The Power of a Read Aloud #sleTHEplacetobe ..

I have been missing reading aloud to kids lately. My new "flexible" schedule allows me to work with teachers and students on technology and also to teach Personal Learning Time (PLT) groups. I don't have a lot of time for reading to children. That makes me sad.

There is so much power in read alouds - modeling fluency, tone, introducing kids to new types of literature, and on and on. I really miss it. I had a teacher come in this week who had a reluctant reader who just could not pick out appropriate books. He was an English Language Learner who checked out chapter books in English - but he was not ready for them. He was not able to, or really interested in reading them. I showed her a series I had that were spooky books that looked like chapter books, but were high interest, low level books. Librarians know what these are, but most teachers, administrators, and parents do not. She took a stack of books back to her classroom and shared them with him. He wanted to check them all out! She reported that he was so excited to read the book he chose and that others also wanted to check out that series. I had another teacher come in who is reading aloud a mystery she bought at the book fair. Her students had begged her to keep reading. They couldn't wait to find out what happened next. I often have students check out the books their teachers read aloud and follow along (or read ahead). I love when teachers read the first book in a series. My third grade teachers do this often. As soon as they start I can't keep that series/author in the library! Read alouds are powerful. Librarians and teachers should do them every chance they get to introduce students to series, authors, and styles of writing!

Britannica Image Quest

Have you ever needed your students to find images for a digital product? It is hard to find out if you have rights to use photos from Google Image, and you want to teach your students to be good digital citizens! And you may be afraid to let your students search "chick" for fear of what results they will find!

Britannica Image Quest may be your answer! The web address is http://quest.eb.com. Your librarian will have your username and password. If you have Mackin Via, the students should be able to access this database - and it should be automatically authenticated! This database has nearly 3 million rights-cleared images from more than 50 of the best collections in the world. You can search in Spanish as well as English.

Check it out to use with your next project! You can save pictures straight to the camera roll on an iPad.

 

Skype with Dove

Amy Keller, the Dove librarian, and I decided we would try to Skype for the first time with a friendly class - so today we Skyped with each other! My 2nd graders read books to her first graders and the first graders had to decide if the book was fiction or nonfiction. The lesson wasn't as great as it could have been, but the kiddos were so engaged seeing other classes. I know that I need to figure out a better way to set up the camera so you can see all of the kids sitting. I want to try it again with a classroom in the school. I want to see if I can reflect to my laptop from my iPad. If I can, it would be a lot easier to place the iPad in the Just Stand and set it up where the camera captures all the students sitting. I am going to be working with 4th graders on Global Read Aloud, and so I think they will work with me to Skype. I may hit up kinder or 1st grade, too, to talk to them because they are researching school leaders.

A Day with Shannon Miller! Loving that she shares tools and gives us time to set them up. Want to make a Symbaloo, set up my Tweet Deck, want to look at Hoot Suite. #sletheplacetobe #gcisdlib

Book Fair a Success!

We had a shortened book fair this past week with the Labor Day holiday but it was still a success. I sold 157 Minecraft books alone! Wow! We also had a whole case of Spanish books sent to us and lots of great upper level chapter books. My favorites were the great picture books. Pippa the Pumpkin Fairy was very popular. It was so much fun to see all the parents and grandparents at Curriculum Night. I love to see kiddos so excited about getting a book that they get to keep for their very own. Makes this librarian smile!

NTCTELA at Hurst Conference Center

Today I am at the NTCTELA convention in Hurst. I saw Matt de la Peña speak as the keynote speaker. He gave a powerful address about reluctant readers. His personal story was a powerful reminder that we must see the invisible child in the back of the room.

Donalyn Miller and Teri Lesenge are so inspiring! I put tons of books on my next order for students and teachers to read! The power of book talks worked on me. : ) I am so happy that they reinforced the power of read alouds.

Feedly and Pinterest

So I set up my Feedly account. It was a great way for me to look for more educational websites that I would like to read on a regular basis. Usually I am bombarded with emails from several websites. I am excited to just have one place to go to look at my favorites. Now I just have to remember to go to the website! Pinterest is another great place to find ideas! I have a friend who always sends me Pins of library and technology ideas.

Book Challenges - Donalyn Miller

Do you love The Book Whisperer by Donalyn Miller as much as I do? I am thrilled to get to go see her present, along with Penny Kittle, this Friday at the NTCTELAR Convention in Hurst!

I love that our elementary teachers are going to start using her ideas next school year with the GCISD 25 Book Challenge. I went to the public library with my children this weekend. We signed up for the summer reading challenge. I was surprised and disappointed that the challenge was for them to read 50 books over the summer. The challenge started on May 29th, when HEBISD ended school. Since GCISD didn't end until a week later, we didn't get started until June 8th. My kids read 100-150 page books...5000 pages in less than 2 months seems pretty ridiculous. We checked out some shorter books in an effort to at least attempt to reach 50. What I love about Donalyn Miller is that her 40 book challenge (for a whole school year) isn't a pass/fail kind of thing. My girls were disappointed in learning that they were expected to read 50 books in ~50 days...if they don't, they don't get the prize, but they do get to have enjoyed reading lots of books.  At Silver Lake we challenged our kids to read 11 books and 1 magazine over the summer. I think maybe the public librarians need to take a reality check!

End of the School Year

I cannot believe that school is out for summer! I hope all of our students are reading over the summer. I took my two daughters to the public library on Sunday and we checked out 7 books. It is so much fun to read over the summer.

Don't forget about Silver Lake's summer reading challenge! Read 12 books and fill out your Book Bingo Blackout form! Click below if you lost yours.