News From the Library--October 19, 2009

A Different Point of View

As we celebrated Columbus Day this week, I read Jane Yolen's haunting book Encounter to the fourth graders. As well as being an excellent example of the literary device point of view, it gives students a new perspective on Columbus and what his discoveries meant to the indigenous peoples who lived on the islands he discovered. The book is told from the point of view of a Taino Indian boy who warns his tribe not to welcome Columbus and his men and it concludes with a chilling image of the boy as an old man. David Shannon's remarkable illustrations add greatly to the impact of this rather sad story. An interesting discussion followed in which we came to the conclusion that while we admire Columbus' bravery and persistence, there was a heavy price paid for his discoveries.

Also in the Library this week...

Kindergarten--What happens when a town mouse and a field mouse fall in love with the same pumpkin? The pumpkin becomes enormous! In The Biggest Pumpkin Ever by Steven Kroll and Jeni Bassett, two mice both feed and water the same pumpkin each with his own hopes for a prize at the end. In a great example of compromise one wins the prize for the biggest pumpkin as the other agrees to help him move it with the promise of being able to carve it into the biggest jack o' lantern. This is one of our favorite Halloween stories in Kindergarten.

First Grade--I found this charming book several years ago and always save it for the first graders. Even now, upper grade students fondly remember it and ask to see it every year. A Pumpkin Story by Mariko Shinju is the story of a man who builds an entire village out of pumpkins--pumpkin houses, pumpkin furniture, a pumpkin hotel and even a pumpkin swimming pool!

Second Grade--Another of my favorite Halloween books is A Job for Wittilda by Marc and Carolyn Buehner. Poor Wittilda the witch has 47 cats and needs to feed them. She looks for a job and finally lands one as a delivery person for Dingaling Pizza. And in her quest for the job (on her broom, of course) she rescues one more cat bringing her total to 48 pizza loving felines.

Third Grade--There isn't a much more darkly moody story about a witch than Chris VanAllsburg's The Widow's Broom. The illustrations are exquisite and the wonderful twist at the end delights third graders.

Fourth Grade--see opening post

Fifth and Sixth Grade--This week we "dissected" non-fiction books in preparation for making bibliographies. Students used their "scalpels" (pencils) and their "lab sheets" to find the title, author, publisher, publishing city, and copyright date in several books. Next week I will show them how to use one of the online bibliography makers (that I wish had been available when I was in school!).

News From The Library--November 12, 2007

Take Me To Your Leader

How do you teach students about the Dewey Decimal System? Not the most exciting of library skills subjects but with the help of a great website called Dewey and the Alien I created a Keynote presentation to show students in fourth grade how the system puts non-fiction books into categories. The beauty of the system becomes apparent as students understand that they can go to almost any library and find books filed according to Mr. Melvil Dewey's ideas. After working with the website and the Keynote students draw a "hundreds" card from a hat and go off to search our collection for a book that exemplifies the category.


Also in the Library this week....

Kindergarten--Classic fairy tales sometimes get lost in the shuffle of all the wonderful new children's books that are published every year. So I've decided to spend a few weeks with our Kindergarteners reading some of the classics. This week, we read the Little Red Riding Hood that is told and illustrated by James Marshall. I am always amazed at how these old tales mesmerize students and we discussed how fairy tales were used to teach lessons so long ago. And this one everyone got....don't talk to strangers!!

First Grade--Leo Lionni is one of my favorite children's authors and I had fun this week reading to the first grade one of my older son's favorites. Alexander and the Wind Up Mouse tells the tale of Alexander, a little mouse who wishes he could be loved like his wind-up toy counterpart Willy. But when he gets the chance, he chooses to give his chance to Willy. Students at this age really relate to the idea of toys that are once loved and then tossed aside and cheer that Willy gets his chance to be a real mouse.

