I CAN HELP by David Hyde Costello

I picked up I CAN HELP by David Hyde Costello at Cover to Cover yesterday. What a great book for new readers. I am always looking for books that new readers can read on their own but I am picky about them. I want the story to be good and the pictures to be important and I want these simple beginning books to be books worth reading. Well, this one certainly is.

The book is filled with simple, repetitive text. On each page, an animal needs help and another animal offers to help. The book is filled with simple dialogue between characters. For example, when the monkey is falling from the tree:
Uh-oh. I am falling
I can help.
Thank you, giraffe

This is a great book. Illustrations tell a great story and the surprise ending made me laugh out loud. I just wasn't expecting it and it is very cute!

This is a great book for reading aloud to young children and also for K-1 classrooms. Perfect for kids just learning to read.

Trust That Your Child Will Make it Through That Reading Phase

As a parent, you will only live through your child's fourth grade year one time. As a teacher, I've lived through fourth grade more than 20 times. Trust me when I tell you that in almost every case, your child will make it through "That Reading Phase."

Some children come into fourth grade, find the graphic novels in the classroom or school library, and proceed to exist on a reading diet comprised almost exclusively of graphic novels. You might think your child will never read a book with pages full of text, but what you're missing is that your child is reading voraciously. And in about January or February, your child will be full to the brim of graphic novels and ready to try some of the other books that the teacher or his/her friends recommend.

Other children come into fourth grade and pick right up with the series they were reading in 3rd grade: Geronimo Stilton or Magic Tree House or Rotten School. That's fine. That's why I have these comfortable, familiar friends in my classroom library. I also have a few books in lots of other series so that when they're ready, I can introduce them to new characters who will become comfortable, familiar friends. I don't have a problem with readers who love a series. Lots of adults are series readers. But it is my goal in fourth grade to teach children the strategies they will need to choose a stand-alone book and enjoy characters and stories on a one-book basis. I model this during read aloud time when as a class we enjoy a book together. Parents can help to balance a series reader's reading diet by reading aloud to their child.

Many children come into fourth grade lacking the reading stamina it takes to sit still and concentrate for 30 or more minutes of silent reading. They read picture books and browse the nonfiction books and I despair that they will ever sit still for anything longer than 32 pages of words and pictures. But then March rolls around, and I look up from my desk and there they are, thoroughly engrossed in THE YEAR OF THE DOG, and hoping that I have THE YEAR OF THE RAT for them to read next, and excited to hear about WHERE THE MOUNTAIN MEETS THE MOON.

One of the things that works in favor of prying your child out of "That Reading Phase" is that in fourth grade, the social nature of reading starts to catch up with their reading ability. They want to read the books that are being made into movies, and they want to read the books that their friends are recommending. They love to talk about books and have opinions about books. Fourth grade is a perfect time to start a parent/child reading club with some of your child's friends. If you start reading and discussing books with your child now, you will open doors for conversations you never would have been able to have without the help of the story or the characters in the books.

If your child is currently in a reading phase that you are feeling will never end, try to relax and live with it for a few more months. Keep them reading and reading and reading, even if it's not the kind of book you want them to to be reading for the rest of their lives, or even a year from now. Take them to the library and require them to bring home a variety of genres. Listen to books on tape in the car. And finally, remember that your child will never get too old for read aloud. One of the best gifts you can give to your child is to read to them from both the books they love and the ones you love.

This post is a part of Share a Story, Shape a Future, an annual blog event to promote literacy, celebrate books, and provide resources for parents, teachers, and readers everywhere. This year's theme was "It Takes a Village to Raise a Reader."

Each day a different kidlitosphere blogger served as host for the posting of several other bloggers. Visit the host blogs' sites to find a complete blog roll for each day.

March 8th: The Many Faces of Reading

Host: Terry Doherty at Scrub-A-Dub-Tub

Topics of the day encompassed the relationship aspect of helping children learn to read: parent-child and teacher-parent partnerships, literacy outreach; and libraries, to name a few.

March 9th: Literacy My Way/Literacy Your Way

Host: Susan Stephenson at The Book Chook

Creative literacy in all its forms (writing, art, computers) was the topic of the day.

March 10th: Just the Facts: The Nonfiction Book Hook

Host: Sarah Mulhern at The Reading Zone

This was the day for exploring the different genres of nonfiction (biography and memoir, science, nature, math, etc), as well as the use (or not) of historical fiction.

