News From The Library--March 17, 2008

(please press play)

The Talented Clementine by Sara Pennypacker

A Book Review by Carlile and Olive

Also in the Library this week...

Kindgergarten--We were getting reading for St. Patrick's Day and read Jeremy Bean's St. Patrick's Day by Alice Schertle. Poor Jeremy. With the best laid plans to wear green on St. Patrick's Day, he forgets. Teasing by his classmates sends him scurrying into the janitor's closet and he's rescued by the principal. This is a nice tale about turning a bad day into a good one and I don't think any of our kindergarteners will forget green on Monday!

First, Second, and Third Grade--These classes worked on our "secret project" this week and they were excellent illustrators.

Fourth Grade--This week we started our Tall Tales unit with a Keynote presentation about the characteristics of a tall tall. Then we watched a wonderful video of Swamp Angel by Anne Isaacs. Over the next several weeks we'll read more tall tales and finally we'll write one of our own.

Fifth Grade--We explored the wonders of GoogleEarth this week. I asked students questions about the location of current events and we traveled to those places. GoogleEarth is a great way to establish context for lessons whether it's current events or the setting of a story.

Sixth Grade--Digital Citizenship was our topic this week and students watched a Keynote and then discussed what it means to be a "digital citizen." The ethical decisions our children are making in cyberspace are a challenge for them--how to be safe online, what to do about cyberbullying, how to avoid plagiarism--all of these are things adults didn't have to deal with when we were children. The more exposure and practical practice with these decisions educators and parents can give them the better. Next week sixth graders will blog about the topic and in doing so practice their digital citizenship skills. If you would like to view a pdf file of the Keynote on Digital Citizenship please go the the Cold Spring School Library Webpage for downloads.

The Librarian of Basra

The Librarian of Basra: A True Story from Iraq

This week fifth graders heard The Librarian of Basra by Jeanette Winter. First I presented a Keynote with some actual pictures of the Central Library of Basra which was destroyed during the invasion of Iraq in April of 2003. Then, using Google Earth we started at our own school library and traveled to Basra, Iraq. The difference between our locations was sobering.

This interesting picture book tells the true story of Alia Muhammad Baker who saved over 70% of the books in the Central Library of Iraq by removing them night after night in her car and hiding them in her house and the houses of friends. Even though the library was destroyed by bombs, Alia managed to save over 30,000 books.

Books "are more precious than mountains of gold" says Alia, and the message of this book is both the great importance of books in our lives and the terrible effects of war on everyone. A portion of the book's sales will go toward helping rebuild Basra's library and if you are interested in helping this worthy effort you can do so by contributing to a fund administered by the American Library Association. Make checks payable to ALA with "Basra Book Fund" on the memo line, and send them to International Relations Office, ALA, 50 E. Huron Street, Chicago, IL 60611. (For more information, contact the ALA's International Relations Department at 1-800-545-2433 x 3201.)

Also in the Library this week....

Kindergarten--What happens when you forget to wear green on St. Patrick's Day? Jeremy Bean finds out in Alice Schertle's delightful book Jeremy Bean's St. Patrick's Day. Even though Jeremy plans to wear his green sweater on the morning of March 17, it ends up in a lump in his bed and when it's too late to go back for it he has to endure the taunts of his schoolmates. Fortunately Mr. Dudley, the kind principal (who has an uncanny similarity to our own principal, Dr. McCabe) helps Jeremy by sharing some of his own green.

First Grade--Jack, the cat, would love to make an omelette for dinner so he decides to build The Perfect Nest. But when first a chicken (who speaks Spanish), and then a duck (who speaks French) and then a goose (who speaks...well, American) all vie for the nest and lay their eggs, Jack has a problem. He gets rid of the birds but not soon enough and all three eggs hatch, dashing his hopes of an omelette or two or three, but giving him three new friends instead. This charming book by Catherine Friend and John Manders has delightful full page illustrations and it was a big hit with first graders.

Second Grade--We played "Name That Book" this week and second graders got very good at figuring out the characteristics of reference books in our library. Using a Keynote, we play the game by identifying books after clues are shown on the screen. After the game, each child was given a real life "research scenario" and they had to tell in which book he or she would find the answer. The books were the encyclopedia, the thesaurus, the dictionary, the atlas and the almanac.

Third Grade--What's great about our state? Third graders learned how to use a U.S. Atlas this week to find out interesting facts about our state. After learning how the atlas was organized, students filled out a questionnaire about our state including our nickname, our motto, our total population, our area in square miles, and other interesting facts. Two students had so much fun doing this they filled out questionnaires about other states as well!

Fourth Grade--This week we started a multi-session unit on American Tall Tales. After viewing a Keynote about the characteristics of a tall tale, I showed the two tall tales that were composed by last year's fourth grade classes. These were done by the students using Keynote complete with illustrations and music. This year, students are going to make actual hardbound books using iPhoto and the books will be cataloged and put in our library for students to check out! We watched a video of one of my favorite tall tales, Swamp Angel by Anne Isaacs, and illustrated in an award winning way by Paul O. Zelinsky. In future weeks were are going to read more tall tales and after Spring Break we'll start our books.

Fifth Grade--see opening post.

Sixth Grade--Sixth graders continued their research for their blog posting about civil rights leaders. Next week, we'll begin composing our blog posts.

Stay tuned next week for the results of our voting for the California Young Readers Medal.....