It’s Monday! What are you reading?
Each week I share at least one reading photo of the week.
9:01 a.m. This little reader doesn’t even bother to remove his jacket or backpack before he grabs a book first thing each morning.
Our #classroombookaday titles let us explore the natural world, wild life and how we interact with animals.
Classroom Highlights
My Monday posts now also contain some sharing from my week in the classroom.
In case you missed it, our class interviewed Sara Levine and T.S. Spookytoothfor the cover reveal of Fossil by Fossil: Comparing Dinosaur Bones. Check it out here.
Loved the writing that #classroombookaday inspired
All of our self portraits are now complete and ready to be added to a school mural that asks What Does it Mean to Belong? We used Paige Britt‘s beautiful book to explore this theme.
In math, we enjoyed our first experience with counting collections. It’s all about the organizing and the representing on our own papers. Students worked very hard on this task and are excited to try more next week.
Hard at work researching insects and arachnids in preparation for the mini-books we are making.
This week we enjoyed a break from the rain and went outside often!
We played with shapes and shadows.
One afternoon, we made a leaf train and raced up and down it!
This student explains.
We took math outside and counted our steps. We recorded each group of ten steps to count totals. We will use this data later this week.
Join Jen from Teach Mentor Texts and Kellee and Ricki from Unleashing Readers and share all of the reading you have done over the week from picture books to young adult novels. Follow the links to read about all of the amazing books the #IMWAYR community has read. It’s the best way to discover what to read next.
Books I enjoyed:
A Day with Yayah written by Nicola I. Campbell and illustrated by Julie Flett.
Incredible title about learning between generations about our natural world. This book raises awareness about endangered Indigenous languages and includes a glossary of words with pronunciations. Local relevance (Interior Salish) Grandmother passes down her knowledge when a family goes to forage for mushrooms and herbs.
Lines by Suzy Lee
This book is beautifully brilliant. Wordless and full of complete surprises and incredible movements (exquisitely implied).
Nothing Rhymes with Orange by Adam Rex
Absolutely hilarious! Poor little orange is upstaged by everyone – including a famous philosopher. A book full of rhymes and voice and a lot of silly!
Lulu and the Duck in the Park by Hilary McKay
I adore this young chapter book series. This is the first in the series and ever so charming. Lulu’s love of animals gets her into all kind of (quite wonderful) predicaments.
Lola Levine and the Vacation Dream by Monica Brown
Follow Lola and her family to Peru on their family vacation in this fifth title in the series. This is another series I am so pleased to have as part of our classroom library collection.
Reading Progress updates:
2017 Chapter Book Challenge: 53/75 complete
Goodreads Challenge: 253/365 books read
Progress on challenge: 48 books behind schedule.
#MustReadin2017: 24/30 complete
Nonfiction Picture Book Challenge: 34/50 titles
Diverse Books in 2017: 37/50 books read
Up next? I am chapters from finishing Refugee by Alan Gratz. It is incredible but I am having nightmares. I am also reading The War I Finally Won aloud to my last year’s students two recesses a week. How we love this book! Next? Probably OCD Daniel by Wesley King.
There's a Book for That 
The War I Finally Won is amazing! Just as great as the first!
I am enjoying it even though we are reading it slowly – just a few chapters a week 🙂
Lola Levine is doing very well with my sixth graders this year, who are very low. The girls really like these beginning chapter books series.
I think they really do span across a lot of ages in terms of interest.
I love seeing pics from the class, Carrie, and reading their words, too. The pic of the boy with the backpack is terrific, and I love seeing you all doing math outside. Thanks for the book recs, too. I’m looking forward to Lines and Nothing Rhymes with Orange!
I LOVE getting the students outside! Everything just feels more right with the world when we can run around and play and learn together!
I loved that picture so much, I had to make my husband look at it too! That’s book love! I need to get back to the Lola Levine series and catch up. I’ve only read the first but really liked it. Of course I want all three picture books, and especially A Day with Yayah.
Book love indeed. This little guy told me recently, “Hey, I am getting to be a good reader!” Absolutely! A Day with Yayah is superb.
A Day with Yayah is now on my list. Unfortunately, the VPL doesn’t have a copy of it. grrrr. I love the self portrait here!
Isn’t this self portrait stunning. I love it too. I got A Day with Yayah from my school library. It is fantastic. Look at that author/illustrator team!
Nicola I. Campbell and Julie Flett!!
I know!!
I loved both Lines and Nothing Rhymes with Orange. A Day with Yayah looks like a very special book. I will definitely start looking around for that one at my library. Have a great week!
Curious to know if Canadian titles make their way to the American market quickly. Let me know if your find A Day with Yayah.
Love how you connected the self-portraits to the book Why am I me? – We put that book on our TBR list
It is beautiful. I had to own it.
Thank you so much for the glimpses inside your classroom each week. I love reflecting on what you do and how it reaffirms our own decisions, as well as gives me new ideas!
I had a feeling you would enjoy Lines 🙂
And I’m thrilled to see you using Why Am I Me? I think it’s a brilliant book and I love seeing teachers use it!
Why AM I Me? really is a brilliant book! Thanks for the feedback Michele. I enjoy sharing some highlights each week. This week, we had a lot!
I love Lola Levine and am excited to visit Peru with her. Suzy Lee does such a great job communicating without words. I’ll look for Lines. A Day with Yahyah seems like one I will want to use in class. Why and I Me? is a book that will definitely get readers thinking. Thanks!
I loved Peru with Lola! A Day with Yayah is incredible – gentle, full of wonder and family connection.
I absolutely loved Nothing Rhymes with Orange. Adam Rex is one of my all-time favorite authors.
He is one funny funny guy!