March 11th: Reading Through the Ages: Old Faves & New Classics

Host: Donalyn Miller at The Book Whisperer

Bloggers shared thematic book lists that include newer titles and the classics we loved as kids.

March 12th: Reading for the Next Generation

Host: Jen Robinson at Jen Robinson's Book Page

On this day, talk is about how to approach reading when your interests and your child's don't match. It may be that you don't like to read but your child does, how to raise the reader you're not, and dealing with the "pressure" of feeling forced to read.


** The Share a Story, Shape a Future logo was created by Elizabeth Dulemba, children's book author and illustrator, and SaS/SaF contributor.

Book Fair-Better Than Working In an Ice Cream Shop

This week, we are hosting a Selections Book Fair at our school. I cannot say enough about the amazing selection of books that they provide for a book fair. And I was able to add several of the titles that kids are currently excited about. The library is filled with kids' favorite characters and authors. It is also filled with new books, ready to be discovered. The excitement is nonstop.

When I first took the job as librarian at an elementary school, Lester Laminack told me that I would love it--that it would be like working in an ice-cream shop and that every day, I would be making people happy. A good comparison, I thought. I think of this chat with Lester often and I was reminded of it again today. The looks on the kids' faces when they enter the book fair are no different than I imagine they would be if they were entering an ice cream shop. They are beside themselves with excitement. I must admit that by 1:00 each day, I am wiped out. 25 excited children every hour for several days in a row and I need some extra caffeine to keep up.


This is the perfect time of the year for a Book Fair. A change of pace and scenery is such fun. Anticipating spring reading is also fun. But I forget my favorite part about book fair. I love listening in on the kids when they shop. I love this week because it gives me a break in routine to really listen in and to notice things that I don't often have time to notice as we rush through 45 minute classes. I notice the ways so many of them are talking about books! I loved that a child who didn't know many books or book characters not too long ago, screams across the library, "Mrs. Sibberson--is this the new Mo Willems book?" when he notices CAT THE CAT. I love watching a child sit on the floor for 35 minutes straight reading the new Babymouse book cover to cover, thrilled to have discovered one she hasn't read and looking up every so often to make sure no one will stop her reading. I love seeing fans of THE LIGHTNING THIEF hover around a new graphic novel about Zeus and looking at the back cover to see that there are more in the series about Greek Mythology. And I love that two older girls found a book they had never heard of (I hadn't either) but previewed together and are now dying to read it. It reminds them of one of their favorite authors and they are anticipating finding another author to love.

There is nothing like the anticipation of reading a great book. I think that is what book fair is about this week. Kids know that whether they buy a book or not, we will get many of these new books for our library.

Really, Lester's thinking about an ice cream shop rang so true today. The thing about ice cream is that it is gone after a few minutes. But a good book? Not so much.

Dying To Meet You

Dying to Meet You (43 Old Cemetery Road: Book One)

by Kate Klise

illustrated by Sarah Klise

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Co., 2009

review copy provided by the publisher

I love the Regarding the.... series by the Klise sisters, but sadly, I have never been able to get my fourth graders to share my love. I think I'll try this book as my next shared read aloud, and then we'll see if I can hook some readers into the Regarding the... series! (or at least the second book of this series -- Over My Dead Body)

Dying To Meet You is written like the Regarding the.... series, billing itself as "a collection of actual letter and documents written over the course of one summer and pertaining to the strange events that took place in a certain house located at 43 Old Cemetery Road in an otherwise quiet town called Ghastly, Illinois." As in the Regarding the.... books, the reader has to make lots of inferences, but the pages aren't quite so packed with information that might be pertinent to the story (or that might be there just to amuse the reader). The story line is more straight forward, and the letters and documents are more clearly linked.

A famous children's author moves into a Victorian mansion to finish the book he's working on. Unfortunately, he has a bad case of writer's block, and also unfortunately, he finds that the mansion is already occupied by a ghost and an 11 year-old boy who has been mostly abandoned by his globe-trotting parents. The writer, the ghost and the boy are at odds at first, but wind up working together towards a common goal.

One of my favorite things about this book are the puns with the names: Ghastly, Illinois; a children's book writer named I. B. Grumply; Anita Sale, a real estate agent; E. Gadds, a lawyer. And on, and on.

A very fun read for 3rd-6th graders.

Reviews: 100 Scope Notes, Dr. Quinn's Book Blog, TheHappyNappyBookseller, Literate Lives.

Kate and Sarah Klise's website.

