The Week in Pre-view

This coming week is the first week in EONS that I will see (knock wood) all of my classes.  Between teacher work days, elections, hurricanes, book fairs, early release days, and assemblies, we've had nary a full week of library.

This week is CHOCK-O-BLOCK full (which means something will go wrong - knock wood, redux!), but here's my week in pre-view.

Kindergarten - This week I will be starting my Caldecott unit with my Ks.  The first week will just be an overview of the Caldecott Medal and then we will look at some Caldecott-winning books together.  I will explain to them that over the next few weeks, we will be looking at some books that might win the Caldecott this year.  {The books I will be working with over the next four or five weeks are Step Gently Out, We March, Green and Boy + Bot}.

First Grade - This week I will be working on dictionary skills with my first graders.  I found this adorable graphic organizer that lets the firsties pick a letter, think of a word that begins with that letter, write the letter, and then draw a picture of their word.  I plan to put them up on a clothesline in the library...in alphabetical order, of course!

For my second graders, it's book talking!  They seem to be stuck in a rut and it's practically a knock down drag out over a few popular titles.  So along with teaching them the fine art of browsing, I'll be introducing them to a few new books that they can fight over peruse.

Third grade is starting a fun thesaurus project that I kind of invented after reading Try Curiousity's post.  I pulled wordless books from my collection.  Students will rotate through the books and after reading them, they will come up with a one-word review of the book.  They can use the thesaurus to jazz up their adjectives.

Fourth grade is a mixed bag.  Some of them will continue with Professor Garfield and creating their YAPPY bookmarks, all in the name of online safety.  My other third graders will begin note taking in order to prepare them for research projects coming down the pike.

And finally, I'm starting book recommendation blogging with my fifth graders.  I have to admit I'm a little nervous even after talking with blogger extraordinaire Oakridge Reads.  Purefoy Reads has also been a great inspiration.

My simple wish is to remain healthy for the few remaining weeks we have until winter break.  Wishing you healthy weeks too!