Taylor Swift, writing, and tears

Say what you will about Taylor Swift, but I am a huge fan! I have talked about her in my classroom for years. The kids love her, and I love her because she writes so many of her own songs! I always talk about and share her songs when I talk about how and where writers get ideas. 

Here is a commercial clip I share with my kiddos every year. She says "it all began in fourth grade...little did he know, I was writing songs about..."

Well, after shedding plenty of tears this morning, I am an even bigger fan now!  I just saw her performance of "Ronan." Oh my! How moving and sad. My heart simply aches for Ronan's mother. 

I am sharing this because I have always talked about how writers are moved by other writers. We get our ideas from the world around us and other writers can inspire us. Taylor followed Maya Thompson's blog about her son's battle with cancer. Here is a link to the story: A Child's Cancer Story Inspires Taylor Swift. 

Maya's blog is raw and emotional, so I will not share it here for my kiddos to see. I will share how her writing through her grief and writing from their experiences moved Taylor. Many of the very words from Maya's blog were used in Taylor's song, Ronan. Because of this, Maya is credited as a co-writer. 

I also want to share this because this song is written as a narrative, and we have spent a lot of time studying what makes a narrative. We have discussed how even though we usually focus on one moment in time, not all of our moments are happy. Sometimes we even need to share the sad moments. 

I will be excited for us to participate in Scholastic Book Clubs: Read Every Day with Taylor Swift. Click on the picture below to learn more.

Alright, enough tears for now. Here are some of the great books that we are reading or will be reading very soon!

Just look at a few of my great picks from our book fair. Yes, the very book fair that makes me crazy because I love and hate it at the same time. I love it because I mean who doesn't love a book fair? I hate it because it means less book orders and points for us, LOL. As long as it is putting books in kiddos' hands, well I guess I won't complain. (too much ;)

Just look at what two of my sweet girls picked out at book fair.
You don't think I went on and on about it do you? haha

After our 5K Saturday, Katie Byrd and I made a quick trip to the book store. Katie had been reading through some of my kiddos Reader's Notebooks. She is such an avid reader and has read such an extensive number of titles; she was making quite a few book recommendations, and she even found one I did not actually own. Hard to believe, but yes, we had to add it to our library. These are some of our other purchases. I just LOVE books listed for $1 but only cost $.80 after discount!

One of my favorite picture book purchases from the book fair was Have Fun, Molly Lou Melon by Patty Lovell. You already know how much I love Molly Lou! This is a great character education book and wonderful for looking at theme ~ believe in yourself and never lose your imagination!

Substitute Creacher by Chris Gall is another fun story that I cannot wait to share with my kiddos. We ordered this picture book with our first book order, but we have been so engrossed in our study of narratives, we have not had a chance to read it. This is just such a fun little read aloud with a bit of a graphic novel feel to it. My students are really loving graphic novels at the moment, so this will be right up their alley. 

You know I am all about Chris Van Allsburg! One of my seasonal favorites of his is The Widow's Broom! Great story - with even better illustrations. One of my favorite things about this author is how he leaves so many things unsaid. It is up to you to read between the lines, to infer!    

Well, I must say good night my friends. Happy reading! 

Currently loving fall days

Happy Sunday! I hope everyone is enjoying this glorious weather! Whoo Hoo ~ loving me some fall now! I decided this would be the day for me to join Farley's "Currently" Linky Party.  Yes, I am a bit late, but that is pretty much the norm for me. Better late than never, I say! 

  

Look what I got!
A present dropped off
by a visiting student!

So I spent some time at work yesterday, surprise surprise ;) and set about planning for our short week. Can you believe we are a few days away from 4H Camp? This is the best field trip - so fun! In honor of camp, a friend reminded me of a fun little read aloud to share with my kiddos. Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah! by Allan Sherman, illustrated by Jack E. Davis, is a silly look at camp life and the bundle of nerves camp can bring out. It will certainly be difficult to read without singing. Let's hope for my kiddos sake, I can refrain. 

Hmmm....this cover reminds me of
Mrs. Marshall for some reason!  Maybe we
shouldn't get in the canoes this year!

