News From The Library--February 4, 2008

(please press Play)

"Stanley and The Magic Lamp"

A Video Book Review by Lucas (& Olive, the Library Cat)

Also in the Library this week.....

Kindergarten--Walter's been told over and over, "Don't Jump On the Bed!" but he just can't resist. Kindergartener's loved Tedd Arnold's story No Jumping on the Bed, and giggled as Walter's bed crashed down and down through the floors of his apartment building until at last he landed in the basement....or was it the basement? Had it only been a dream? In any event, Walter decided there wouldn't be any more jumping on the bed for him!

First Grade--It's always interesting to me how a classic story with black and white illustrations can capture the attention of our 21st century students. This week first graders heard Millions of Cats by Wanda Gag. Published in 1928, its charm is in the repetition of the refrain, "Hundreds of cats, thousands of cats, millions and billions and trillions of cats!" and by the end of the story students were joining in. What a fun way to begin to understand those huge number concepts!

Second Grade--The concept that every snowflake is unique is a fascinating one and this week second graders heard Jacqueline Briggs Martin's and Mary Azarian's Caledecott Honor winning biography of Snowflake Bentley, the man who first photographed snowflakes. His perseverance gave us a beautiful gift--a peek into the complexity and awesome beauty of nature. After reading the book, I showed the students a Keynote with pictures of Snowflake Bentley at work, pictures he made of snowflakes, and some modern pictures taken with a photo-microscope.

Third Grade--In order to understand the literary device of plot, third graders and I read several versions of Cinderella. This week they heard one of the oldest versions, Wishbones, retold by Barbara Ker Wilson and Meilo So. We had fun finding the similarities and differences in this Chinese Cinderella story and the more familiar French version. All our extensive collection of multicultural Cinderella stories are on display for students to check out if they wish.

Fourth Grade--As the second part of our Atlas lesson, fourth graders really had fun finding out about the symbols of different states. They used their skills at finding information using the index and the almanac section about the different states.

Fifth Grade--Ms. Zannon's class finished up our Web site evaluation lesson this week by doing their own evaluation of websites. Their class missed one lesson due to a network problem (one of the "joys" of teaching with technology!). Mrs. Pickles' class enjoyed a library time devoted to reading quietly. How nice it was to have time for this!

Sixth Grade--Taking notes is a skill and learning how to do it helps prevent plagiarism. Sixth graders this week watched a keynote presentation on ways to take notes and then took notes from a magazine article about Tornadoes. I put their notes away and in about 3 weeks, they will use those notes to write a paragraph. In watching them work, I realized that text messaging may have a benefit--they were very adept at using abbreviated writing and had no trouble understanding what they had written.

News From the Library--January 8, 2007

A New Year in the Library Has Begun!

We're back!! The Library was a busy place this week as classes began again after our nice Winter Break. Even though the sun in shining in Santa Barbara and pretty soon we might need to do some kind of rain dance, it was "chilly" in the Library for Kindergarteners and First Graders as we read penguin books this week.

Kindergarten--There were lots of chuckles as we read the story of Tacky The Penguin by Helen Lester. That Tacky!! He's an odd bird indeed. Finding the differences between Tacky and his companions was fun (a Hawaiian shirt on a penguin?) and his marching style is a little strange, but we all agreed that in the end when Tacky saves himself and his fellow penguins from the hunters, he was a good bird to have around. This humorous and fun story also gives a nice gentle lesson that being different can be something to be respected.

First Grade--Which Cinderella story has a glass flipper instead of a glass slipper? Cinderella Penguin by Janet Perlman. First graders had fun finding the similarities and differences in this version and the one they are more familiar with. As well as enjoying the story, it gave us the opportunity to begin a discussion of the literary element of plot.

Second Grade--We had fun learning about the parts of a book this week with an interactive Keynote presentation, complete with sound effects and quizzes. Using books from our own library, we located the cover, the spine, the table of contents, the index, and the glossary.

Third Grade--This week we started on our Cinderella Project. Over the next several weeks we'll read different versions of the Cinderella story as a way to discuss plot and theme as literary elements. We also get to see a multi-cultural snapshot of this famous story and find its enduring theme of the rewards of kindness and generosity. For our first stoy, we read Adelita by Tomie de Paola and found that instead of a glass slipper to help the prince find his Cinderella, it was a beautiful rebozo, and as always, in the end they "lived happily ever after."

Fourth Grade--Get out those scalpels! It's time to "Dissect a Book!" This week's skills lesson for fourth grade involved "taking apart" a non-fiction book in order to find the relevant information needed for a bibliography. With scalpels (pencils) in hand, they bravely found author's names, titles, publishing cities, publisher's names, and copyright dates. But one of their favorite parts was my story about my high school lab partner (fullback on the football team) who fainted when we dissected a frog in Biology lab!

Fifth and Sixth Grade--We are so lucky to have a new resource for research and with laptops in hand, the fifth and sixth graders were introduced to Encyclopedia Britannica Online, our new software subscription, which allows them access to three different versions of the Encyclopedia Britannica (elementary, middle school, and high school), plus a database of magazines and journals, and vetted websites for any topic. It is updated regularly--we checked the entry for Gerald Ford and James Brown and found they were current--and it's a wonderful, accurate, and safe place to do in depth research. Watch this week's Wednesday Word for information about how you can use this at home. This is now available to students and families 24 hours a day/7 days a week/ 365 days a year! It can be accessed from any computer--at home, in the classroom, or in the tech lab.

See you next week!