adults Book.  Seraphina is also one of the nominees for the 2015 Abe Lincoln Award and voting is currently underway in Illinois. Voting closes at midnight on March 15th, with the 2015 winner expected to be announced on Friday, March 20th.  If you have been busy reading and already voted, here is a recently released link to the 2016 list– enjoy!
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Mrs. Grant and Madame Jule by Jennifer Chiaverini

I picked up Mrs. Grant and Madame Jule when I recognized the author, Jennifer Chiaverini, whose Elm Creek Quilt stories I have been enjoying for years.  In this work of historical fiction, Chiaverini focuses on the title characters and the military career of Ulysses S. Grant. If I have a criticism to make, it is that this novel is not as much about the relationship between Julia Grant and Jule, her slave, as it could be.  However, I enjoyed reading about the time period and the relationship between the Grants, a Southern belle and a West Point graduate from an abolitionist family.  In fact, I learned quite a bit as I read the book – including about Grant’s controversial General Order no. 11 which was issued in 1862 and dealt with forcibly removing Jews from the territory (Tennessee, Mississippi, and Kentucky) he supervised.  Other recent works of historical fiction by Jennifer Chiaverini include Mrs. Lincoln's Dressmaker and Mrs. Lincoln's Rival. 

A Murder of Magpies by Judith Flanders

A Murder of Magpies is a fun mystery, mostly due to the clever wit of its main character, Samantha Clair who works in the London publishing field. She is juggling the needs of various writers – one who seems to be experimenting with a totally new style and another who may be charged with libel due to a tell all book about the fashion industry.

It really gets interesting, though, when a courier is killed, one of the writers goes missing, and a break-in occurs. Inspector Field enters the picture and Sam’s near-perfect, high energy, solicitor mother joins in, too.  Throughout, I found Sam’s sarcasm and wry perspective to be especially entertaining:

• "... we were going to be brave because we were all too cowardly to be anything else."
• “I briefly wondered what you called a group of editors – a chatter of editors?  I thought … and revised: a pompous of publishers, definitely.”
• “I’d felt as if life was like a play and I’d come in at the interval.  The rest of the audience knew what was going on, while I was the only one who was mystified by the dialogue.  As I got older, I worked out that that’s what everyone thought.”

Pick up Judith Flanders’ A Murder of Magpies if you if you are looking for a light, entertaining mystery. The contemporary London setting and book publishing references are a plus!  Hopefully, we will see more stories involving this amateur sleuth – they would be perfect for PBS’ Masterpiece program.