About carriegelson

Elementary teacher passionate about all things literacy.

Dragon Boating!

Posted on May 25, 2012 by carriegelson

Today the entire school went Dragon Boating near the Creekside Community Center in False Creek.

Division 5 was very excited about this trip! Big smiles on the bus and as we waited to get suited up and into the boats!

Catriona and Khai can’t wait to see the boats we will ride in!

Waiting near the water in the sunshine is just fine with us!

Being excited before it begins is half the fun!

We learned how to hold our paddles and about the different calls like “Let it Ride!” (which means rest!)

Then it was into the boats with our buddies and out into False Creek!

Students loved seeing everyone on all of the other boats especially as we lined up for races!

And of course, eating lunch after all of our hard work was a highlight of our trip! Happy boys in the hotdog line!

Students expressed their gratitude to the “Dragon Boaters” (Thanks to Dragon Boat BC and Canadian International Dragon Boat Festival Society) by writing thank you letters when we returned to school.

Thanks also go to the Vancouver community and matched funds from Adopt a School which allowed us to pay for bus transportation to and from the Community Center.

Some excerpts here:

Dear Dragon Boaters:

I got wet a bit but I had so much fun! Thanks. But why can we not see fish? From Jacky

I never in my whole life Dragon Boated! But now I have. I want to go again and again. From Carmen

It was good nobody fell in the water. I liked going under the bridge. It was hard pushing the water but I tried my best to do it. From Truman

Thank you for letting our whole school come boating. It was so much fun learning and going fast in the water. We loved eating hotdogs and hot chocolate. From Isa

Thank you for such a good time. I was a little scared at first but when I saw the boat, I knew it wasn’t going to tip over so it turned out to be okay. At the end of paddling my arms felt so tired that I had to go to the doctor. Just joking ha ha ha From Shae Lynn

I liked it when we raced. I won every race. I was in row 8. I’m 8 years old and it was my first time (I was scared) I had a blast. Thank you From Purity

Thank you for giving us the opportunity to go! One of my favourite parts was when we saw a black bird that kept dipping its head underwater. I’ve never been in a Dragon boat before and it was AWESOME! From Catriona

I was excited! I like paddling and I like racing but my hand got tired. We went fast when we were going under the bridge. I’m glad we went dragon boating and I want to go again. From Raymond

Thanks for letting us come Dragon Boating. And thanks for the Hot Chocolate and the granola bars and the hotdogs and the juice. I want to go again. From Reiko

Thank you for taking us dragon boating. My boat came second. I liked the food. But my favourite part was racing. From Raelyn

My favourite part was racing. I had a lot of fun! I was very excited. Even though I got wet it was still the best trip. That was my first time dragon boating. From Khai

A Bus Called Heaven

Posted on May 15, 2012 by carriegelson

Our latest BLG treasure: A Bus Called Heaven written and illustrated by Bob Graham, read to us by Bill.

We were excited as soon as we saw that Bill had a Bob Graham book as we are definite fans of Graham’s work. How to Heal a Broken Wing was a book we used during our kindness unit and April and Esme Tooth Fairies was a BLG book from last spring that often makes it back to our classroom via our library book basket.

What happens to a community when an abandoned bus gets parked in its midst? Well . . . People start talking. They do some exploring. They begin to take ownership. Soon that bus is pushed into a front yard. It is cleaned and scrubbed. It gets a paint job. And people begin to congregate. They play and interact. They eat and laugh. The old bus has new life. And when a tow truck arrives to tow the old bus away, the community has new purpose.

This story tells the story of a community coming together and of a little girl with a lot of gumption. We read this book and looked around to see everyone smiling. A feel good story perfect for rereading.

Our student reviewers report:

Truman: I liked the part when Stella won with no goalies and bought the bus back with all the kids who were energetic and the adults who were exhausted!

Carmen: The book started with a girl named Stella. She saw a bus and made a bus be like a house. They had a party and music. One night, guys came and sprayed black paint and wrote Street Ratz!

Bertha and the Frog Choir

Posted on May 13, 2012 by carriegelson

A recent book brought to us by our BLG reader Deborah was Bertha and the Frog Choir written by Luc Foccroulle and illustrated by Annick Masson.

I admit I have a thing for fictional frogs. They have a certain charm and vulnerability that I find myself drawn to. I even blogged about it: Five Fantastic Fictional (Mostly) Frogs So when Deborah brought this book in to class, I was pretty excited! And it had us from the beginning – oh the poor frogs, described as flabby and slimy, not beautiful as so many other animals are. But. . . they redeem themselves with their chorus, their beautiful frog song! So what happens when you are a frog like Bertha who doesn’t exactly produce lovely sounds when she opens her mouth? Or a tiny frog like Lucy who isn’t even allowed to audition for the frog choir because she is so small? Well . . .

