It has been a VERY exciting month in the library. During April and into May, library classes were regaled with children’s poetry from around the world. Favorite poets included Neruda, Prelutsky, Katz and everyone’s favorite children’s poet, Shel Silverstein! In celebration of this delightful month, we created our first “Poet-Tree” filled with poem leaves created by students. It was such a success that librarians continued to add student work to the poet-tree during international lessons with kindergarten students including piñata leaves and butterfly wishes. These two elements correspond to two of the books read during their book plane journey around the world, Pancho’s Piñata (Mexico) and The Faerie’s Wish (Ireland) as they continue their journey across the continents for new and fascinating folk tales.
Many of our youngest students have questions about the election and in keeping with their interests, we devised a “Battle of the Books” election for K-1. Each week, the students would vote on their favorite book choices until each “primary” was narrowed down to two champions in the big “general election.” The winner of BOTH grades for the best beloved library book of the year is:
This means that Finding Winnie has the enviable position of brandishing not 1, but 3 gold medals! The 2016 Caldecott Medal, and the Dalton FP Library Kindergarten and First Grade 2016 Medals.
In classes, grades 1-3 are continuing their study of the dewey decimal system, examining books from every non-fiction subject including animals, technology, true-life adventures and history. Our goal is for our students to discover how to organize information into different subjects and use a cataloging system to locate them in a library. Up next, we will be sharing and celebrating stories for Asian and Pacific Islander Heritage month. Stay tuned!
