Celebrate Reading

June has slid away and July has crept in. This week I celebrate reading and the gift of time.  The month of June was perfect for me.  Filled with my favorite activities: reading, gardening, visiting, and of course more reading. I also have more time for Saturday celebration blog posts.Thanks Ruth for encouraging us to celebrate and connect with my Saturday friends from near and far. 

My summer office with a view.

• Visiting my favorite Ostrander Library weekly and talking to my friends.  Walking in and hearing, "You have several titles on the shelf today."  Discussing which ones that I reserved through Search Ohio that I think the Delaware Libraries should consider purchasing.  I celebrate amazing conversations about books and the opportunity to influence the purchase of new titles. 
• Gift of time to read blogs and tweets. The Newberry Buzz started this week with Elizabeth posting at Fuse 8.  It's like an early Christmas present to see if I am on target or way off the mark.  This year I have done pretty well with my picks so far, and of course there were a few new titles that I wasn't aware of YET.
• Gift of time to discuss books with friends that visit, through twitter, facebook and our BE google list that Bill, Margaret and Ben keep going all summer with new titles and front runners for Newberry.
• I celebrate last year's class and their class gift which were gift cards, so I could purchase my new books for next year's class.  Every year I have a student ask me about the "new books," and I explain how it's important to pay it forward. Explaining that last year's readers are already supporting this year's readers. A full circle moment connecting the end of one year and start of a new year. 
• Visiting my favorite bookstore, Fundamentals and discussing books with my friend Tami. It's always a fun day when she gives me an ARC  and this week I got Wishtree by Katherine Applegate.  I am excited to share that the Scholastic Summer Road Trip will be coming to her store in Delaware, Ohio.  That will truly be a celebration for everyone!!!
  

Celebrations from Friends to Pie

Knowing that I want to post on Saturday, celebrating my week really helps me slow down and reflect. Thanks to Ruth Ayres for her weekly link-up. You can link up HERE. 

Every day I spent time visiting with different friends. My circle widened this week because two of them I knew through other friends, but we had not spent time visiting one on one.  Celebrating time to talk and share fears, passions and hopes is powerful. It always helps me when I know that someone else feels exactly like I do.  I’m not an island, as I get overwhelmed with three weeks until school start.  I have a thousand ideas floating around, and I need to get to a hundred soon and finally down to ten and as one friend suggested, “Choose one and do it well.” 

Sharing books….How can you go wrong?  I love visiting my favorite bookstore, Fundamentals, in Delaware, OH. It’s like my little piece of heaven. Every time I walk in the door and Tami says, “What are you reading?” or better yet “Have you seen this ARC?” I actually get a happy feeling. I met a few friends there this week and shared my piece of heaven. We had such fun previewing, reading, laughing and of course finding the perfect gem for our classroom. As you can see from the photo when you find a great book, you just sit down on the floor and start reading.

Finally I am embarrassed to say but I think I made my first homemade pie from scratch.  The reason I think it is my first because if I had made one in the past I don’t remember so I am considering this the first.  It was more about the process than the eating it, which describes who I am pretty well.  I love the organization starting with finding the recipe, purchasing the ingredients. Who knew there was special cake flour? Making the crust and then cutting strawberries and rhubarb seemed perfect. I did learn to cut the rhubarb smaller next time. Lessons learned from baking a pie really made me stop and realize the importance of taking time to celebrate.

Wonderful Word Wed. Games and Thoughtful New Book

Last Saturday, I spent my morning at my favorite bookstore, Fundamentals talking to Tammy.  I love when I go into her store because she always has some great book suggestions but this time she also told me about some new games.  I always try and purchase my class a new word game for the holidays since we are starting the long days of indoor recess in Ohio.

Her first choice is the award winning game Consensus (Junior Edition). This game has won numerous awards including Major Fun Award, Dr. Toy Winner Top 10, and 2009 Game of the Year Award. I am excited to wrap up this game because it reinforces parts of speech (nouns and verbs) as well as logical thinking.  It's also great for a classroom because up to 8 students can play the game.  The point of the game is lay out 10 noun cards on the game board and one adjective card. Each player chooses which noun is best described by the adjective secretly and places their vote-#1-10.  Which ever noun gets the most votes is the consensus and those students get to move their pawn ahead and the game ends with ten dots.

Tammy also suggested Pairs in Pears with a title like that how could I go wrong?  I was excited
to learn that it has four separate alphabets
that can be combined or used separately. I
love the idea of using this game in word
study to reinforce spelling patterns and allowing the students to have fun with words including practicing figurative language. Should be a huge hit for indoor recess this year.