Bertha and Lucy sit at the edge of the pond, both sad and rejected. But then they start to get creative. Bertha could cook up a delicious meal to help Lucy grow and Lucy could give singing lessons to Bertha. Unfortunately, the plan does not seem to work. So the two clever frogs come up with a new plan. One that involves a trick. A trick that works perfectly. Perfectly, until both frogs get tired of pretending and decide that their true talents need to be recognized.

A story that reminds us that good friends are as important as being true to yourself.

There is a song at the back if reading this book puts you in the mood to sing. Twice, Deborah asked if we wanted to sing along. Each time the students exclaimed “No!” But each time they sang and the second time even louder and sweeter!

Picture Books to help us explore the complexity of bullying

Posted on May 13, 2012 by carriegelson

Division 5 is currently exploring the theme of bully, bullied, bystander through picture books. We also share books on this topic during our weekly Social Responsibility gatherings. Here are some of the titles we have been reading.

Jungle Bullies written by Steven Kroll and illustrated by Vincent Nguyen

This book has a simple repetetive message important to help children understand that bossy, mean behaviour isn’t okay especially when someone is using their bigger size to be intimidating. As each jungle animal nudges another out of a napping spot, the trend seems like it will never stop until a little monkey decides with the help of his Mama that he wants to stand up to a bully. Children learn: Being a bully isn’t okay. I can stand up to it with some help from others. Let’s focus on sharing and maybe even being friends. Perfect for Pre-K-2.

Howard B. Wigglebottom Learns about Bullies written by Howard Binkow and illustrated by Susan F. Cornelison.

This is one of my favourite Howard B. Wigglebottom books and one that never fails to engage listeners. This book teaches us about the importance of asking for help when bullying doesn’t stop. Howard has a little voice inside his head that tells him Be brave, Be bold, A teacher must be told. But it isn’t always easy to trust our intuition and Howard suffers many unpleasant interactions with the Snorton twins before he finally decides to report their behaviour. Finally, he can sleep easily, knowing that he was brave, he was bold when his teacher was finally told. “I am okay. I am safe.” he assures himself at the end. Such an important book!

Great for K-3

You’re Mean, Lily Jean written by Frieda Wishinsky and illustrated by Kady MacDonald Denton.

This is a “could be”, “might be”, “kinda is” a bully book but the social dynamics between the children allow it to be a book that is more about making firm expectations for play. Lily Jean is definitely some kind of bossy and quite quite mean. She shows off constantly, says “No!” when asked “Can I play too?” and bosses everyone around when she does allow them to be part of the game. (“You be the cow and I’ll be the cowgirl” kind of thing) But when sisters Sandy and Carly are assertive with Lily Jean and set some limits, Lily Jean is basicallly put in her place with the question, “Can you be nice?” When she agrees, playtime continues and is happy for all involved. A great book to illustrate that children can often solve their own social problems without involving an adult. It also shows us that the power of a bully dissolves quickly when nobody will go along with it.

Ideal for K-3

Spaghetti in a Hot Dog Bun written by Maria Dismondy and illustrated by Kimberly Shaw-Peterson.

The message of this book is all about courage – courage to stand up for yourself but also courage to forgive and reach out to others. Lucy has been bullied by Ralph in some truly nasty ways. When he gets stuck on the monkey bars, she has the opportunity to get back at him. Instead she realizes, looking at him so full of fear, that just like her Papa Gino told her, Ralph has a heart with feelings. Lucy offers her help, demonstrating courage to do the right thing – treat others the way she wants to be treated. Students learn that sometimes the hard shell of a bully can be softened with a little bit of kindness.

Suitable for Grades 2-4

Say Something written by Peggy Moss and illustrated by Lea Lyon.

What happens when you see bullying all around you? Pushing. Teasing. Name calling. But you don’t participate? You don’t say anything. What happens when one day the bullying happens to you? Those other kids sitting near, the ones saying nothing . . . suddenly the silence feels like something. It feels like it should be different. Saying nothing is the opposite of saying something. Of standing by instead of standing up. A very powerful book that shows us the importance of speaking up.

Suitable for Grades 2-5

Silly Goose’s Big Story

Posted on May 12, 2012 by carriegelson

A recent BLG book read by Maria was Keiko’s Kasza‘s Silly Goose’s Big Story.

Goose and his friends often act out the stories Goose makes up when they are playing. Each story is full of drama, excitment and adventure. The only problem is that Goose always wants to be the hero. When his friends point out that they would like to have a turn to be the hero, Goose disagrees, even when he is accused of being selfish.

When a big wolf sneaks up on the animals, Goose gets the chance to really be the hero or he will end up as lunch! He tries out his story telling talents on the wolf trying to scare him away. Wolf is having none of it until the monster that Goose is describing seems to come to life. Students quickly figured out that it was Goose’s brave and clever friends who were pretending to be the monster that scared the wolf away. Goose figured out that his friends were his real life heroes!

