This has been a great summer of reading. We are super excited to share all the reading we have done with you. It is like a shot in the arm to have new children's literature to share with our students. It has inspired us, and we can't wait to share our enthusiasm with our students. We know motivation is the key to reading success, and we are confident that our students are going to be begging us to take these books home to read.
It has also been a great summer of writing. We are taking a class from Learner's Edge called The Writer's Notebook. We have gotten several new ideas to enhance our Writing Workshop lessons, and we have an exciting kick-off party planned to introduce our students to the Writing Notebook. Over the next few blogs we will share that and other resources with you. Today, we just want to share a few of our favorite picture books. We've been spending so much time reading these books, but at this point in time, we don't have a definite lesson plan for using them. That will come soon. This is just our recommendation of good books you can read.
The first one that caught our eye was Peanut Butter and Cupcake by Terry Border. This is a book that we will definitely use in the first few days of school. It has a wonderful theme and message. We will want our students to complete a project and respond to the message. Somehow, we will make sure a cupcake is involved! This book is all about friendship, making new friends, and accepting others.
Another good book that we will use as we introduce the 6-traits in writing is What Do You Do With An Idea? by Kobi Yamada. We feel like this book is like an allegory of the writing process, and how an idea can grow into something special. It also addresses some of the struggles and fears that occur along the way.
A Boy And A Jaguar by Alan Rabinowitz is a true story about the author's struggle with stuttering, and how that led him to "being the voice for jaguars and other large jungle cats. As a boy, animals were the only ones he could talk to without stuttering. He promised them that once he found his voice, he would speak for them. He kept that promise, and is still doing that to this day. This has a message of believing in yourself, overcoming fears, and keeping true to your goals and desires. This is another good book to read at the beginning of the year when you talk about setting goals and reaching them.
The last picture book we want to share with you today is titled, This Is A Mouse by Richard T. Morris. Along with A Boy And a Jaguar, this book is a Monarch Award Nominee for 2016. With this book, the main focus would be fluency, and using the punctuation to add expression and to understand what is happening. This book would be perfect to use after introducing the Christina Smekens voice chart. From this link, click on the chart of punctuation marks link.This book can also introduce students to the concepts of foreshadowing and irony at their level. The foreshadowing comes into play on the front endpaper and the title page.
We hope you can find the time to read some of these books if you haven't already. We included the thoughts off the top of our heads on how we would use them. If you have other ideas, we'd love to hear them!
Kim and Anne
