Authors to Talk to Teachers about Nonfiction

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Jack Gantos, Doug Hesse and Carla McClafferty

This year's University of Arkansas Literacy Symposium on Sept. 6 features a fiction writer who has won the Newbery Medal and Scott O'Dell Award, a nonfiction writer who won a national science organization's award for her book about Marie Curie, and a professor of English who directs the University of Denver Writing Program.

The theme of the symposium this year is "Common Core Standards: Nonfiction Reading and Writing." Educators can earn six hours of professional development credit approved by the Arkansas Department of Education for attending. More information and online registration are available on the curriculum and instruction department symposium website.

Jack Gantos of Boston has written more than 40 books for children, including the Rotten Ralph and Joey Pigza series. His most recent novel, Dead End in Norvelt, won the 2012 John Newbery Award and the Scott O'Dell Award for Historical Fiction. He also writes novels for adults.

Carla McClafferty is an Arkansas native who won the National Science Teachers Association Outstanding Science Trade Book Award in 2007 for Something Out of Nothing: Marie Curie and Radium.

Doug Hesse is the founding executive director of the University of Denver Writing Program and a professor of English. He has written 55 essays and co-authored four books, most recently Creating Nonfiction.

The eighth annual symposium was moved from June to September this year to be part of the three-day True Lit Fayetteville Literary Festival. The literary festival takes place at several venues Sept. 5-8. The literacy symposium sponsored by the curriculum and instruction department in the College of Education and Health Professions will be from 7:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Friday, Sept. 6 at the Fayetteville Town Center.

Elementary and middle/secondary teachers can choose from breakout sessions offered in the morning. The afternoon will be a general session for all attendees.