Great Picture Books to Read Aloud

I ran across a great linky party about books! Denise at Sunny Days in Second Grade is showcasing favorite books for her most recent Show & Tell Tuesday theme. 

I just love a good read-aloud, so I'm linking up and sharing some of my personal favorites. Some of these books are linked to blog posts I've written that describe activities to go along with them. All of the following are picture books that have been kid-tested and approved by my students this school year! 

"Pierre the Penguin" by Jean Marzollo

This is a must-have for your penguin unit! It's the true story of a penguin who lost his feathers and the brilliant solution that helped to restore them. Pierre just celebrated his 30th birthday and still lives at the California Academy of Sciences, which features live penguin cams on their website to show your students after reading the story.

"Moe the Dog in Tropical Paradise" by Diane Stanley

A great book to read in winter-time when you're wishing for warm weather! Click here for my blog post on this story.

"Little Granny Quarterback" by Bill Martin Jr.

You don't come across too many books about a football-playing grandmother! Click here for my blog post on this story (scroll to the end of post to see activities my students did with the book).

"There is a Bird on Your Head" by Mo Willems

Another hilarious Elephant and Piggie adventure! I read Elephant's lines using an elephant mask with a bird attached to the top and the kids were enthralled! This just might be my favorite book in the series.

"Little Dog Lost: The True Story of a Brave Dog Named Baltic" by Monica Carnesi

This is the true story of a dog rescued from an ice floe in 2010. Students can see pictures of Baltic and a video of his actual rescue on the author's blog! 

"Snowflake Bentley" by Jacqueline Briggs Martin

This is a beautiful picture book biography of Wilson Bentley, a farmer born in 1865 who photographed and studied snowflakes. Students can use Wilson Bentley's pictures as inspiration for making or drawing their own snowflakes.

"How Rocket Learned to Read" and "Rocket Writes a Story" by Tad Hills

Rocket's got reading and writing covered! See my blog posts here and here for ideas and activities.

"Senorita Gordita" by Helen Ketteman
This book is a Southwestern-style retelling of "The Gingerbread Man" and is so fun to read aloud! Kids will join in the refrain with enthusiasm ("with a flip and a skip and a zip-zoom-zip"), and comparisons to the original Gingerbread Man fairy tale are sure to follow. Spanish words are sprinkled throughout the book, so an introduction to a few of them before reading it will have your students thinking about language and making predictions based on prior knowledge of the original story.

"Porkenstein" by Kathryn Lasky
 A fun Frankenstein-esque story to read at Halloween. Throw on a lab coat and safety goggles and start conducting science experiments after reading this book!

"The Library Dragon" by Carmen Agra Deedy
A librarian has serious issues with kids checking out or even touching the library books in this awesome story. Click here for my blog post on "The Library Dragon".


Be sure to check out other great picture book recommendations at Sunny Days in Second Grade's linky party here!

~Swersty

A Tropical Paradise in Winter!

"Moe the Dog in Tropical Paradise" by Diane Stanley is one of my favorite books and perfect to read at this time of year because it takes place in winter:

What images come to mind when you think of winter? Snowflakes? A blanket of white snow covering the ground? Ice-covered ponds and lakes? Well, winter in Central Texas is usually pretty mild, so unfortunately snow is a rare occurrence here. Last week was no exception with daytime temperatures in the mid-70's. Oh how we yearn for a little snow and ice once in a while!

So you can imagine the surprise for my students when they found out that there was an ice storm in the library, complete with a snowman, igloo, and an ice tunnel!

Our story area was transformed into a giant igloo!

The ice tunnel--brrrrr!

What does the inside of an igloo look like, anyway? Let's take a peek...

Entrance to the igloo

Hmmm, not quite what you might expect...

