Life & Reading

Library:

I'm reading The Book With No Pictures by BJ Novak to all grade levels this week.  I started out showing a video of BJ reading the book to a group of elementary students because I thought my students would like seeing the author read his own book.  He reads about half the book then I picked up where he left off.  I was surprised how much more they laughed when I read it.  So... failing forward here... I stopped showing the video and read the entire book myself to my other students. They enjoyed that so much more!  Who know?!

What I'm reading:

I started Three Wishes by Liane Moriarty for my Faculty/Staff Book Club at school. This is the first book Moriarty published.  We are enjoying it but not as much as The Husband's Secret or Big Little Lies.  We decided to just read everything she's written in our book club until we've read them all.  I don't what we'll read once we've read all her books.

I finished listening to Friendship by Emily Gould.  It wasn't my favorite book but that could be because I listened to it instead of reading it.  I give it three stars. There was so much more I wanted to know before the book ended.  I also had a hard time relating to characters.

The librarians in my district and I are still working our way through Wild Readers by Donalyn Miller.  We will discuss chapter 4 next month at our meeting.  It is such a powerful book! All reading teachers and librarians should be required to read it!









I haven't started a new audiobook yet but I will.


Personal:

It's snowing here in Texas... well, it's snowing to us! Today was the first time in 12 years of teaching that I got students out of the car while it snowed.

Exercise: I'm participating in Walk Across Texas.  Last week I walked 23.5 miles.

Library Happenings and Valentine's Day

This week in my library I am reading the 2x2 book Super Hair-o & the Barber of Doom by John Rocco to Pre-K through 2nd.  They are loving it!  They can't wait to tell me what super power they would have and what their super hero name would be if they were a super hero.

I'm showing the Bluebonnet Award video to 3rd-5th grade.  They are excited to see which Bluebonnet book won the award.  Funny enough only one of my students voted for the winner.  

I took down my Valentine's Day display and added books to my Black History display.

Valentine's Day was a fun day for my daughter and nephew (and the adults too!).  We had a blast cooking a Valentine's Day meal.

This week I'm reading: 

For pleasure: The Ruby Circle: The Bloodline Series by Richelle Mead.  

Listening to: Friendship by Emily Gould via the Hoopla app.  

Professionally: Reading in the Wild by Donalyn Miller and I'm about to start The Time is Now: Volume 2 by my principal Jonathan Kegler. 

Read Bow-Wow's Nightmare Neighbors by Mark Newgarden and Megan Montague Cash.  I read it in preparation for the Texas Librarian Twitter chat (#txlchat) I participate in on Tuesday nights at 8:00-8:30.

Authors Week

What a crazy, wonderful week this has been!  We had two authors visit our campus!

 Wednesday we had award winning author and illustrator Don Tate visit our elementary.

He spoke to students about his childhood, family, and work as an illustrator and author.  The students keep talking about how he had to rewrite It Jes' Happened 37 times! 37 time!  What a great life lesson! Students also keep telling me their favorite part was his drawings.

He had students come up and draw lines on the paper then he turned them into something spectacular! He also drew a couple of students.  So. Much. Fun! 

I have no real reason for putting this picture in other than... I just wanted too! 

Thursday my school did our first Skype!  We Skyped with author and motivational speaker Jon Gordon. I was so worried that technology was going to go crazy that I had a nightmare about it the night before but it went off without a hitch!  Mr. Gordon read parts of his book The Shark and The Goldfish and spoke with students about being and staying positive.

He also answered some students questions.  Students were able to come up to the computer and ask their question directly to Mr. Gordon.

Students thought the whole experience was so cool.  This is definitely something I want to do again!

#LoveTeaching

I have been in education for nearly 12 years.  10 years as a teacher of the Deaf and I'm completing my second year as a librarian.  I have always loved my job!  Being a teacher of the Deaf was very rewarding.  Being a librarian is fabulous!

I am participating in a challenge, #EduLS, put together by Todd Nesloney.  This week's challenge is to state a reason you love teaching everyday this week using the hashtag #LoveTeaching.

Sunday: I loved my elementary librarian, Kris Dewees.  She is the reason I became a librarian.
Monday: Hearing students excitement over a book they read and loved.

I'm going to wait to post my Tues-Sat reasons because I don't know what might make me love teaching these days.  I have general reasons that I love teaching but this week I'd like to be as specific as possible!

I'm new to this blogging business.  Not new to reading them but new to writing them.  So we shall see where this might take me!

Oh, the places we'll go... Dr. Seuss