Author Archives: cre8tivelibrarian

“Libraries really are the gates to the future.” ~Neil Gaiman

I just returned from the MASL (Maryland Association for School Librarians) annual conference and it is always so nice to spend a day focused on what we do best – sharing information!

In my e-mail this morning was a link to a fabulous article about the prolific and talented author Neil Gaiman.   I am attaching the link to his lecture for The Reading Agency, but wanted to include some of his quotes, in case you don’t have time to read the whole article! 

“Literacy is more important than ever it was, in this world of text and email, a world of written information. We need to read and write, we need global citizens who can read comfortably, comprehend what they are reading, understand nuance, and make themselves understood.” Our world is becoming smaller and smaller every day, and we need to teach our students how to become global citizens.

“A library is a place that is a repository of information and gives every citizen equal access to it.”  This is especially important to remember when we are school librarians in Title 1 schools – we are often our students’ only access to books.

“Books are the way that we communicate with the dead. The way that we learn lessons from those who are no longer with us, that humanity has built on itself, progressed, made knowledge incremental rather than something that has to be relearned, over and over.”

“I think we have responsibilities to the future. Responsibilities and obligations to children, to the adults those children will become, to the world they will find themselves inhabiting. All of us – as readers, as writers, as citizens – have obligations. I thought I’d try and spell out some of these obligations here.”

“I believe we have an obligation to read for pleasure, in private and in public places. If we read for pleasure, if others see us reading, then we learn, we exercise our imaginations. We show others that reading is a good thing.”

“We have an obligation to support libraries. To use libraries, to encourage others to use libraries, to protest the closure of libraries. If you do not value libraries then you do not value information or culture or wisdom. You are silencing the voices of the past and you are damaging the future.”

“We have an obligation to read aloud to our children. To read them things they enjoy. To read to them stories we are already tired of. To do the voices, to make it interesting, and not to stop reading to them just because they learn to read to themselves. Use reading-aloud time as bonding time, as time when no phones are being checked, when the distractions of the world are put aside.”

“We have an obligation to use the language. To push ourselves: to find out what words mean and how to deploy them, to communicate clearly, to say what we mean. We must not to attempt to freeze language, or to pretend it is a dead thing that must be revered, but we should use it as a living thing, that flows, that borrows words, that allows meanings and pronunciations to change with time.”

“We all – adults and children, writers and readers – have an obligation to daydream. We have an obligation to imagine.”  We must encourage our students to think outside the box, to dream, and to find ways to make the world a better place. 

We have an obligation to our students to continue to advocate for them.  Full-time school librarians are critical to our students’ success as they navigate research projects, are exposed to quality literature, and learn a love of reading for pleasure.  Last Wednesday, Julie Greller, who writes the blog “The Media Specialist’s Guide to the Internet” posted several links to videos that praise school librarians and highlight the multitude of hats we wear to help make our students successful.  You can access her post by clicking here.  I hope you will take some time to view them, and share with others when you can!

The last idea I want to share with you is an event that ties in with the above, because the founder, Pernille Ripp,  was inspired by Neil Gaiman’s One Book, One Twitter book club– it is the Global Read Aloud and this  year’s project runs September 30th – November 8th. According to the website, there is no deadline to sign up and there are four different groups from which to choose:

Eric Carle Author Study – K and up

Marty McGuire by Kate Messner – 1st and up

Out of My Mind by Sharon Draper – 4th and up

Stupid Fast by Geoff Herbach – 8th and up

Hope to connect with you soon!

Lots of Dots, Awesome Authors, & One Little Otis

It’s been busy couple of weeks in my school libraries.  We had a great time celebrating creativity, courage, and collaboration during International Dot Day (well, for us, it was a week!).  The hallways outside my libraries are splashed with color in an amazing array of dots.  My 3rd graders made dot trading cards and we’ve sent them to our Skype partner in Dayton, Ohio.    Most of my classes had the opportunity to Skype with other classes….we chatted with classrooms in Higganum and South Burlington (Vermont), Princeton ( New Jersey), Austin and Weatherford (Texas) and Lexington (South Carolina).  We shared The Dot by Peter Reynolds,  Press Here by Hervé Tullet, colorful dots, and lots of state symbols. Please click here to take a look at our Brookhaven celebration, and here for our Clopper Mill celebration. One really neat result of my Skyping was that I got to meet my Lexington, SC Skype partner, Valerie Byrd-Fort, at the National Book Festival in Washington, DC that same weekend!  Skyping is such great way to collaborate, share a love of reading, teach digital citizenship, and also show our students how small our world really is!

