Week of January 11, 2010

It's mighty cold outside and I have so many great books to share with our students. The suspense is rising in kindergarten when we read Something is Going to Happen by Charlotte Zolotow. We will also enjoy Pip & Squeak by Ian Schoenherr and Geraldine's Big Snow by Holly Keller.

Chris Van Allsburg is an amazing author and illustrator of fifteen children's book, many of which your children will hear before they leave M.E.S. This week in second grade we will discuss the achievements of Chris Van Allsburg, including two Caldecott medals for Jumanji and The Polar Express and we will read The Z Was Zapped.

In the beginning of November our first graders were introduced to author and illustrator Marc Brown, creator of the Arthur books. We learned then that Mr. Brown likes to hide the names of his children, Tucker, Tolon and Eliza, in his illustrations. This week, we will read Locked in the Library by Marc Brown and then we have plenty of Arthur books to go around so we'll do illustration searches to find Tolon, Eliza and Tucker's names.

We are continuing on with our biographies in third grade. We will touch base with the third graders that chose their biographies last week to see if anyone needs more materials to complete their project. Then we will read a biography on Snowshoe Thompson.

An exciting addition has come to our media center...a SMARTboard!!! After a very successful Scholastic Book Fair in the fall, we were able to purchase it with our profits. So again, thank you for your support. If you are not familiar with the SMARTboard, it is an amazing interactive learning tool. I'm counting on the 4th graders to teach me how to use it! We will again practice our use of Alexandra cataloging computer system and locating resources in the library. Everyone will get a turn!

Week of January 4, 2010

Happy New Year!

We'll be talking about the weather in kindergarten for the next couple of weeks. We will read some non-fiction in How Do You Know It's Winter? by Allan Fowler and When Winter Comes by Robert Maass. We'll also read Snowballs by Lois Ehlert and get lots of ideas for making the perfect snowman...so let it snow!!!

We have a new season, a new month and a new year. We'll discuss all of those and then read some wintry books. First some non-fiction: Ice by Helen Frost, and then Snow, a Caldecott Honor book by Uri Shulevita and Stephen Gammell's Is That You, Winter? We'll also have plenty of time to check out some wintertime books!

 

We wrapped up 2009 in second grade with author and illustrator Jan Brett and that is how we'll begin 2010. Ask your child what makes her illustrations different from others. Our story this week is Berlioz the Bear, a delightful story about Berlioz who is supposed to play his double bass in the village square at eight. But there is a strange buzz coming from his instrument. What could it be? Hmmm! We will watch the video of this book paying special attention to the background music from Flight of the Bumblebee.

The time has come to start the third grade biography projects! This week Mrs. Schenck and Mrs.Wilson's students will peruse the biographies in our library and choose a famous person that they would like to learn more about. Our remaining third grade classes will not choose their biographies until the week of February 1st, therefore we will read together the biography of Snowflake Bentley, the beautifully illustrated Caldecott Medal winner about the first man who was able to photograph snowflakes. We will also get to view his snowflake photographs in Mr. Bentley's non-fiction book Snow Crystals.

We've got some housekeeping items to take care of in fourth grade this week. Our first item of business will be to make sure everyone has completed and taken their blue dot test on their December book of the month. We are then going to have some review time about how our library is set up, looking up books by title, author or subject in our Alexandria computer cataloging system, and where to locate our book. Alexandria is the same system that is used at Madeira Middle School too, so by the time these students hit that library, they'll be old pros! Finally, the students will be encouraged to choose their January book of the month.

Week of December 14, 2009

While it hurts my feelings, it is very exciting for the students when they get to watch a book on video rather than have me read to them.  These poor deprived kindergartners have not had that treat yet! And so, this week they will get to watch Morris's Disappearing Bag and Max's Christmas by Rosemary Wells.

Two weeks ago, the first graders heard some bear stories while we discussed hibernation patterns.  This week, Bear is back and we'll read Bear Stays Up for Christmas by Karma Wilson. We'll also revisit a favorite author, Eric Carle and we will read Dream Snow.

Author and illustrator Jan Brett's books are so much fun to read and learn about the borders that she uses in her illustrations. In second grade we are going to enjoy her version of The Night Before Christmas.  We will then be entertained by Lewis and Gilbert in Jingle Bells, Homework Smells by Diane DeGroat.

We will read one more Patricia Polacco book this week, Uncle Vova's Tree. This is a beautiful Christmas story that I'm sure the third graders will love.  They have really enjoyed all of the Patricia Polacco books that we've been reading.  They'll be sad that we won't be reading another Patricia Polacco book until springtime!

Since fourth grade was researching during their library time

last week, we'll need to cover both a Hanakkah and a Christmas story. We will first read One Candle by Eve Bunting. This is a beautiful story that really gives the students a history lesson too.  Then we will lighten things up by reading A New Improved Santa by Patricia Rae Wolff.