Media Center News
November 2014
Thank you!
Thank you to everyone who participated in National Young Reader's Week and helped to make it fun for our students! Mrs. Griggs and I appreciate everyone who swapped classrooms, dressed in their PJs, read outside in the hallway, and promoted reading all week long with their students. You are all so wonderful!
November is National Picture Book Month
Celebrate picture books during the month of November with one of these brand new gems:
The Farmer and the Clown, by Marla Frazee
Whimsical and touching images tell the story of an unexpected friendship and the revelations it inspires in this moving book from two-time Caldecott Honor medalist Marla Frazee. This beautifully simple wordless picture book can be a wonderful read aloud! It could be used in the classroom to tell a sequential story, or individual pictures would make excellent writing prompts. Perfect for all ages.
As an Oak Tree Grows, by G. Brian Karas
This inventive picture book relays the events of two hundred years from the unique perspective of a magnificent oak tree, showing how much the world can transform from a single vantage point. From 1775 to the present day, this fascinating framing device lets readers watch as human and animal populations shift and the landscape transitions from country to city. Methods of transportation, communication and energy use progress rapidly while other things hardly seem to change at all. This book would probably be best for grades two and up, but I can especially imagine fourth graders enjoying this one.
Ivan: The Remarkable True Story of the Shopping Mall Gorilla, by Katherine Applegate
Captured as a baby, Ivan was brought to a Tacoma, Washington, mall to attract shoppers. Gradually, public pressure built until a better way of life for Ivan was found at Zoo Atlanta. From the Congo to America, and from a local business attraction to a national symbol of animal welfare, Ivan the Shopping Mall Gorilla traveled an astonishing distance in miles and in impact. Written by the author who wrote The One and Only Ivan, Katherine Applegate now brings Ivan's true story and includes photographs of Ivan in the back.
Why not try a book tasting?
Tired of your students never picking anything new to read? Tired of students who only pick books they are not ready to read? Come in to the library for a book tasting! Sign up for a time that is convenient for you, let me know what your goals are for your class (breaking out of a rut, finding just-right books, trying a new genre, finding new non-fiction), and I'll set up a sampling of books for your students to try.