November 2022 Inspiring Reads!

Welcome back! It is our pleasure to share with you the fourth and final issue of Reading Nook’s Recommended Readings for this year.

In this issue, we are excited to bring you the recommendations from Nurulhuda (Pre-U), Eka (Sec) and Peggy (Pri). Read on and find out more about their recommendations below!

Specialists’ Picks

By Nurulhuda Abdul Halim

Some years back, an ex-colleague vented in despair that the students were not reading and seemed to only be interested in videos! As we could not under any circumstances, give up on reading, it was about finding ways to help students read better.

Enter Naomi S. Baron’s engaging “How We Read Now” which comprehensively explains the impact of the reading medium on our learning. The research that Baron draws on helps us as curriculum planners to understand the strategic decisions that can be made to read as effectively as possible from multiple formats.

It also provides practical guidance for educators seeking to support students’ reading using different media such as print, screen or audio. It is a book that you can read in parts, over time.

Leaders’ Recommended Reads

By Eka Tanu

The Energy Bus is one of the earlier books I read about leadership. It is easy to read and the principles are easy to grasp. It charts the journey of a protagonist who was not having the best time.

For the two weeks that he had to take the bus (his car had broken down), he had conversations with the bus driver and different commuters who each gave him certain insights to how he can view, manage and lead his life.

One of the key principles which stuck with me was about redirecting your energy away from people who do not want to journey with you or buy into your vision - it made me think about how I need to walk away from such situations or people and reinvest my time wisely.

There are other interesting nuggets in this book about positive energy and if you feel like you need a booster, this short book may just give you the power up you need.

Watcha Reading?

By Peggy Lee

Crying in H Mart only? More like Crying on The Train and Everywhere Else as I read this book mostly on my commute to and from work and I had to hold back my tears every time I did so.

Before I knew Michelle Zauner as an author, I knew her as the quirky lead singer of the band “Japanese Breakfast”. She traverses the realm of songwriting to explore the themes of food, identity and mother-daughter relationships in her debut novel which essentially is a memoir of her mother.

The titular “H Mart”, an Asian supermarket in America, highlights the role of food in Zauner’s life. Being a mixed-race Korean American, Zauner’s connection to her Korean roots was mostly through the home-cooked dishes whipped up by her Korean mother. Grocery runs to H Mart with her mother become once fond memories of hers as less than halfway into the book, Zauner opens up about the painful loss of her mother.

The pages after that revelation further reveal the complex relationship Zauner has with her mother and records her journey of grief and healing as she attempts to recreate the experiences with her mother through what they bond best over – food.