A sweet little story about being there for your friends and learning about what is really important.

Our student reviewers report:

Truman: I like the part when Goose scared the wolf away wih his story

Raymond: I like when they scare the wolf!

Khai: I like how the author did it so the Goose’s friends were mad at Goose and they still helped.

We imagined some gardens . . .

Posted on May 10, 2012 by carriegelson

This gorgeous book written by Andrew Larsen and illustrated by Irene Luxbacher was our inspiration for some beautiful flower art. The Imaginary Garden tells a story of grandfather and granddaughter who paint a lush garden mural when a real garden is no longer possible in Poppa’s new apartment.

Just as little Theodora and Poppa created flowers from bright green stems and blobs of paint colour, the students used dabs of paint to create beautiful imagined gardens, each one unique.

Students began by adding dibs and dabs, blobs and swirls of bright coloured paint to their papers.

Adding the blooms

Some chose to make huge blooms. Others, a mixture of shapes and sizes.

Then with vibrant green paint, stems were added.

Carefully snaking the stems up to the flowers

We let our pictures dry overnight with plans to add details the next day with felt markers.

When we were ready to add more detail to the flowers on Day 2 we used two books by Lois Ehlert for inspiration.

Planting a Rainbow takes us on a garden tour colour by colour.

Waiting for Wings tells the story of butterflies flitting flower to flower in a garden in full bloom. Both books are gorgeous.

Each student approached this step very carefully creating a variety of interesting effects. Markers were used to add details to blossoms and stems.

Adding details

Finished pieces are stunning. Come check out our display in the hall and walk through an imaginary garden or two or three . . .

Can you pick a favourite flower?

We were so pleased with how these pieces turned out that our Mother’s Day cards are painted in the same style!

Another one just because they are that beautiful . . .

Tempted to come visit our display yet? They really do look beautiful all together!

Happy Mother’s Day to all of the Moms, Grandmas and important women who love us!

Making Vegetable Creatures

Posted on May 9, 2012 by carriegelson

Our session today with Growing Chefs was a lot of fun!

We started by celebrating how well our windowsill vegetable gardens are growing! Not only are they thriving but . . . we got to do some tasting today. The verdict on arugula: “spicy”, “nutty”, “like radishes” and a “yuck!”

Arugula anyone?

Claire then read How are you Peeling? Foods with Moods to the class as an inspiration for making some vegetable art!

We appreciated the inspiration and happily selected from a variety of vegetables to create some odd vegetable creatures!

Raelyn created a zucchini sea monster!

Ashanti tried not to be too scared by the vegetable monster she made!

Hailey made a vegetable “guy” with a cool hairdo!

Carmen’s vegetable creature could stand by himself and was it just me or did he always seem to be watching us . . . ?

Stuck

Posted on May 4, 2012 by carriegelson

Picture Book Love #5: Celebrating picture books that are just too good not to gush over.

“Ms. Gelson have you blogged about that book yet?” I am asked this question about six times a day. I have been asked this question since last week. I am asked this question everyday at least a half a dozen times because it is basically the class consensus that I am holding the book Stuck by Oliver Jeffers hostage. I have the book at home to blog about it and share how much we absolutely adored it. Therefore, I am preventing it from being on our “New Books” stand in the classroom where it could be fought over daily so that children could relive their joy independently or in small groups (I’m pretty sure this book is one of those books that has a child magnet in it – no child can be within 2 meters of it without being lured closer and closer). All of my excuses do not suffice. I have extreme guilt. I have been busy but I know that doesn’t count because this book needs to return to our classroom NOW so we can give it the love it deserves! So here we go:

WE LOVE THIS BOOK. LOVE OF THE “READ IT AGAIN” CHANT KIND. LOVE AS IN WE LAUGHED, WE CRIED, WE ALMOST DIED. LOVE. LOVE LOVE.

Why? It’s not because we are already Oliver Jeffers fans. (Even though we are) It’s not because this book is about some fantastically amazing creature or place. No monsters. No wild beasts. No magic. It is beautifully simple really. Just a boy. A kite. And a tree. But Jeffers weaves little boy logic with the right dose of the absurd and creates a picture book that sends children into laughing mania. Beautiful shout out laughter that makes you laugh even more when shared. This book read aloud in a classroom of book lovers is a force to be reckoned with.

