Sarah Mulhern Gross
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thereadingzone.bsky.social
Sarah Mulhern Gross
@thereadingzone.bsky.social
1.9K followers 1.9K following 520 posts
NBCT, English @ High Tech, past chair @alanorg Walden, AIP MAT Bio @ WCS, NYTimes Learning Network, #nerdcampNJ organizer
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thereadingzone.bsky.social
As an OG elder Swiftie this is wild and amazing. (Why yes, I did start a free trial of YouTube Premium so I could watch this ad free on my TV).
August 15, 2025 at 2:03 AM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
I saw John Proctor is the Villain for the second time yesterday. I can not stress enough how incredible this production is. I cried again, and my friends who were seeing it for the first time were stunned by the production. You have until Sept 7 to see this show. It should be mandatory viewing.
August 7, 2025 at 2:34 PM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
#CopaAméricaFemenina

Tell me you are watching this game without telling me.
August 2, 2025 at 11:43 PM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
July reading!
August 1, 2025 at 2:10 PM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
For high school teachers: penguinrandomhousesecondaryeducation.com/wp-content/u...
July 31, 2025 at 7:38 PM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
For middle school teachers: penguinrandomhousesecondaryeducation.com/wp-content/u...
July 31, 2025 at 7:38 PM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
For elementary teachers: penguinrandomhouseelementaryeducation.com/wp-content/u...
July 31, 2025 at 7:38 PM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
Big day today! A male magnolia warbler stopped by the yard! #wildlifecontainerpond
May 20, 2025 at 3:38 AM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
Ahh! New backyard bird at the #wildlifecontainerpond A female Black-throated blue warbler!
May 19, 2025 at 12:08 AM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
Heaven forbid a teacher share an award-winning book recommended for 7-10 year olds with 3rd graders.

This is why no one wants to be a teacher anymore.
May 1, 2025 at 1:18 AM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
NJ Parents’ rights groups trying to stir up controversy around The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane. 🤯🤔🫠🙄
New Jersey Project - News 1d • & 3RD GR Teacher in Scotch Plains Fanwood read "The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane." which contains heart wrenching deaths and suicidal ideation. She didn't notifiy parents that she was covering such a heavy topic even though she was given a warning about the book. Thoughts?
May 1, 2025 at 1:12 AM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
Finished up The Tempest and now it’s time for more book clubs!!
April 30, 2025 at 5:28 PM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
Every time I tell teachers about it, I find myself describing the myriad of ways it might be used in interdisciplinary units in grades 6-12. It truly spans the entire age range + there’s so much it brings to a unit centered on nature/the environment.
April 22, 2025 at 3:09 PM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
Thrilled to be a judge for the Green Earth Book Award YA fiction category! This year’s YA fiction winner is Force of Nature, an incredible verse novel that introduces readers to Rachel Carson + her work.
April 22, 2025 at 3:09 PM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
Happy Easter!
April 20, 2025 at 1:59 PM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
Great way to end the week! A visit to the Drama Book Shop and Smash on Broadway’
April 19, 2025 at 2:22 AM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
*screams internally*
Robert Wong, Google's director of product management for learning and education, said the tools are invaluable for students whose parents cannot help them with math homework. He suggested that cheating had less to do with access to A.l. than with "other factors, like, are students engaged in the class?"
April 14, 2025 at 6:39 PM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
Anyway, if you want bring climate change learning into your class, I wrote some teaching guides that can help!
HS: penguinrandomhousesecondaryeducation.com/wp-content/u...
MS: penguinrandomhousesecondaryeducation.com/wp-content/u...
Elem: penguinrandomhouseelementaryeducation.com/wp-content/u...
Screenshot of cover of middle school guide Screenshot of cover of high school guide Screenshot of cover of elementary school guide
April 10, 2025 at 12:26 AM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
The federal government cut $4 million from climate change research at Princeton University, blaming it for causing “climate anxiety for America’s youth.” Guess what? Kids care about the environment. They care about climate change.

This is ridiculous.
www.nytimes.com/2025/04/09/c...
Trump Administration Cuts Research Funding, Claiming It Creates ‘Climate Anxiety’ The cuts to a Princeton University program come as the Trump administration has been reviewing an array of research grants related to global warming. In pulling funding for the program, the Commerce Department said that the collaboration “promotes exaggerated and implausible climate threats, contributing to a phenomenon known as ‘climate anxiety,’ which has increased significantly among America’s youth.” The agency also said it would stop funding the program’s educational initiatives targeted at students in kindergarten through high school students.
April 10, 2025 at 12:26 AM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
Severance is filmed at Bell Works (formerly Bell Labs) by my house, and this weekend Apple did a pop-up exhibit!
April 7, 2025 at 1:49 PM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
March 31, 2025 at 4:15 PM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
Then things really go off the rails. “They will see that forsaking the ordinary duties of marriage and parenthood to "find oneself" and live as an "expressive individual" is chasing a mirage”. I’m sorry, what now? We should force kids to read classics so they abide by traditional gender roles?

😬🚩
This feast of the imagination will teach children to have a realistic sense of what truly is possible in this life and wherein lie life's boundaries. They will see goodness and beauty, evil and ugliness for what they are. They will see that forsaking the ordinary duties of marriage and parenthood to "find oneself" and live as an "expressive individual" is chasing a mirage . They will learn this from the misery that romantic escapism brought Anna Karenina and Madame Bovary.
February 26, 2025 at 2:52 PM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
Unsurprisingly, the examples Finley lists are white and often problematic in 2025. What about diverse voices? Contemporary classics?
Laura Ingalls Wilder's "Farmer Boy" shows children that in this life, reward comes after long, hard work. Frances Hodgson Burnett's "The Secret Garden" illustrates what resilience looks like. C.S. Lewis's "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe" portrays the good and evil that lurk within each one of us. Greek myths teach children proportion. Robert Louis Stevenson introduces children to beauty in lyrical form. Classical music gives them the best that can be offered to the ear.
February 26, 2025 at 2:52 PM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
Then we start to diverge. This was an immediate 🚩. I’m not sure how many young people Finley regularly spends time with outside of her own children, whom she homeschools, but I’ve taught many deeply religious students. Many families have deep-rooted cultural, religious, and/or familial traditions.
Without religious beliefs, traditions or standards to connect them with permanent things, young people feel tremendous anxiety about who they are and how they should find meaning. They have read no good literature or history that would furnish their imaginations with examples of heroism, or even ordinary men and women overcoming the ordinary challenges of life. They have seen no movies that illustrate real beauty, heard no music that draws them upward, and seen no art that stirs in them a sense of the transcendent. For them, modernity is-to borrow a term from T.S. Eliot— a wasteland.
February 26, 2025 at 2:52 PM
thereadingzone.bsky.social
Finley and I also agree that technology and parenting aren’t the only causes of many of the problems teachers see in the classroom today. We also agree that kids need more time alone with their imaginations!
Technology addiction and parental coddling aren't the causes of mental-health problems in young people, but rather symptoms. The real problem is the romantic corruption of imagination. Imagination is far more powerful than logic or reason. It colors our entire view of life and life's possibilities. A well-formed imagination- one properly adjusted to reality-can adapt to life's vicissitudes and see life steady and see it whole.
February 26, 2025 at 2:52 PM