Week of October 25, 2010!

Second graders were introduced to my favorite book of all, The Widow's Broom, by Chris VanAllsburg. He is also the author of The Polar Express and Jumanji, which were both made into DVDs. We enjoyed listening to the story and providing details as to how the broom was able to survive...read for yourself!

First Graders enjoyed the remake of There was an old lady, except this was titled, There was an old monster, written by Rebecca, Adrian and Ed Emberly. We discussed what illustrators do and aterwards students were given a sheet of paper and crayons. As I read, Go away big, green monster, by Ed Emberly, students had to draw what they thought the illustration would look like. Upon completion of the book, I reread the book for the students to view so they could compare their illustration with the actual drawing of the illustrator. We all have different ways of visualizing a story....

Kindergarteners read Boo to you, written and illustrated by Lois Ehlert. We also discussed illustrations and how many illustrators/artists use different mediums in their creations. As a follow up we read Pumpkin Heads to compare the many ways pumpkins are carved.

Fifth graders continued with their scientific sketches (see previous post).

Third and Fourth graders continued with their dissection of the dictionary and experienced the book, Velcome, written and illustrated by Kevin O'Malley. What a very scary story....not:-) ha, ha....

Enjoy your weekend!

Happy Reading,

Mrs. Wetherell

Week of October 18, 2010

This week in media the third and fourth graders dissected a dictionary. We learned about entry words, guide words, and the many ways a dictionary can help us. Noah Webster began working on the dictionary when he was 43 years old. Twenty seven years later he completed our first dictionary. Students also had fun reading about a few of our entry word's "word history." Sometimes we may think we know how a word originated, but it is best to look it up. Happy Birthday Noah Webster (October 16th)

Fifth graders began going outside to collect a leaf specimen to sketch. We learned about scientific sketching and field journaling. We also learned the difference between art and scientific sketching. Lewis and Clark practiced field journaling during their expedition. Our next quest is to identify our leaf and find the scientific name and common name for each leaf we collected.

First Graders were introduced to the bat family. We learned through exploring nonfiction books that bats are mammals that fly. We also discovered bats are very helpful creatures. After learning several bat facts, we read, Bats at the Library by Brian Lies.

Second Graders continued with the bat theme at the library by discovering the book by Jannell Cannon titled Stellaluna. We watched a follow up DVD by Reading Rainbow in which we explored a cave in Texas where over one million bats live. Each night they consume over 200 tons of insects! Their droppings are used to make fertilizer which is also helpful.

Kindergarteners read a nonfiction book titled, It's Pumpkin Time, which informs students how pumpkins are grown. After their trip to the pumpkin patch, they learned how the soil was turned, pumkin seeds were planted, dirt covered the seeds, and then more work had to be completed for the seeds to grow. We read a fiction book as a follow up titled, Big Pumpkin by Erica Silverman. This was a follow up book for the kinders to enjoy before Halloween.

First Grade students discussed the process of coming to the library. We placed all the events, in order, to show a sequence. After we documented these steps, I read Dragon's Halloween by Dav Pilkey. After each chapter, we used the first, then, next, finally steps to place the story details in order.

Hope your week was as enjoyable as ours in the library!

Happy Reading,

Mrs. Wetherell