The tropical decor shocked the kids, but it made sense after hearing the story. And they really loved leaving the story area through the ice tunnel:






The story doesn't actually have an igloo or an ice tunnel in it, but I couldn't resist adding them. And in case you're wondering about the extravagant set-up, I didn't do it all by myself. I had help from my daughter and her friend, who were completely in charge of the tropical paradise area while I tackled the icy parts. We had fun decorating, and the students had a blast with this story! The setting prompted great discussions about weather, with students comparing warm and cold climates. Personally, I enjoy living in a warm location, but wouldn't mind a nice snowfall once every winter. How about you? 

~Swersty

Library Football

 Give me an "R"! Give me an "E"! Give me an "A"! Give me a "D"! What's it spell?

Have your kids ever played library football? It's kind of like real football, except no tackling is allowed, and the Dewey Decimal System is an important part of the game! The week before the Super Bowl is when my 1st-5th graders play this totally loud but very fun game. Students are immediately greeted by marching band music and this guy when they come to the library for their lesson:

I have this awesome football field rug that comes out each year for the big event:

The kids get suited up in red and blue jerseys (courtesy of our P.E. coach) and the ref (yours truly) goes over the rules of the game, the most important of which is to quickly find a book that matches the Dewey Decimal number on a card.

Here's a sampling of the cards that students use during the game:

And here is a student finding a book to match his card. 

Once a match is made it has to be verified by the ref, and then a real football is moved down the field by the classroom teacher. 

A touchdown is worth 6 points, and the scoring team answers a question about something we've learned in the library to get the extra point.

When the game is over, students shake hands with the other team:

The kids LOVE this game--probably because it's the one time I tell them to be loud and run in the library! Something else they love is discovering books from the nonfiction section, especially sports books!

I am not brave enough (or crazy enough) to do this with kindergarten. Instead, I take this opportunity to compare nonfiction and fiction books. First I read them a simple nonfiction book about football and then we read "Little Granny Quarterback" by Bill Martin Jr.

Have you heard of this story? It's one of my favorites, and they really enjoy holding the story clues from this book!

After reading the books, we play a quick game of library football, kindergarten style. Basically the kids toss the ball to each other down the field until everyone has had a turn. Each catch counts as a point for the whole class, and we clap and cheer at the end. Believe it or not, they love it!

TOUCHDOWN, TOUCHDOWN

SIS BOOM BAH

READING IS FUN

RAH RAH RAH!

Oops--looks like my inner cheerleader has been unleashed!

~Swersty

"Whoooo" is Rocket's New Friend?

Last week in the library we made some new friends.  We literally MADE friends--for one of our favorite story characters, Rocket the dog from the book "Rocket Writes a Story" by Tad Hills! In this sequel to "How Rocket Learned to Read", Rocket befriends a shy owl and learns about the writing process at the same time. The kids loved this project! Take a look at a few of their masterpieces:

These new friends are cute for sure, but also WISE, because they have the very important job of holding word cards for their primary-grade owners. First, have students write words they can use in their own stories: 

Each student's cards are then stored inside the owl, providing motivation to collect lots more great words to use when writing stories!

If you are interested in more unique and educational activities to go with the Rocket stories, click the following links that will take you directly to my TPT store and the corresponding unit for that book:

"Rocket Writes a Story" Book Study Unit

"How Rocket Learned to Read" Book Study Unit

I can't resist one more picture of these cuties before signing off. "Whoooo" else thinks they're adorable?!

~Swersty

Woo hoo! I got a story clue!

See the smiles on these kinder kids' faces? They were happy because they got to hold story clues during last week's story time. Before reading a book to kindergarteners, I show them 3-5 objects that relate to the story. They try to guess what the story is about using the clues, which helps to develop good speaking and listening habits along with a host of other language arts skills. It's so neat to see the progress they make in their story predictions from the beginning of the year to the end!

Story clues are easy to incorporate into story time and kids eagerly await their turn to hold them. Stuffed animals and inexpensive small toys make up the majority of my story clue collection. 

So how many of you use story clues when introducing new books to your kids? If you do, I'll bet you've noticed that behavior instantly improves with the mere mention of the word "clues". And good behavior paired with a good story will get a "WOO HOO" from me any day!
~Swersty

Book Fair Fun

It's book fair time! This coming week the library will be hosting a Scholastic Book Fair and the kids and staff are so excited! 

