Birthday Wishes for Dr. Seuss

Next Tuesday, March 2nd, is the birthday of Dr. Seuss and, once again, our school will be celebrating this favorite author/illustrator. We've already begun the fun with Mrs. St. Clair's class project of "Find the Cat in the Hat". Fortunately, a helpful 4th grader showed me the Cat's hiding place this afternoon since I had walked passed the hiding place several times!

Mrs. Wright, our Reading Teacher, made the Seuss resource binder available to teachers and we expect to see other fun projects next week. The pencils above will be part of the classroom activities and we hope to see every student earn a Horton Hears a Who pencil. Today our Seuss committee met, planned and counted out the pencils for each classroom (see photo). Let's hear an early Happy Birthday wish for Dr. Seuss!

Playaways Arrive!

Back in the fall, I used this blog to announce receiving a CCEP Grant to purchase 20 Playaway Digital Audiobooks. Well, they have arrived and will be ready for circulation after February vacation. These digital devices will begin replacing the old audiocassettes. The grant was written for Grade 3 and Grade 4 so those students and teachers will be able to check out these new resources from our library.

This week I've been telling those students about the upcoming Playaways and told them I would be posting the list of titles online through this blog. I expect the Playaways to be quite popular and will start lists and Hold lists when students ask for a particular title. Students can come to the library after vacation or a parent can help them request by sending an email to me at cerei@chariho.k12.ri.us. As I said, they will be ready for checkout after vacation.

Since Playaways are relatively new, the list of available titles is still limited (e.g. Harry Potter is not on a Playaway) Vendors and the manufacturer are continually getting copyright clearance to add more books into this format. I hope to add more titles in the future; for now, here's what we have added to our school library:

The Best Christmas Pageant Ever ( Barbara Robinson)
The Capture (Kathryn Lasky, 1st book of Guardians of Ga'Hoole series)
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory + Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator (Roald Dahl)
Charlotte's Web (E.B. White)
Ella Enchanted (Gail Carson Levine)
Escape: the Story of the Great Houdini (Sid Fleishchman; nonfiction)
Holes (Louis Sachar)
Island of the Blue Dolphins (Scott O'Dell)
The Journey (Kathryn Lasky, 2nd in series mentioned above)
The Lightning Thief (Rick Riordan)
Lost and Found (Andrew Clements)
Love That Dog (Sharon Creech)
My Side of the Mountain (Jean Craighead George)
The Penderwicks (Jeanne Birdsall)
Ruby Holler (Sharon Creech)
Stuart Little (E.B. White)
The Tale of Despereaux (Kate DiCamil lo)
Tuck Everlasting (Natalie Babbitt)
Where the Red Fern Grows (Wilson Rawls)
A Wrinkle in Time (Madeleine L'Engle)

Hey, I just realized we got 21 titles since the Charlie Playaway has two books on it (narrated by Eric Idle!) After vacation we'll probably be seeing these "books on a lanyard" with lots of 3rd and 4th graders. BTW, the Playaways can also be connected to car or home speakers for family and class listening - enjoy!

Good-bye and Hello

Today is Miss Bouffard's last day and I wanted to share some photos of her working with students:

• The first photo was taken as Mrs. Manchester's 2nd grade class learned more about indexes. The SMART Board review was followed by hands-on lesson using books with indexes.
  
• The second photo shows Mrs. Krause's 1st grade class in the middle of an extension activity for the book, Jeremy Draws a Monster. Miss Bouffard brought this book from North Kingstown Public Library (yes, she works part-time, too!) It was a real hit so I'll be buying it for our library.
  
• The third photo shows two students working on special projects with Miss Bouffard's help and guidance.

It has been a wonderful experience to be the mentoring teacher for Miss Bouffard. Her new ideas for lessons and quick take on technology have created learning opportunities for all of us. In her third week here she presented two workshops for teaching staff about extra features on the SMART Board. We will all miss her as she goes on to her secondary school practicum. Good bye and good luck, Rachael!

This has been a busy week. Mrs. Wright, Reading Coordinator, and I were invited to the Tuesday PTO meeting to plan April's Reading Week. What energy and ideas come from those PTO members! Later in the week, the Reading Teachers and I discussed Dr. Seuss Day on March 2nd. You'll be hearing more about these upcoming programs.

This was also the week that the Playaway Digital Audiobooks arrived so we can say "Hello" to these "books on a lanyard." The 20 Playaways were purchased with CCEP Grant money and will soon be introduced into the library collection. The titles were selected for Grades 3 and 4 and I'm sure they will be quite popular. For more information about the Playaways, come back next week!