What are kids reading these days?

When I taught 3rd and 4th grade I was always trying to read the books my students were reading. This is an important aspect in getting students to read. Students will read based upon book recommendations! Student recs, teacher recs, librarian recs, and even parent recs are vital to exposing students to different genres of books. Elementary students are still figuring out who they are as a reader. This is why I highly recommend to my teachers Donalyn Miller’s 40 book challenge. She challenges students to read 40 books in all different genres during that current academic school year. Students will be dipping their feet in many different types a books. Eventually, they will gravitate towards a genre they enjoy most. But, in order for educators to foster students reading different types of books we need to have our noses in books too!

Colby Sharp is a 5th grade teacher and he sets the best example of introducing students to new books and passing them out like candy! Check out the video he posted about what his kids are reading now!

What are you recommending others to read?

La Princesa and the Pea

Fairytales are always a favorite with kids! I love that one of our Mockingbird books this year is about The Princess and the Pea. I was not as familiar with this fairytale which probably means a lot of students aren’t either. La Princesa and the Pea has a Spanish twist and has Spanish words trickled throughout it. Students can do ALL kinds of inferring and context clue hunts to find the meaning of the Spanish words. Thankfully a glossary was provided in the beginning pages of the book to help with definition and pronunciation. As a read aloud, pronunciation is important in this book. My two years of Spanish has helped me ONLY with pronunciation. But, that is about it. I remember NOTHING else! After reading this book to the students I add in a digital teaching tool by reminding our students about our digital library which has changed this year to Sora. We use Sora to read a classic version of The Princess and the Pea. Students were able to see how the stories are similar. The kids loved this book and if you get a chance to read it, you’ve got to check out la reina’s cat! So hilarious! I hope you enjoy it as much as us!

Interview with Author, Diana Glass

We are excited to interview Children's Book author, Diana Glass in this week's episode. She wrote Benny's Moving Buddy, which she wrote as a result of her own personal history of moving from place to place and school to school. We are sure children all over the world can relate to this book, especially if they have to experience a move to another school.
Scroll to the bottom to go straight to this week's episode or click the podcast button near the top of this page!
Here's a link to her book on Amazon if you'd like to own  your very own copy.

Benny's Moving Buddy

 

What we're reading now:

Persais is reading The Land of Stories: Beyond the Kingdoms

Author: Chirs Colfer 

Book Website: http://thelandofstories.com/books/

Sarah is reading Hot Cocoa Hearts
Author: Suzanne Nelson
Book Website: https://www.suzannenelson.com/hot-cocoa-hearts/

Kaden is reading Diary fo an 8 bit Warrior Book 2 From Seeds to Swords

Author Cube Kid

Book Website: https://allauthor.com/preview/7622/

Ms. Reynolds is reading Refugee
Author: Alan Gratz
Book Website: https://www.alangratz.com/writing/refugee/

Books Blurb

 

   

Doll Bones

The Doll in the Garden

The Dollhouse Murders

The Doll People

PODCAST
Season 2 Episode 2

The Podcast is BACK for Season 2!

We are back at it for our podcast and we hope to record weekly episodes for this season. We got a later start (my fault) and still would like to record at least 4 to 5 episodes.

We have our new Podcast cohosts and they are readers! This is important, being out podcast is about reading, books, and authors!
Below are links to information about the books our cohosts are reading and also the Book Blurb segment!

Season 2

Episode 1

We're Back! S 2 .EP 1

What We Are Reading Now

Sarah is reading Diary of a Wimpy Kid - The Long Haul By Jeff Kinney
Call Number: F Kinney
Book Website: http://www.wimpykid.com/books/book9/

Persais is reading
Book 3 of The Land of Stories - A Grimm Warning by Chris Colfer
Call Number: F Colfer
Series Website: http://thelandofstories.com/books/

Kaden just finished reading
America is Under Attack: the day the towers fell: September 11, 2001 by Don Brown
Call Number: 973.932 B
Book website: http://www.booksbybrown.com/non-fiction-for-older-readers/

Ms. Reynolds is reading WEdgie & Gizmo by Suzanne Selfors

Call Number: F Selfors

Book Website: https://www.suzanneselfors.com/copy-of-smells-like-dog-series

Book Blurb

Info about the book: The Magnificent 12: The Call

Call Number: F Grant

Epic! App

Writing Camp Podcast Episode 3!

We are a little behind posting our blogs, but we are up and running still!
We hope to produce 2 -3 more podcasts before the summer break!


Today's episode was recorded right before the Writing STAAR test for our 4th Graders.
We are featuring two students and some of the writing the produced in Writing Camp!
Scroll to the bottom for the link to Episode 3!


Here are the books the hosts were reading, in case you want to check them out!

Persais' Book

The Candmakers by Wendy Mass

Ms. Reynolds' Book

 The Mark of the Dragonfly

Roger's Book

The Ungifted by George Korman

Click the link to hear the podcast!

Writing Camp Episode 3 Season 1

Battle of the Books Podcast

This week we are adding episode 2 of our Little Black Library podcast!


Episode 2 is all about Battle of the Books!
We interviewed the winning teams from our school and got the 6th grade teams take on their feelings before the Semi-finals.




Here are links to the books that my co-hosts and I are reading as well as the book blurb books. Scroll to the bottom for the link to the podcast! Enjoy!

Persais' book:

Clementine by Sara Pennypacker

Ms. Reynolds' Book
Maybe A Fox by Kathi Appelt

Here's our 2nd Podcast!
Battle of the Books Podcast Season 1 Ep. 2



Maybe a Fox

The 2017 Bluebonnet Books are now in the library! Over Spring Break I began reading Maybe a Fox, which is one of the new Bluebonnet Books. Let me tell you, I could not put this book down. I read it in a day! I don't usually have that kind of time! But, this was worth the day's read!

Maybe a Fox is about two sisters (human by the way). One is a runner and the other is an avid rock collector. The girls are already broken from the loss of a parent. But, tragedy strikes the family again leaving the family in survival mode. All the while, 3 foxes are born and one has a special connection to humans, especially little Jules. The fox has a connection with the spiritual world and her senses are hopefully used to help Jules find peace and understanding.

I highly recommend this book!