Hosting a book fair is a huge job because, for starters, it doesn't magically set itself up. In fact, it takes a lot of work to get a book fair ready, as one of my 5th graders reminded me last week. My book fair was delivered on Monday, and on Tuesday this student poked his head into the library. Here's how our conversation went:

Kid (shouting urgently): "MRS. WERSTERFER! YOU HAVE TO START SETTING UP THE BOOK FAIR!"

Me (looking up from my computer): "Huh?"

Kid: "THE BOOK FAIR! IT'S NEXT WEEK! YOU NEED TO SET IT UP NOW!"

Me: "Don't worry, I've got it covered. Now get back to class!"

That thrill over a book fair never seems to go away. Even adults get excited at the mere mention of the the event! Friday afternoon some of my wonderful library volunteers and PTA moms helped me unpack and arrange our school's fall book fair. I think it looks really good. Take a look! 

(Cue the "ooohs" and "ahhhs"...)

Oooh!

Ahhh!

I have a big smile here because this was a posed completely spontaneous picture to show the joys of selling items at a book fair. I'll be the first to admit that hosting a book fair is not always sunshine and lollipops. Allow me to present the photo above as exhibit A--note the non-cluttered cash register table--very nice, right?! By Tuesday it will be covered with stacks of books and miscellaneous items to put away because people either: a.) changed their minds about what to buy, or b.) couldn't afford them in the first place. This table will also be littered with a collection of random papers, book fair flyers, sticky notes, trash, and pens. (Speaking of pens, the Murphy's Law of Book Fairs holds that they will mysteriously disappear the exact moment someone needs one to write a check.)

Exhibit B--no long lines of restless students and stressed-out parents here yet, but come Monday morning this place will be a zoo! And let's not forget about clueless kindergartners who can't count money but are laden with baggies full of pennies and nickels. You don't see them in this photo, but they are sure to make an appearance! 
Don't get me wrong; there are many things I like about the book fair. I enjoy the smell of brand-new books and the thrill of finding awesome stories to share with my classes. However, the best part of having a book fair is seeing so many kids get pumped up over books. All the hard work and effort put into running a book fair is worth it when a student says, "Yessss! You have the book I want to read!" 
~Swersty

Library Characters

I'm ba-ack! It has been a while since my last post and my only excuse is that I'm finding it a challenge to juggle family activities/schedules, work responsibilities, and blogging stuff.

Our library has had a few visitors since the beginning of school! One surprise guest in September was Miss Lotty, a.k.a. the Library Dragon!

Yep, she sports a dragon tail and stylish beehive hairdo!

If you're not familiar with the story The Library Dragon by Carmen Agra Deedy, it's about a librarian named Miss Lotta Scales who is hired to guard the books at an elementary school. She starts out as a real dragon by not doing story time or letting the students even touch the library books. Of course, by the end of the story she transforms into Miss Lotty, a more kid-friendly librarian who allows the books to be checked out and even introduces story time in the library! A sequel book, Return of the Library Dragon, was recently published and I feel certain my students will be seeing more of Miss Lotty in the near future.

 Jumoke the baby gorilla continues to make occasional appearances at our library, but most of the time she is "napping" in the back office. Almost every class wants to know where she is and when they'll get to see her again, so to preserve my own sanity this past week I told them that she was away visiting a zoo! Who knows, that zoo trip may turn into an extended stay...

Last week's story Porkenstein, by Kathryn Lasky, brought out my inner scientist/inventor persona:

This is a great Halloween story that I read to pre-k through 4th grade classes. After the story, we had fun with science experiments. Please note that I use the word "science" loosely here, as the experiments involved water-filled beakers, cake sprinkles, an old TV cable, and a singing pig stuffed animal! Suffice it to say that I probably won't be awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry any time soon.

That's all of the library characters for now, friends. I'm signing off but am determined to do a better job of keeping up with the blogging world from now on. Who knows, maybe my next character will be called Super Blogger!

~Swersty