The plot? Floyd gets his kite stuck in a tree. He can’t pull it down so he throws his shoe at it. It also gets stuck. So he throws his other shoe. Stuck. Up went Mitch the cat. (He was tossed. He didn’t amble up of his own accord in case you might be wondering) Again, stuck. When Floyd fetches a ladder and ends up tossing it into the tree in the attempt to dislodge everything, a few students fell over. Really! “Why would he throw it? Oh man!” This tossing of items up the tree continues. When the kitchen sink goes up, we really were losing it. “He’s crazy!” “My God!” “At least it’s just a kitchen sink!” More things end up in the tree. Much larger and seemingly impossible things. The absurdity did us in. We were bowled over by giggles. I heard a few, “Please. Make it stop,” requests. Almost as if I was tickling each child without mercy. But no, I was just reading the book!

When Floyd finds the saw . . . Well let’s just say that his decision completely put us over the edge. The laughter engulfed us. Nobody could get a word out. When the book ended and the breathing slowly returned to normal, the unsolicited reviews began:

“That’s the best book ever! A 10 out of 5!”

“That book was awesome. The most awesome. The best book in the world!”

“I loved it infinity and beyond!”

So mission accomplished. Book is blogged. It is going in my bag to return to the classroom tomorrow. My prediction? I will be begged to read it immediately again and then it will travel from desk to desk spreading picture book joy.

Meadowlands

Posted on May 3, 2012 by carriegelson

Have I mentioned lately how brilliant my little reading group happens to be? Or how much I enjoy our morning lessons? It is such a pleasure to learn along with these students! We have been working on strategies to use when we come across an unknown word or concept using the wonderful story by Thomas F Yezerski: Meadowlands – A Wetlands Survival Story.

This book takes us back in time hundreds of years to when the Meadowlands were 20,000 acres of swamps, marshes and bogs and home to many different plants and animals. Over time human interactions had a very detrimental effect on this wetland habitat. Much of the wildlife fled or disappeared. Pollution and gargbage threatened to destroy the area completely. In the 1960s only 11,000 acres of wetlands survived in the Meadowlands.

However, many things worked in the favour of this ecosystem: the daily meeting of the river and tide, laws that alterted chemical dumping, reintroduction of different insect, fish and bird species as the habitat improved, etc. In 2007, a young osprey was spotted taking flight from a nest built in the Meadowlands. This young bird of prey was a symbol of recovery and hope for this precious ecosystem.

As we read the text and came across a word we didn’t know, we collectively tried to figure it out and charted our thinking. We filled an entire chart paper with strategies!

An example might help. The text read:

The Meadowlands is an estuary where the Hackensack River empties into Newark Bay. Much of it is wetlands, with a mix of freshwater and salt water soaking the spongy ground.

We didn’t know what estuary meant. We needed to use some of the strategies listed below to determine what the word meant (especially reading on to the next sentence, inferring and referring to a reference page that included a map) We figured out that it probably meant a boggy, wet area where the fresh water mixed with the ocean water and that maybe it would support unique ecosystems.

What do you do when you come to an unknown word?

The list the students came up with:

*hold a question in our head and read on to find out

*re-read a section and think carefully

*read the previous sentence or next sentence for clues

*does the word sound like another word? have a root that we recognize?

*check the reference pages like maps, glossary, pictures

*connect to other texts or our background knowledge

*use the reading power strategies like connect, visualize, question and infer

*think about whether you are understanding. This is worth it even if it might be slow going and very tiring!

*ask, “Does this make sense?” and then “Does what I am thinking make sense?”

So I did mention the brilliant aspect of these kids right? What was wonderful was that as we read, we found there were fewer unknown words or confusing concepts because we were gaining a deeper understanding of the subject matter. Now we can engage in this active engaged reading independently with various non-fiction texts. But, we continue to practice with a weekly book we can share together.

The More Mud the better!

Posted on May 1, 2012 by carriegelson

What an amazing day Division 5 had with staff and students from John Oliver’s Take a Hike Program! We went to Deep Cove and hiked through the rain and mud to Quarry Rock.

It was fun to trek up steps, across bridges and over tree roots.

Despite a lot of rain, our smiles beamed through!

Reaching the top gave us this beautiful view!

The view from here is pretty amazing

An hour through the rain and mud made us pretty proud. We climbed a mountain!

We love the Take a Hike students. Always smiling and always encouraging!

Our hiking tour guides!

For many of us, this was the first time ever in a forest. In fact when we were doing the poll, “How many people have ever been to a forest?” one child said: “This is a forest?!” Yippee for first time experiences!

Trees, even burnt ones, offer many stories . . .

After eating lunch on the top of Quarry Rock, we needed to head back down. We spotted a large black bird swooping in to eat our lunch crumbs.

Mr. M and Sergio watching the bird on the edge of the rock

We finished our day sitting on the grass in Deep Cove. Everyone got to share their favourite part of the day and how they were feeling out of 10. Some highlights of the day included: “climbing a mountain,” “seeing a waterfall,” “singing a song together,” and “being out in nature.” A beautiful day. Rain and mud didn’t make it any less wonderful!