Monday, July 22, 2013

It's Monday, What Are You Reading? 7/22/13

I'm linking up with Jen at Teach Mentor Texts and Kellee at Unleashing Readers today.  Check them out for great books!

I think I'm on track with my summer #bookaday.  It was a good week of reading.  Here are some favorites.

These two were excellent, if you haven't seen them.  They are great for the beginning of the year.  I generally do not like counting books (I find them boring), but I laughed out loud in the bookstore when I read Count the Monkeys.  Mac Barnett is awesome.
123 versus ABChttp://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1360564793l/16650266.jpg
Crankee Doodle also cracked me up.  I think it would go over the heads of my first graders, but I bet older kids would really get a kick out of it.  It has great voice, and I think it would be really fun to read aloud. 
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 Another book with great voice that I LOVED is The Day the Crayons Quit by Drew Dewalt.  I will definitely be using this one early in the year as well.  I think it would be great with older kids, but not too old for my first graders.  It's a great book for getting kids to think about different perspectives.  I can't say enough good things about this one.
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I really enjoyed Better Nate Than Ever by Tim Federle.  I think it's a story that easily could have been overdone, but as much as a story about a boy who wants to be a Broadway star can be understated, it is.  It made me want to visit NYC, but I settled for my showtunes Pandora station. (My copy did not have the book jacket--just realized that Jesse Tyler Ferguson of Modern Family wrote a blurb on the cover.  See?  Great book. And you don't have to take my word for it.  [nodding to LeVar Burton])
Better Nate Than Ever
I really liked these ones too.  Bee and Melody are both very special characters whose inner strength helps them overcome outward physical issues.
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For professional reading this week, I read From Reading to Math by Maggie Siena.  It's a great book that looks at teaching math through the framework of literacy.  You can read more of my thoughts about this one here.

Up next this week will be What Readers Really Do by Barnhouse and Vinton, and Out of Nowhere by Maria Padian.  I've also got a stack of picture books to investigate, including If You See a Whale by Julie Fogliano and Erin Stead.  Happy reading!

3 comments:

  1. I loved the crayons one. The frustrating thing is the text. Most of the ones that check out books from our "everybody" section won't be able to read it. The older kids that might won't be caught dead getting a book from the everybody section (or teachers, well meaning as they are, say "YOU CAN'T GO OVER THERE." So I will have to talk it up!
    Our students LOVED Out of My Mind. Which is awesome because it's not one I might have guessed would be as popular as it was. Considering Firegirl (Tony Abbott) was the same way I SHOULD have expected it. They're good, caring kiddos!

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    1. The text is a bit tricky, but we have other Oliver Jeffers ones in our room. I hope that if they can't read every word, they'll know it so well as a mentor text that they can come close. I haven't heard of Firegirl. I'll add it to my list. Happy reading!

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  2. Better Nate Than Ever sound so cute, and the second book (5, 6, 7, Nate) sounds just as great!
    People always rave about Out of My Mind, and I have never read it...I need to remedy that soon!

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