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Valerie & Me – Skyping partners meet in person at the 2013 National Book Festival in Washington, DC

Speaking of the National Book Festival, I had a super–dee-duper time listening to the wonderful childrens authors speak about their work.   Suzy Lee had a wonderful multimedia presentation of three of her books: Mirror, Wave, Shadow , and Open this Little Book – she also illustrated the official National Book Festival poster.    Mirror, Wave, and Shadow are wordless books, click here for an article about other great wordless books.  In this article, Susan Dee states, “Author David Wiesner commented once that one of the most valuable characteristics of the wordless book is it’s “endless possibilities for creative interpretation.”   Consider including some wordless books in your lesson plans – I plan to, and will let you know how it goes!

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Author/Illustrator Suzy Lee shows us “Shadow.”

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Author Jon Sciezska shares a funny story with the audience

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Mark Teague’s dinosaur drawing at 2013 National Book Festival in Washington, DC

Jon Scieszka (he said it rhymes with Fresca) had a fun talk about growing up in a family of all boys.  He is the founder of Guys Read website, too!

Mark Teague, was also on the line up in the children’s tent.  He is both an author and an illustrator.  He gave a nice talk about what he loves to do, drew a dinosaur for us , and moderated a long line of Q & As.

Author Lesa Cline-Ransome and her author/illustrator husband James E. Ransome spoke about the creation process, working together, and a lot about their newest book:  A Light in the Darkness. Lesa is a passionate researcher, reader,  and writer.  I encourage you to check out Lesa’s website – you’ll be glad you did!   Click here for a video which shows James as he creates a beautiful watercolor painting from A Light in the Darkness. 

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Christopher Myers & Me!

Christopher Myers, son of award winning Walter Dean Myers, gave a wonderful talk about being black in today’s America, and about his new book, H.O.R.S.E. – A Game of Basketball and Imagination.  He said that despite his height (6’7”) he was never a good basketball player ( but that he was good with a pen) and that the basketball games he and his friends played were a combination of creativity, imagination, and physical playfulness.  Click here for a wonderful father-son interview about their collaborative work We are America.

Last, but certainly not least, Newbery Award winner Richard Peck spoke about what it means to be a good writer.  He said that in order to be a good writer, one must first be a good reader.   What struck me the most (besides his eloquent way of speaking!) was that he writes his books six times – 6 times!  He writes, rewrites and rewrites and rewrites, until he gets it right.  He types each version on an electric typewriter – he does not use a computer. He writes from beginning to end. Once he finishes the book, and knows how it ends, without rereading it, he throws out the first chapter and rewrites it, because “the first chapter is the last chapter in disguise,” Typically pulling his opening line from somewhere within the novel, he said said that he can rewrite his opening paragraph twenty or more times.  This is true of his newest novel, The Mouse with the Question Mark Tail.

A fun event happening this week is “Read for the Record” sponsored by We Give Books, an online source for free e-books.  Please consider sharing the story Otis by Loren Long with your students on October 3rd! You may pledge to read on their website here.

Happy Reading!

Getting Graphic with Dots and Books!

My students and I are gearing up for a fabulous celebration of International Dot Day.  Here’s a sneak peek at the splash of color that decorates the hallway walls at Brookhaven ES. Image

I also wanted to share some additional Dot Day resources created by Peter Reynolds which includes posters and certificates of participation.

I have a few openings in my International Dot Day Skyping schedule, and would love to connect with you!    Please take a look at the Google Doc that lists everyone connecting the dots through  Skype video chats.

