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Teaching comics to teens day 2: Creating an exquisite corpse

The second day will be about them getting to know each other. I like to have the class play a game called The Exquisite Corpse. Originally conceived by Andre Breton and the Surrealists, the game encourages group creativity through random chance (in my experience, kids love all things random).

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Teaching comics to teens day 1: Using comics to tell your story

We inaugurate a fantastic new series by Derek Mainhart, who is setting out to write up an entire year’s curriculum for a comics class at the secondary level: middle school and high school. From what I’ve seen so far, it’s going to be entertaining, well-planned, and incredibly useful.

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Mastering Comics pre-release giveaway online and at MoCCA Fest!

Our new textbook, Mastering Comics, releases officially on May 8 and to celebrate we will be giving away four copies, two here on the website and two in person at our table at the MoCCA Fest 2012!

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Book group transcription #1: “Fun Home” by Alison Bechdel

Back in the fall, Matt and I ran a graphic novel book club at the Brooklyn Public Library. These were really great discussions, and we’re going to try to post complete transcripts.

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Guest post: Cartooning and Confianza

As a teacher, having confianza with my students has always been of the utmost importance. In fact, it’s always been my main priority: I just figured the content-learning would come if I could get my students to trust me. Teaching, I think, is about managing human relationships.

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Panels, pages and balloons book club: a few notes on Asterios Polyp

This Saturday, December 17, we’ll be hosting a final live book club meeting at the central branch of the Brooklyn Public Library. This time we’ll be discussing Asterios Polyp, by David Mazzucchelli.

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Panels, pages, and balloons book club: a few notes on Lucille

This Saturday, November 19, we’ll be hosting another live book club meeting at the Central branch of the Brooklyn Public Library. This time we’ll be discussing the recently translated French comic Lucille, by Ludovic Debeurme.

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Panels, pages, and balloons book club: a few notes on Ice Haven

Next Saturday, October 29, we’ll be hosting our second live book club meeting. This time, we’ll be discussing Ice Haven, by Daniel Clowes.

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“What Is a ‘Graphic Novel?'” slideshow

Librarians and comics educators, here’s a great and simple tool for introducing the basics of comics! We’ve put together a Powerpoint/PDF presentation of Jessica’s 2002 strip, “What is a ‘Graphic Novel?'”, also available as a PDF poster or handout. Feel free to use it, whether for a book club or in a classroom, or in any way you think up.

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Panels, pages, and balloons book club: a few notes on Fun Home

This afternoon, we’ll be hosting a live book club meeting on Fun Home, by Alison Bechdel. Our plan is to talk a little bit and show some slides at the beginning and show and then open up the floor for all of you to share your thoughts, questions and observations about Fun Home and reading Read More

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