In social studies class, my 2nd grade students learned about immigration. With help from their parents, they created family trees, discovering that their ancestors immigrated from different Eastern and Western European countries and even from as far away as Taiwan. … Continue reading
My second-grade students recently learned all about alliterations and then created their own digital versions, which we compiled in a book. We started by reading Maurice Sendak’s Alligators All Around and defining alliteration. We thought about the purpose of alliterations … Continue reading
When last month I worked with my 4th grade students on creating maps (an extension of a social studies lesson on map skills), we referred to it as our GeoLiteracy project. While we thought we had come up with the … Continue reading
I love my job as a teacher librarian at a private school. I have had the freedom create my own lessons–shaping and reshaping them, while trying new ideas or adapting old ones or just sticking with the tried and true. … Continue reading
Danny’s Banned Book Poster In September, the American Library Association celebrated Banned Books Week. Who knew that this 5th grade lesson would turn into an amazing discussion about belief systems and values! We learned about who challenges books, where, and … Continue reading
When I was in elementary school, assessment was all about paper and pencil quizzes and tests. I love the alternative forms of assessment technology affords us today. (Also see my earlier post on Chatterpix: Creative Assessment in the Lower Grades.) … Continue reading
The last few weeks of the school year, my 3rd grade class researched information about a country of their choice. While engaged in the research process, they explored a variety of technology resources to gather information, synthesized what they found, … Continue reading
My 1st graders love learning about animals, so making animals the subject of our research skills unit was a no-brainer. Also, thankfully, our library collection includes a decent number of early reader books on different animals. My goal was for … Continue reading
App Smashing Biography Research My 2nd grade students did some biography research this spring. The first challenge was to find biographies they could actually read. While we had enough books for each of the students, I wish we had … Continue reading
In language arts class, my 5th grade students read A Long Walk to Water: Based on a True Story by Linda Sue Park (2010). The book tells the story of Salva, one of the thousands of Sudanese “Lost Boys” who … Continue reading
Liquid Literacy 