Text Features and Dictionary Skills

In Pre-K, I read the book Blocks by Irene Dickson since they have been learning about shapes.

We worked on dictionary skills in Kindergarten and First Grade. In Kindergarten, I introduced using a picture dictionary to find words they do not know the meaning of. We played a scavenger hunt type of game to find words that began with certain letters of the alphabet.

In First Grade we discussed the importance of guide words and how they can be used to find an entry in the dictionary. We did an activity where there were magnetized guide words on the board and they had to put the other words in order between them. I was amazed at well they did this activity.

In Second Grade we discussed the difference between inferencing and predicting. We first looked at photos and then read some short passages to infer what was happening.

In Third Grade we discussed different types of text features such as titles, headings, bold print, photos, captions and diagrams.

In Fourth Grade we read The Worrywarts by Pamela Duncan Edwards for all of the alliteration in it.

Fifth Grade had camp this week, so we just did a check out only so that everyone would have an opportunity to get a book.

Next week we will be reading various Halloween stories and doing all kinds of Halloween activities.

Online Catalog

This week I taught a variety of topics. In Pre-K they were studying pumpkins, so I read Pete the Cat: Five Little Pumpkins by James Dean.

In Kindergarten, we discussed what a character in a story was. For this lesson, I read My Friend Rabbit by Eric Rohmann. After reading the story, students had to tell me who the characters were.

We worked on main idea in First Grade by reading Stand Tall, Molly Lou Melon by Patty Lovell.

In Second Grade, I read Dragons Love Tacos by Adam Rubin to illustrate cause and effect.

In grades 3-5, I showed them how to access our online catalog via the PISD Library KOHA Catalog app with their Chromebooks. This will allow them to search for a book by title, author or subject. It will also give them access to a variety of online library resources such as encyclopedias and databases. I demonstrated how they could access this from home and gave them a bookmark with the information to have for future reference.

Hopefully, this will empower them to be more independent when selecting books and being able to use the library resources.

How to Choose a Good Read Aloud Book

Since this week was only three days, we just did checkout only when the classes came to the library so that everyone would have an opportunity to check out a book.

Reading Rockets had a great article for parents about how to choose an appropriate book to read aloud to your child. They had different suggestions for infants to third graders. There are many things to consider when selecting a book. How interesting the characters or topic is, does it have an exciting plot or are the illustrations engaging. Below is the link to the full article and I hope that you will find it interesting and helpful.

http://www.readingrockets.org/article/how-choose-read-aloud-books-babies-third-graders

Columbus Day

This week Pre-K was learning about friendship, so I read Nugget & Fang by Tammi Sauer.

All of the other grade levels learned about Christopher Columbus and how we came to have the federal holiday Columbus Day. We discussed what a biography was and these are the biography books I read to Kindergarten and Second Grade.

For First Grade, I showed them how to access the Pebble Go Biographies from our Library Resources page and then let them listen to the entry for Christopher Columbus.

For Third and Fourth Grade, I read books about Columbus Day. It had some biographical information on Christopher Columbus as well as information on how Columbus Day became a national holiday. These are the books that I read to them.

For Fifth Grade we listened to a reading of Encounter by Jane Yolen on You Tube. This is a story about Christopher Columbus from the perspective of the native people. We discussed how telling a story from different perspectives can really change the narrative.