When Donald Murray passed away this week, it seemed sudden even though he was 82 years old. I've never known anyone more full of life, and eager to learn more. Don delivered his weekly column to the Boston Globe on Friday, drove to visit a friend on Saturday, and was dead by the evening. Since last weekend, those of us who counted him as a mentor near and distant have done what we do in this age to grieve - we've picked up the phone, pecked out tributes on electronic message boards, and mostly, shared stories to remind ourselves how much he is still with us.

I've heard so many great tales this week about how Don was a true literacy coach years before we knew such an animal existed. My friend Ruth Shagoury shared a favorite anecdote from almost a decade ago. In the midst of writing a book, blocked morning after morning with no words emerging, in desperation she emailed her old professor. "Okay Don, I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing, sitting down every morning to write. But I am stuck, and I mean really stuck. What now?"

Within minutes a reply flew 3500 milesthrough the ether, from Don's study in New Hampshire to Ruth's in Oregon. "I'm relieved to hear you are following the most important rule, which is to park your butt in that chair every morning. Now what you need to do is type the title of the chapter you are supposed to be writing. After you type in the title, follow it with the words 'by Donald Murray.' There - now you've given yourself permission to write the worst garbage in the world. The best part is everyone will think I wrote it, not you! Write." And write Ruth did, working her way down through the draft over the days and weeks, till finally she was able to erase "by Donald Murray" and put her own name to the writing (which in the end wasn't the worst garbage in the world).

"By Donald Murray" is the shadow over every byline of those of us fortunate enough to have learned with him, sitting in his office as he pored over our drafts, or chattering on his all-season porch about inspiration in seminar sessions while Minnie Mae puttered in the kitchen creating glorious baked goods for our class breaks.

It's ironic that this week the featured items in the Big Fresh include advice on writing news releases and getting media attention for literacy programs, since Don first burst on the scene as a journalist decades ago - the youngest person ever to win the Pulitzer Prize (at age 29). But it may be the mentoring, more than the writing, that is "by Donald Murray" for those of us who knew him. Don believed everything good in a draft came from the strengths of the piece. Build on the strengths, he said, and the bad bits of any draft would just fall away. He took that lesson from writing and applied it to his relationship with every colleague and every student. Build on the strengths in any classroom, any child, any teaching community, and it's amazing how the "bad bits" tend to fall away, too.

Read the tributes to Don raining out over the web from teachers and writers, and what's doubly sad is how many begin with "I wish I had written this to Don while he was still here..." This week we've also launching our first contest in the Big Fresh - our modest attempt to gather some stories about amazing literacy leaders and share them with the Choice Literacy community. No purchase necessary, and you could win a $1000 prize package of great chocolate and greater professional development materials for your school.

But really, the contest is just the excuse you need to park your butt in the chair and write the literate thanks you've been wanting to write to the person who casts a lively shadow of purpose and meaning over your work with kids and colleagues. It doesn't take long to create and zip off a tribute to your favorite literacy mentor - writing that is "hard fun," as Don would say. And years from now, in a moment when you're surprised and saddened by the passing of that cherished friend, you won't have to write your own "if only I'd let them know when they were here..." phrase in a tribute book.

I did follow Don's advice to "not get it right, but get it written," and I'm grateful that piece of wisdom allowed me to thank him more than once, with words however halting and inadequate, for what he meant to me as a teacher, writer, and friend. Bye Donald Murray. Nulla dies sine linea - Never a day without a line.

Brenda Power

***Free for All***

This week we've posted the second of our two-part series on spreading the good news in your literacy program. News releases are easy to create to publicize special events or innovations in your literacy curriculum - there are even "press release generators" on the web which automate the process for free:

http://www.choiceliteracy.com/public/239.cfm

If you missed the first part of the series on timesaving tips for creating literacy newsletters last week, you can access it here:

http://www.choiceliteracy.com/public/235.cfm

"Why My Literacy Leader is Better Than Chocolate" is Choice Literacy's first free contest, open to all. Here's a secret for you - we're a pretty tiny operation. Even if you've never won so much as a paperclip in your life, if you've got a terrific literacy-related story about a colleague and a half hour to write it up and zip it off to us on email, you've got a really great shot at winning the $1000 prize package:

http://www.choiceliteracy.com/public/department64.cfm

***For Members Only***

We welcome new contributor Mary Lee Hahn, who provides a quick primer for comprehending graphic novels and their place in the classroom, including a booklist of easy, medium, and difficult graphic novel styles for the unitiated:

http://www.choiceliteracy.com/members/242.cfm

Alphabet books are fascinating to young learners just cracking the code themselves. But what about alphabet books for young English language learners? Ruth Shagoury provides an annotated booklist of picture books that present alphabets from other languages:

http://www.choiceliteracy.com/members/241.cfm

Is it possible for children to set and track reading goals before they even know their alphabet? Joan Moser confers with five-year-old Hailey in this video from our CAFE Assessment Series. (CAFE is an acronym for Comprehension, Accuracy, Fluency, Expanding Vocabulary - the article includes a link to other features with background information on the program.) In this conference, Joan helps Hailey understand the concept of cross-checking as they read a book together and set a goal for Hailey's independent reading:

http://www.choiceliteracy.com/members/243.cfm

One of our most popular features this fall was Franki Sibberson and Aimee Buckner's dialogue about organizing their classroom libraries. This week, they reflect upon what works and what doesn't in their book arrangements now that they have observed their intermediate students using the libraries for months:

http://www.choiceliteracy.com/members/240.cfm

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https://www.choiceliteracy.com/public/5.cfm

Those paying for single annual memberships with school purchase orders or checks should use the site license form for single subscribers:

http://www.choiceliteracy.com/sitelicense_1.pdf

That's all for this week!