As I worked in my room, I looked back at all the work we have accomplished in such a short time. We have planned our narratives and some students have begun their drafts. We are paying close attention to make sure that we include the figurative language and sensory detail that we have practiced for weeks now. Last week, we looked at what makes a great lead, and we went over a number of great strategies to hook the reader. Students really enjoyed some that I shared, but I have to say that my favorite is the Ba-Da-Bing! I have had the best luck helping students craft a strong lead using this strategy. I first learned of it when I attended a Barry Lane session at the Arkansas Reading Conference. He shared this writing strategy created by Gretchen Bernabei. Together, they wrote about it in one of my all time favorite writing workshop books, Hooked on Meaning. 

 

With a Ba-Da-Bing, students begin by writing Ba: what their feet did, Da: what they saw, Bing: what they thought. For example: When I rushed through the door, I noticed my son wasn't home yet. He was so grounded! ~ Can you believe how brilliantly simple that is?! Uugghh...this is one of those, "Why didn't I think of that," kind of things.

Ba-Da-Bing: Barry Lane, Hooked on Meaning

Here is a short clip of one of the lessons on the video that comes with Hooked on Meaning. Each year, my kiddos love these!

 

While thinking about our work in writing our own narratives and our pulling apart story elements in our reading, I have pulled as many of my favorite narratives as I could. There are so many great titles and authors out there: Bunting, Lowry, Rylant, and Polacco. I really want to encourage my students as we read this week, to take a look at some of these wonderful and touching stories. I will share a few with the class as we talk about character traits and plot and then bring it back to our study of narratives.

 

Mailing May by Michael O. Tunnel will have my kiddos asking lots of questions as five year old Charlotte May tells the story of how she was mailed to her Grandmother with such a sweet and honest little voice. The Other Side by Jacqueline Woodson is a wonderful narrative full of theme: acceptance and kindness. Both characters learn and grow watching each other from "the other side" of the fence. Just like Mailing May, this story is told with such an honest little voice; I can almost hear the little girl herself telling me her story. 

Crow Call by Lois Lowry is so perfectly illustrated by Bagram Ibatoulline, and Ms. Lowry left a beautiful author's note showing the significance of this story for her. This is a bit on the longer side for one mini-lesson, but it is definitely worth sharing over a couple of days. Again, I love sharing how a narrative story can pull in one small moment in time, one memory, and magnify it with such beautiful detail. 

 

OK, these next two are for seasonal fun! The Bones of Fred McFee by Eve Bunting and The Follower by Richard Thompson are rhythmical and repeating  and great Halloween reads. Would you think me completely over the edge if I told you that The Follower is great for reviewing prepositional phrases? Yes, I will try to find a way to fit grammar in just about anywhere, LOL.  I love them both and you just can't go wrong with a Bunting book.

One last thing before I call it a night and hit that huge stack of papers to be graded, edited, or replied to, whew...I wanted to say thanks to my sweet kiddos for donating books from the book fair and some from their very own libraries to help our library grow! So excited that we are sharing so many great books with each other! With that, I will say good night and happy reading!

Friday fun and the boys of fall

What a busy week we have had! I cannot believe just how quickly time has flown by this year. Is it a sign of getting older that the years are speeding up? With this sweet group of kiddos, I wish I could find a pause button. We rolled picture day, book fair, Grandparent's Day celebrations, homecoming, and early out into one mad rush of a week! 

That now leaves me one very tired teacher this Friday evening, and this is my first post of the school week. I cannot say how many times this week that I have thought, oh I need to remember to blog that or don't forget to mention that. Yet, life decided that family, my own kiddos, and football needed attention; couldn't ask for better distractions though :) With an away football game that is just a little too "away" for this mama to make, I have found my first quiet moment to post some of the fun things we worked on in class this week!

I really wanted to share the sweet pics above of my kiddos dancing to "Gummy Bear" during our morning meetings this week. It was an instant hit and so darn cute to watch! Below is a very small clip of them. I will try to get more on here later.