Author Visit -- Melissa Sweet

Two weeks ago, Melissa Sweet was the visiting author at our school. There are three great things about an author visit: all the learning that takes place before the visit, the excitement of meeting the author on the day of the visit, and the learning that lingers after the author has gone back home!

Second graders learning about Ohio animals made constellations of the animals after reading TUPELO RIDES THE RAILS.

These students wrote about their grandmothers after reading CARMINE: A LITTLE MORE RED.

If you're getting ready to meet an illustrator, you might want to take some sketching lessons online and sketch an illustration to go along with your wolf research.

Third graders practiced letter writing by writing letters to Melissa Sweet.

Fourth graders who read A RIVER OF WORDS illustrated poems in the style of Melissa Sweet, using collage and watercolors.

CARMINE inspired word work...


...and TUPELO inspired mapping the community.

We loved Melissa Sweet's books, and loved meeting her and hearing the stories about how her ideas turned into those books. She is everything her name says she is: SWEET!

GREEN START BOOKS

I just discovered these sweet little "Green Start Books" that I love! I just picked up a few to add to baby presents. These books are little board books, made from 98% recycled materials. They are great little books--about the size of an average board book. The pages are sturdy and the illustrations are quite fun.

Each book deals with some aspect of our Earth. The two that I just picked up are called IN THE GARDEN and BABY ANIMALS. They are both done so well for young children. The text is simple and predictable. The books invite interaction. And even though they are short, they teach so much. As I mentioned, I am buying these for baby gifts but I think they are also perfect for new readers. These would be great for 1st and 2nd graders since the text is supportive and the topics are interesting. Hopefully, they'll add more to the collection. I am excited about this new series.

True Dat

From Indexed

Poetry Friday -- Numbers

Fractions are on stage in fourth grade -- it's that time of year when every skill that's been mastered (hopefully) so far gets a part in the play. Multiplication and division are still the stars, but they wear different costumes and are sometimes unrecognizable at first. The reason for understanding factors and multiples stands proudly in the spotlight with its chest thrust out, and the moment when the audience can anticipate the moves of every character on the stage, knowing almost before they do who's greater, lesser, equal, improper or mixed...oh, that moment...it is among my favorites every year.

Numbers and the four operations of mathematics come to life for Mary Cornish in her poem, Numbers. I give you two stanzas; click through to Poetry 180 for the whole poem.



Numbers
by Mary Cornish

I like the generosity of numbers.
The way, for example,
they are willing to count
anything or anyone:
two pickles, one door to the room,
eight dancers dressed as swans.

.

.

.

There's an amplitude to long division,

as it opens Chinese take-out
box by paper box,
inside every folded cookie
a new fortune.

The whole poem is here; the round up is at Teaching Books.

More Read Across America Fun

From SchoolTube.

Celebrating READ ACROSS AMERICA with Song!

We had a great READ ACROSS AMERICA Celebration today at school. Last year, we had a type of "carnival"--lots of activities for kids to do around books. It was a fun day and we all had a great time. This year, we decided to celebrate in a different way and it was even more fun!

The band RMT came to our school today to celebrate literacy through song. I had heard about what a great show this band does and I thought that reminding kids that songs tell stories made sense for the day. The band is a popular Central Ohio band and they have an amazing program called Songs of America. The show is almost an hour long and it tells the history of America through song. It was a GREAT way to celebrate literacy. First of all, the energy was amazing. The show has the feel of a very fun concert! The songs were put together to show the history of our country. As the band played, they told the pieces of history that were needed to understand the importance of the music they were sharing. Giant wall-size slides played behind them--showing the times and events in history that they were sharing.




Kids and teachers sang along, clapped along, and danced along. There was such a good balance of types of music shared. My favorite was the last song of the show that they wrote themselves called "American Song". (This is the last song on the clip below and also one that I am buying from iTunes next time I shop there.) The kids left smiling, laughing and, of course, dancing.

My ten-year old daughter saw this same show on Veteran's Day last year. I must say that this is a great show to celebrate any day. A great holiday show or a great show for anytime of year. This is a fun show for kids of all ages and for adults. The YouTube video below shows clips of the show but imagine 500 smiling, singing, dancing children in the audience when you watch it. If you have any money left for a show like this, I would definitely recommend getting them to your school or library.

I am trying to figure out how to do things like this on a smaller level in the school library having bands, artists, speakers, scientists, etc. in for school library events. A few whole school events like this one but then grade-level or interest-type events through the year during lunch recess, etc. So much learning and fun from events like these.

I think this was, by far, my favorite celebration of READ ACROSS AMERICA since the tradition began!