On a completely different note, I was excited to spend my Saturday at the Small Press Expo, where I got the chance to meet amazing graphic novelists Raina Telgemeier, Dave Roman, John Green, and Gene Luen Yang, and also listen to a very informative conversation between Raina and Gene about their work.

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Raina has a great newsletter, and her fall edition included a series of blog posts about the graphic novel creation process – a great set of resources for the MCPS 3rd grade Marking Period 3 writing project.

 

If you haven’t done so already, consider building your graphic novel collection.  An informative article by Scholastic Books explains what the graphic novel format is, and how graphic novels promote literacy  – this is a great resource to share with those that are wary of the format.  

For a list of great graphic novels for the grade 4-6 set (in addition to the titles by the authors listed above!) visit the Maryland Association of School Librarians 2013-14 Maryland Black-Eyed Susan nominees for the new graphic novel division.

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Making our Mark!

The Dot Poster

Make Your Mark on Dot Day!

I am looking forward to connecting with other educators, and sharing the joy, hope, and creativity that The Dot by Peter Reynolds inspires in its readers.  For ideas about how to participate in International Dot Day on September 15th–ish, visit the official site here.  For even more ideas, read the blog posts on The Busy Librarian and Life Lessons for Little Ones.

If you haven’t read The Dot or Ish by Peter Reynolds, you should!  I also highly recommend The North Star, also by Peter Reynolds.  All three of these books celebrate finding one’s own talents,  following your dreams, and creating your own life’s journey to make your personal mark on the world.   Another book I plan to share on International Dot Day is the interactive book Press Here by Hervé Tullet (watch book trailer here).

For additional activity ideas, visit blogs Creative Connections for Kids and My Little Bookcase, or Laughing Book’s Pinterest page Ideas for Book of the Month. Both The Dot and Ish are available on TumbleBooks, and I also located a video on YouTube, if  you don’t have access to TumbleBooks and you’d like to experience the animated version of The Dot.

Whether we’re connecting with a classroom around the world, across the country, or across Montgomery County, my students and I look forward to visiting with you and sharing both The Dot and Press Here next week!

Awesome Blogs I Follow!

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Librarians love to share knowledge with others, so today I want to share with you some blogs that I follow.  These are by other school librarians, and they are filled with great information.  I hope you will find them as helpful as I do!

The Busy Librarian, Matthew Winner, is an elementary school mover and shaker.  He is full of wonderful ideas for lesson plans, book titles, integrating technology, and now has started posting podcast interviews with authors and other librarians.

Julie Greller is a media specialist that has an amazing assortment of articles and resources for librarians at any level.  Her blog, A Media Specialist’s Guide to the Internet, has resources broken out by grade level, subject, and her blog posts are timely and helpful.  For example, her August 29th post is filled with resources for free classroom (and library) posters, certificates, and many other items you may need.

Mover and shaker high school librarian, Joyce Valenza, writes The NeverEnding Search blog for School Library Journal, and her blog also covers a wide variety of topics.  Hers is a must read as well!

Another mover and shaker in middle school librarianship is Gwyneth A. Jones… The Daring Librarian…her website and blog are full of cutting edge ideas for research projects and integrating technology and her humor shines through.

Have a great week!

Welcome Back-to-School!

As we all start heading back to school after a productive/restful/exciting/too short [fill in the blank] summer, I wanted to share a few ‘book care’ resources that I have found.  The first is a parody of Mo Willem’s Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus – Don’t Let the Pigeon Touch the Books by Laughter in the Library.  Note that there are two versions, one by the each of the librarians that created the videos.   I pair this with the actual story, and my students loved it – so much so that they asked every couple of weeks to see it again and again, and on their last media day, I made sure to show them one last time for the school year.

This year, I discovered another video that is a parody of favorite children’s book character. This one: The 5 Book Care Rules starring Skippy Jon Jones is the one I plan to use this year, followed by a mini author study and book talks.

How to Care for Library Books at Home is another cute video about book care.  It features a big and little sister, and also encourages discussion about each event shown in the video.

The Shelf Elf by Jackie Mims Hopkins is another option for teaching book care to young children.  Children learn library etiquette from this book and will help make their library adventures much more enjoyable.