As much fun as we tried to squeeze in this week, we did even more work! Planning, planning, and more planning! We have really discussed all the things that make an amazing narrative (we have sure read a lot of them), and we decided to be as thoughtful in our planning as possible. We are thinking small, but writing big as we narrow down our topic! Even after narrowing it down to one precise moment in time, we have tried to plan ahead in using some of the great techniques of our favorite writers. These first plan sheets we use are a bit much, and not something that I will always expect us to use in our writing. This heavy planning early on will help us form some habits and expectations in our own writing.

 

I know I posted this previously, but here is a pic of the story I am using for my narrative. The kiddos were asking about it, so I thought I would add it again. If you would like to see the original post, click here.

One very MAD Katie rescuing a puppy
 that someone threw off the cliff...
she was off the cliff, in the air before 
the puppy came out of the water.

After a lesson on writing leads, we finally started drafting! Woohoo... we are on our way to a published masterpiece!

We are still working like crazy on those
complex sentences!

We are having fun with our story Trumpet of the Swan by E. B. White. As we have read, we have looked at character and story elements, but you know me; I had to throw some great picture books in to help pull it all together.

Feathers and Fools by Mem Fox is one of my absolute favorites to teach rise in action, climax, and falling action. This is an amazingly illustrated story that is very moving and without fail brings out tons of conversation in my room. This is also a very easy discussion of theme - acceptance! I love how the end shows that looking at what we have in common rather than our differences can mean so much! Mem Fox does an amazing job of bringing that message home to kids in a way that jumps right out at them. LOVE this story!

Keeping in mind story elements, we have also really looked character traits, and just how much a character can move your story. When comparing and contrasting characters, my faithful standby is Mufaro's Beautiful Daughters by John Steptoe. Manyara and Nyasha are two beautiful sisters, but both are about as different as can be. Students easily identify the contrasting traits of these characters, and it is such a beautiful read.

Looking at setting, I shared this sad and moving narrative. Working Cotton by Sherley Anne Williams is remarkably illustrated by Carole Byard. I share this story to remind my students that the images of a story and the dialect and behavior of its characters are all impacted by the setting which is not just place but time as well!  

Our focus in reading this week became our guide
in helping us plan and organize our own narratives!

 Lots of great work happening around our room this week....

  

Have I mentioned how proud I am of my hardworking group? :)

Just for fun we read a couple of my favorites for this time of year. Here is another David Catrow beauty! Lu and the Swamp Ghost by James Carville. My book came with a CD narrated by Mr. Carville, but honestly most of the time I cannot bring myself to use it because that would mean giving up a chance to read to my kiddos. Besides, it is so fun to try and bring out that deep down southern girl. There are a plethora of things I could teach with this, but seems like I focus on the fun of it mostly. We giggle at the illustrations and make predictions as to just who the ghost may be. After we have our fun, I do manage to go back a discuss the theme of this story, kindess and loyalty.

Now this next favorite...well, I try to start out reading it for fun, but I must say that Tony Johnson paints such a brilliant picture with words, we often slow down, really breath in, and savor the text. When I have fourth graders oohing and ahhing at how well written something is, then you know it is noticeable! How many times is it acceptable for me to say "I LOVE this story" in one post? LOL...I don't think I could go one Halloween without sharing this, and the timing of it is perfect in that students are finding all kinds of figurative language in this fun little read, The Ghost of Nicholas Greebe.

  

That is almost it for now. I will have more to share Sunday after I do a little planning. We are gearing up for a fun time at 4H Camp, and I know the kids are so excited!

I have just a few videos to share. The first is one of my kiddos singing along with Uncle Kracker's, Smile. They have really enjoyed learning about simile with his song. The second is something I have had stuck in my head since going to Joshua's game last night. I do love the boys of fall! Kenny Chesney tells such a memorable story with his song - just had to share. Makes me think of my boys! 

Last but not least, I am linking up with Kelly and her blog, Teaching Fourth, for Fun Friday! We try to have fun everyday, but this week, I think "Gummy Bear" was a blast and a brain break all rolled into one! Be sure to click on her link above to see what other fun things teachers are doing.

Happy Reading!