Just Keep Reading

During any type of extended break from school, it is important for students to maintain their reading skills.  The best way to accomplish this is for them to read every day. Some of the benefits of reading daily are an expansion of vocabulary, increased creativity, improved writing skills, enhanced memory and development of analytical thinking.

To assist them in getting motivated to read every day, let me remind you of our reading challenges for the year.  The deadline for the Texas Bluebonnet Award for 3^rd-5^th grade students is coming soon after we return from Winter Break.  Students will be voting for their favorite the week of January 24, 2017 if they have read at least 5 of the books on the list.

The next major deadline will be for the Six Flags Read to Succeed Program.  All reading logs of 6 hours of recreational reading will be due on Friday, February 24, 2017.

Grades K-2 will be voting for their favorite Texas 2x2 book the week of April 24, 2017.  Like the Bluebonnet Award, students must read at least 5 books on the list in order to vote.

Our final deadline is for the Bookworm Challenge. Reading logs for all grade levels will be due by April 28, 2017.

I look forward to seeing how many students complete the challenges for this year. In the meantime, I hope everyone has a relaxing and fun filled Winter Break.  Remember, just keep reading, just keep reading, just keep reading!

Hour of Code

Code.org is a non-profit organization committed to providing access to computer science for all students. This week is Computer Science Education Week and Hour of Code is part of the celebration of this week. I did coding with nearly all of the grade levels this week during their library time.

In Pre-K, I read Here Comes Santa Cat by Deborah Underwood. It’s still a little too difficult to get a class of Kindergarten students to operate a computer independently, so we worked on giving and following directions.  I had four different stations. There was coding on the move, file folder coding and two separate LEGO stations.

Grades 1-5 used laptops or their own devices to go to www.code.org/learn to practice for the Hour of Code that we held at our school Friday afternoon. During that Hour of Code, parents were invited to come and code with their children.  We had an amazing turnout!

Cultural Diversity and Figurative Language

This week, Pre-K discovered the world of The Little Red Hen. I therefore, found a Cajun version to read to them titled, Gator Gumbo: A Spicy-hot Tale by Candace Fleming.

In Kindergarten, we discussed the difference between fiction and non-fiction books. I read Eric Carle’s The Very Hungry Caterpillar and Butterflies by Jennifer Hurtig.

Both First and Second Grade were learning about cultural diversity this week. I read The Sandwich Swap by Queen Rania Al Abdullah to First Grade.  It has a wonderful message of not judging a book by its cover, or anyone else for that matter. For Second Grade, I read Same, Same But Different by Jenny Kostecki-Shaw. It shows how people from different parts of the world can be different, but still have a lot of similarities.

Third Grade learned about onomatopoeia this week, so I read In the Small, Small Pond by Denise Fleming. Fourth Grade was working on their inferencing skills, so I read I Want My Hat Back and This is Not My Hat, both by Jon Klassen. The students really enjoyed predicting the outcome of both stories. Fifth Grade was also working on figurative language by learning more about metaphors. I read You’re Toast and Other Metaphors We Adore by Nancy Loewen.

Next week, we will be hosting an Hour of Code on Friday, December 9^th from 1:30 – 2:30.  Please come and join us if you can!