Second Grade--Mysterious things happen in the garden on a moonlit night and Leaf Men tells the enchanting story of an old woman, a neglected garden, and a battle to bring life back to both of them. After studying arthropods and insects recently, second graders really enjoyed this book written and illustrated by Kevin Joyce.

Third Grade-This week we played a rousing game of "Name That Book." After looking at several books in our reference collection students watch a Keynote that gives them clues and then they have to name the correct reference book. After that we try out several scenarios and figure out in which book might we find the answer. For example, if you wanted to get your mother a really nice birthday present with her birthstone in it, in which book would you find the correct birthstone for the month in which she was born? (Good to know when your mom's birthday is, too....)

Fourth Grade--see opening post

Fifth and Sixth Grade--Get those "scalpels" ready...it's time to dissect a book! With our scalpel/pencils students chose two books and "dissected" them to find out the information needed for a bibliography. It would be so nice if all publishers put the information in the same place but of course that isn't the case, so students learned all the different places to look for copyright date, publishing city, and publisher's name. This will help them with those reports that are coming up.

Until next week....

Thank you, Parent Club!!--Nov. 13

We Love Our New Bean Bag Chairs!!

Thanks to the generosity of our Parent Club we have two new places in the Library to cozy up and read. Everyone agreed they are really fun and really cool. So once again, your contributions make our library program ever more special.

This week in the Library:

Kindergarten: If you're a frog and you want to jog, well you certainly have to have the right outfit. In Finklehopper Frog by Irene Livingston poor Finklehopper finds out that it's not the clothes that make the man. After being teased by other joggers, he finds out that what he does best is hop, not jog, and there's room for his style. This story has a gentle message about not only recognizing your own strengths but being tolerant of others and their differences. The illustrations by Brian Lies are fantastic! (Mrs. Sickafoose's class went to the wonderful assembly by Michael Katz, storyteller, this week during their library time and were entertained by three wonderful stories told only as Mr. Katz can.)

First Grade: One of my favorite children's authors and illustrators is Leo Leonni. I remember using his books in my first classroom back in 1972. My own children (now 26 and 30!) loved his books as well. The imaginative illustrations using collage techniques, and his spare prose set the tone for the lovely messages in his books. In first grade this week we read Alexander and the Wind Up Mouse which tells the story of a little mouse who thinks he'd love to be a toy, only to discover that by his generosity he gets an even greater gift when he changes his mind as he's granted that wish.

Second Grade--Mrs. Seeple's and Ms. Warner's class have been studying insects so for this week we read the amazing story Leaf Men written and illustrated by William Joyce. Mysterious things happen in the garden and only the Leaf Men can save the day. The suspenseful story combined with Mr. Joyce's unique illustrations make this book a favorite of ours.

Third Grade--Third Graders played "Name That Book" this week (see last week's post for a description of the game) and enjoyed learning about various reference books in the library. The almanac was their favorite!

Fourth Grade-- Who is that guy, Mr. Melvil Dewey?? And what is the Dewey Decimal System? Fourth graders had fun watching a Thinkquest presentation called "Dewey and the Alien" and learned about why Mr. Dewey came up with his method for classifying books. Then we had a little scavenger hunt in which students drew a card from a deck and had to find a book in our collection that matched the Dewey 100s group that was on their card.

Fifth Grade and Sixth Grade--It was another fun week with our laptops as students learned about making bibliography citations using Citation Maker. I don't know about you, but making a bibliography was about my least favorite part of writing a report. Thanks to modern technology there are bibliography makers available on the Web and the one we used is one of the best. It follows the MLA protocol and can be used for various books and media. If you have junior high or high school students at home, you might want to try this out with them as well. There's a link to two Citation Makers on my website in the Resources page. For their assignment this week, students tried out making a citation for a book. The lesson is on the Cold Spring School Library Skills Blog if you'd like to take a look. Just scroll down to the posting for October 31 entitled "Make a Bibliography with Citation Maker."

Until next week....and thanks for all your positive comments about the blog. It means alot to me to hear from you.

~Mrs. Pedersen