Tammy also suggested a new book, because of mr. terupt,  that was just released in October by first time author Rob Buyea. Tammy was so excited to tell me that the story's setting is a fifth grade classroom and each chapter is written from the point of view of six students in Mr. Terupt's class.  There’s . . . Jessica, the new girl, smart and perceptive, who’s having a hard time fitting in; Alexia, a bully, your friend one second, your enemy the next;Peter, class prankster and troublemaker; Luke, the brain; Danielle, who never stands up for herself; shy Anna, whose home situation makes her an outcast; and Jeffrey, who hates school.  Mr. Terupt is in his first year of teaching and is a marvelous teacher because he learns about each of his students' home life and then handles many difficult situations with a sense of humor as well as many endearing conversations with the students both privately and within the class setting.  I actually am going to start the (dollar word) math game which Mr. Terupt used to hook his class into loving math after the holidays.  

Poetry Friday

When I read Karen’s post I called her and told her that I had just purchased the same poetry book, and she suggested that we both blog on the same book today.  Bill calls this simublog not sure if this is a real word but I like it!

When I was at  Fundamentals Tami suggested that I look at this new poetry book.  The first thing I noticed about the book is the beautiful cover.  Tami shared with me that the illustrator is Chris Soentpiet, and she showed me where he drew himself, his wife and two sons on the cover. He is above the American Flag and his wife is in the purple shirt holding their youngest son. His son is holding the flag.  I have been a huge fan since he came to my son’s school when he was in fifth grade and he came so excited about meeting a real life illustrator.

I opened the book and loved how the poems were so diversified and the illustrations felt like they took me to the setting of the poem.  I am always looking for books that expand the views of my students.  The first poem
Miss Stone by Nikki Grimes caught my attention because our first day of school is this Monday.

My wishes gathered like ants.
I wished there was no recess.
I wished there was no first day.
I wished somebody, anybody
Would come over and ask me to play.

Then you said, “Excuse me.
Would you keep my company?
I’m feeling all alone.”

Remember Mrs. Stone?

I loved you that day.
You made my unhappy thoughts
Scamper away.

As I read this poem, I think about my new students who are starting school on Monday and how important it is to take the time to not only listen to them but also read their faces especially on  playground duty.  I hope you all have a wonderful first day as you begin to look into your students'
Amazing Faces.

Laura has Poetry Friday round up at Teach Poetry K-12.

Poetry Friday

A few years ago when Karen from Literate Lives was teaching 5th grade with me, we had numerous conversations about Language Arts, but I really changed my poetry instruction after our conversations.  I began to implement Poetry Friday.  Poetry Friday for my class is when the students have at least 15-20 minutes to explore our class poetry books. The students are able to sign up to share the poem aloud to the class while standing on  “potty stools.”  After the students share, I then lead the class in a mini lesson starting the year with looking at different types of figurative language using the poems that the students just shared.

This year I will start Poetry Friday with a newly published book that I bought at my favorite teacher’s bookstore called Fundamentals in Delaware, OH.  The owner, Tami, is extremely knowledgeable about children’s books.  Her store reminds me of the small independent bookstore in the movie You’ve Got Mail. There is nothing better than going there to just hang out to discuss and read some great books.

 I purchased There’s No Place Like School: Classroom Poems are selected by Jack Prelutsky and illustrated by Jane Manning. I already have many Jack Prelutsky books so I will love adding it to his tub.  I chose this book for several reasons.

First of all I love the colorful illustrations, which are bright, funny, and the character’s facial  expressions are wonderful.  You could use the book later for a mentor text for inferences by having the students look into the character’s eyes and use the text to support their inference.


Next, the titles are amazing and really caught my attention

     *Not Fair (perfect for 5th graders)
    *Why the Class Frog is Purple (and it really is)
     *When the Teacher Isn’t Looking (you can only imagine)

Lastly,  I am extremely excited to introduce my new class to a new book and start with some funny poems.  I think I will start with " The Drinking Fountain"  by Kenn Nesbitt which starts with these opening lines:

The drinking fountain squirted me.
It shot right up my nose.
It felt as if I’d stuck my nostril on the garden hose.

Perhaps this poem will lead to some funny summer stories-you never know in the classroom.  That is the fun part of being there!

** For more Poetry Friday fun, check out Szofia at the Stenhouse blog this week.