If you haven’t discovered Scooter Hayes AKA Melvil Dewey International Library Hip Hop Superstar – you need to!  He’s got some great rap songs about the library.  One of the new ones from his recent CD Papercuts is “Book Marky Mark.”     His CD is available on Spotify (free membership for 30 days), iTunes, and Amazon.  As a side note, there is a fun DDCS video – The Dewey Decimal Rap on YouTube (another much requested video by my students).

With Scooter Hayes’ songs, you’ve gotta get the kids up dancing – they love it!!

SafeShare.tv is a great way to block the pop-ups and extraneous information on the You Tube site….helps keep the students focused on the video instead of the ‘recommended’ ones on the side bars.

Penelope Popper, Book Doctor by Toni Buzzeo (one of the movers and shakers in school library world) is a sweet story about the importance of book care, and how one small girl rises to great heights as she learns to heal her library, one book at a time.  This print resource also has a set of lesson plans to go along with it.

What Happened to Marion’s Book? by Brook Berg is another great print resource – and also written by a school librarian!  Unfortunately, it is no longer in print, but still available on Amazon and in used bookstores, and has a set of lesson plans as well.

There are many book care Pinterest boards – click here for one that has a nice assortment of resources. 

Here’s wishing all of us an awesome school year!

Each Kindness

Showing kindness to others was an important theme the last few weeks of this school year.  At both of my schools, we read the 2013-2014 Black-Eye Susan nominee Each Kindness by Jaqueline Woodson.  Discussing the events as we read the book, every class I read this to sat quietly at the story’s end, not quite sure what to do when I closed the book, and there was not a happy ending.  “Wait, Ms. McDonald, what happened to Maya?’’  “Why didn’t Chloe fix things with her?” “That is not how a book is supposed to end – it has a sad ending!” were repeated comments. After reading and discussing the story, each class gathered around a table with a large pot of water to drop in a small stone as each student shared a kindness they had shown others.  I was impressed with, and touched by, the kindnesses – both large and small – that my students shared with each other.  Many also wrote a note on a Post-it and hung it on our wall of kindness – at each of my schools, the wall was covered with sweet notes.  I have included some pictures below.   If you’d like to read more about Jacqueline Woodson and view lesson plans for Each Kindness, click  here.ImageImage

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Poem in Your Pocket Day

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At my two  Montgomery County, Maryland elementary schools, we celebrated Poem in Your Pocket Day on April 18th and 19th at Brookhaven ES, and April 19th and 22nd at Clopper Mill ES.  We had the opportunity to share some wonderful poems with each other, and were able to Skype with several schools throughout the USA.  Using templates from Homeschool Creations and Scholastic, my students wrote original poems or copied a favorite  poem to share.

 

We Skyped with elementary schools in Iowa, Texas, Vermont, Wisconsin, and Howard County, Maryland (thanks, Matthew – The Busy Librarian).  Each video chat was filled with  enthusiastic students, teachers, and media specialists.  We learned facts about the states and shared many original poems, riddles, and also two voice poems “Cricket” and “Grasshopper” from Joyful Noise by Paul Fleischman.  We read together selections from Poem in My Pocket by Bobbi Katz, “Whistling” byImage Jack Prelutsky (we whistled together at the end, Imageof course)!    When one of our video chat sessions fell through because of a scheduling glitch, one of my Clopper Mill 5th grade classes stepped up at the very last second to to share poems with one of my 1st grade classes – and it was a treat for both classes!  My students shared a wide variety of poems — from silly poems about hot dogs and messy bedrooms to Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad. What an awesome three days!    Can’t wait for next year’s Poem in Your Pocket Day!ImageImage
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A Media Specialist’s Guide to the Internet: Coping With Tragedies

As we try to understand why tragedies happen, and how to help our students cope with their fears and uncertainty, there are many resources available to assist us.   One of the blogs I follow, A Media Specialist’s Guide to the Internet, has a comprehensive set of resources to help educators help their students.  I hope you will take a look at them.

A Media Specialist’s Guide to the Internet: Coping With Tragedies.