The third book that I have read from my Sasquatch 2015 nominee list is Jinx by Sage Lockwood. This was a great book - very entertaining all the way through.
I've been creating book trailers to share with my kids, but this one already had a great one.
I just picked up the second book in this series, Jinx's Magic. I'm excited to see what happens in this one.
I'm always looking for book recommendations. What are you reading?
Unfortunately, my father's been quite sick and spent about ten days in the hospital. Fortunately, he's at home now, but he needs some help getting around while he's getting his strength back. So, I've been over at my parents' house helping out, and I've had quite a bit of time to get some work done for next year.
I created Weekly Entrance Slips. This resource includes one grammar concept for each week. You, of course, can use them in any order. It covers parts of speech, punctuation of dialogue, comma use, homophones, simple diagramming, subject-verb agreement, and so much more. I plan to use these to guide my instruction. I will give one concept entrance slip at the beginning of the week after our spelling pretest. This will allow me to see who has already mastered the concept and who needs instruction. For those that need the instruction, I'll pull small groups and teach or include in conferencing. The resource is in black to save on ink, 4 of the same concept per page, and answer sheets are included.
Another thing I've been working on is book trailers to show next year. I found this book on the Sasquatch Book Award Nominee list. I had never heard of these awards or this book, but I loved it! I discovered this book award on Librarian Arika's blog.
Here's my book trailer for The Adventures of a South Pole Pig by Chris Kurtz.
Be sure to head over to 4th Grade Frolics and see what everyone has made this week!
Last week I received one of the books I ordered to read for professional development over the summer - Jennifer Serravallo's new book: Reading Strategies Book. I then discovered a group on Facebook that was discussing the book, so I joined. One of the group members was getting a group going using the VOXER app, so I downloaded the app and joined that, too. If you haven't used Voxer before, it's super easy. You can make audio recordings of your thoughts and post, create written posts, or use the walkie feature. I don't enjoy hearing my own voice, so I've opted to use the writing feature so far. We have only read the first chapter, but there has been some great conversation so far. If you're interested, search Reading Strategies Book Group on FB and you'll find us. We're moving on to chapter 2 this week. Don't let that scare you away though. If you join Voxer send a message to Kathryn through Voxer after you download it - kteach364, that way she'll have your Voxer username and can add you right away. The posts are in chronological order and you can go through and listen to a few to see if the topic is of interest or just pick up on the current day. There are over 100 people, but so far only a few of us are posting. I'd love to hear from more people! The book is really great. As Jen described it herself - it's a bit like a cookbook - filled with strategies to develop skills for readers. The book is divided by reading goals. I think it's going to be a great resource in my classroom this year, and because this will be my first year as Language Arts Department Chair, I think it will be a great resource for me to share with others in my school!!
Yesterday I finished reading The 14 Fibs of Gregory K. by Greg Pincus. It was great! I don't know how I missed this book and haven't read it until now, but I'm thankful I saw it on the Sasquatch Reading Award list of nominees for 2015-2016.
Summary:
Gregory K. and Kelly are best friends and have been since the age of 3. Gregory K. is terrible at math but great at writing, especially poetry. Kelly is great at math and not so great at writing, although she likes to write.
Kelly just found out she's moving at the end of the school year. The two want to go to Author's Camp together over the summer, but Gregory's failing math class. He has to not only pass math class but come up with a math project for the City Math Class in order to have a chance of attending Author's Camp.
Will Gregory K. be able to come up with a project and pass Mr. Davis's math class in order to spend the summer with Kelly? Read the book to find out.
The first book I read this summer was The Adventures of a South Pole Pig. I absolutely fell in love with this book and all the characters! I am trying to create a book trailer for each of the books I read this summer and am sharing them on Mondays on Kidblog with my students. Here’s the trailer I made for this book:
