MSI Press Blog

  Today's publisher's pride is  Travels with Elly  by Larry MacDonald, which reached #144   in travel with pets books. Book description: Discover Canada like never before -- from a personal perspective, similar to John Steinbeck's view of America in his 1960 book  Travels with Charley . The author travels from coast to coast in a trailer with his wife and pets, including their Standard Poodle, Elly, in order to gain a better understanding of his adopted country. Interspersed between descriptions of history, cultures, places, and icons are the author's reflections on various things such as Elly's antics, signage, ferries, political injustice, environmental issues, and animal instincts. To provide a canine's perspective, Elly reflects on things of interest to her, including cats, cows, and other critters...but especially cats! Where was Canada's first settlement? What is its prettiest town? When and where was its most devastating shipwreck? And who was its greate...

  Alejandra, My Mexican Pen-pal When I was in seventh grade, I developed a strong interest in other cultures. In the 1960s, about the only way for a farm girl to access those cultures was vicariously—through pen-pal. I came across a pen-pal organization, Youth of All Nations, I think it was called, and made full use of its services, acquiring pen-pals in far-flung places, learning about so many different kinds of lives and ways of living, and even began a stamp collection that gathered in so many unique stamps that selling it when stranded for cash and out of work as a young adult helped my young family make it through another few months of struggle. That is how I began an intensive correspondence with Alejandra, a young girl my age from Mexico City. Her letters were vibrant—once I figured out what she meant to say. Her photographs, cards, and even small cultural gifts brought Mexico City alive for me, so alive that I wished that I could understand everything she was talking ab...

  In every world language classroom, there is a quiet truth instructors know instinctively: no two learners ever arrive with the same history, the same motivations, or the same way of making meaning. Traditional, linear curricula often ignore this reality. Open Architecture Curricular Design (OACD) embraces it. Where conventional models ask learners to conform to a predetermined sequence, OACD asks a different question: What if the curriculum could meet each learner where they already are—and still move the whole cohort forward? This post explores how OACD personalizes learning without fragmenting the classroom, and how honoring individual pathways ultimately strengthens proficiency for everyone. 🌱 1. Personalized Entry Points: Beginning Where Learners Truly Begin In OACD, the starting line is not a chapter number. It is the learner’s lived linguistic profile. A heritage speaker may need literacy and register refinement. A military linguist may need cultural nuance and i...