FIRST grade students experienced the thrill and history making of the first moon landing. After reading the book Man on the Moon by Anastasia Suen, they picked out their parts and performed a reader's theater of the book. Did you know that a word was lost from the transmission when Neil Armstrong first stepped onto the moon's surface? No one knows why. What we were supposed to hear was:"That's one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind."SECOND grade students read Carolina's Gift, a story of Peru, which described the Sunday market in the colorful village of Pisac in the Andean highlands. The village does not have a supermarket, so the people in Pisac and the surrounding towns depend on the weekly market for all their needs. They found out the descendants of the Inca Indians still keep their ancestor's ancient traditions alive today, including the Sunday market. Quechua is the language spoken at the market. Some of the farmers and artisans also speak Spanish, and some English. In fact, Peru has three national languages: Spanish, Quechua, and Aymara. The students also practiced pronouncing 10 vocabulary words that might be spoken in Peru today.
Students in K were introduced to author Amy Krouse Rosenthal and Jen Corace who have written Little Pea, Little Oink, and Little Hoot books. If you do not know these books you need to treat yourself and read one...just ask any K student if Little Oink liked to have a messy room or a clean one...Students also heard the story entitled Chickens Aren't The Only Ones by Ruth Heller which showed all the animals that lay eggs. Did you know that there are two mammals that lay eggs? They both live in Australia, too. Just ask a K student if you do not know.
Biography books were introduced to the students in grade 3 by reading several chapters of Knucklehead, an autobiography by Jon Scieszka, the author of The Stinky Cheese Man. These pages were filled with tall tales and mostly true stories about growing up Scieszka...a very funny and interesting person to read about. This remains one of the most popular choices in the biography section, too.
Students in Alpha and Jr. K were discussing author/illustrator, Jan Brett, who celebrated a birthday on December 1st. We celebrated along with her by reading Gingerbread Baby and The Mitten. She is one of the few authors I know that actually travels to do research throughly before writing and drawing her own books.
In fifth grade, students saw a video about Henry Winkler's new series of books about Hank Zipzer, the world's greatest underachiever. Henry Winkler is well known as an actor, producer, director, coauthor, public speaker, husband, father, brother, uncle, and godfather. He lives in Los Angeles with his wife, Stacey. They have three children named Jed, Zoe, and Max, and three dogs named Monty, Charlotte, and Linus. He is so proud of the Hank Zipzer series that he could scream-which he does sometimes, in his backyard!
