"Middle Grade Mania" Author Visits

Today our third and fourth graders got to meet three authors at my school: Elana Arnold, Beth Fantesky, and Greg Neri. They came to talk to about their newest middle grade novels as part of Middle Grade Mania with HMH Kids Publishing Company. They came on tour through Anderson's Bookshop, a local bookstore and bookfair company. If we host bookfairs with Anderson's, they share their authors with schools, which is a win-win situation!

We learned that Elana Arnold's latest book, Far From Fair, was inspired by her own life. When her husband got laid off, they sold their house and car and took their two kids into an RV and went traveling up the East Coast with their pet ferret, just like Odette's family in the novel. Elana shared that she always wanted to be a writer but in her early twenties, she found herself ready to write but with no ideas. Instead she taught, raised her children, lived her life, and said she nearly forgot she was a writer. When her family started traveling in the RV, she started blogging, and people read her blog and connected with her. She commented that "road trips and life are winding weird things" - eventually, 15 years after she thought she would start writing, she got her first book published. She encouraged the students by saying that writers don't always write: they read, daydream, have adventures, get bored, and they write too.  Elana explained that the love of story is human, and being able to tell stories to people is fabulous!

Greg Neri shared that as a writer you never know where or when the next story idea will come along. Getting a story idea is like finding a piece of gold on the ground that no one else seems to notice. You start digging at it and realize it is bigger than you thought and you need to dig around to get it free...but when you do, it is priceless. Writers have their eyes and ears open all the time looking for those nuggets of gold! His book, Tru & Nelle, tells the story of Harper Lee and Truman Capote's childhood friendship. Greg described how he and his brother were interested in solving mysteries when he was a child, and when he learned that Lee and Capote liked to play Sherlock and Watson-style detectives, he felt like he struck gold with a story idea.

Beth Fantesky shared that she has lucky writing socks! She explained that her book Isabel Feeney, Star Reporter came about after she wrote her PhD thesis on 1920s Chicago news, and someone told her that topic would make a great children's book. She described getting so attached to her characters that when it is time to start writing a new book, it is like starting a new school and she always thinks she won't like it as much as her old familiar characters.  She loves creating characters and spending time with them, just like good friends.

The two copies of each of these books we purchased were immediately checked out by my students and hold lists have started. I'm glad they got the chance to see a glimpse into the lives of these three authors! If anyone would like to order any of these books, you can order them through school, just get in your order forms by Wednesday, March 23!

Trailer for Mr. Lemoncello's Library Olympics!

We are so excited that the next Mr. Lemoncello's Library book, Mr. Lemoncello's Library Olympics, is coming soon!

It will be released on January 5. Check out the trailer below!

For more information, see author Chris Grabenstein's website: http://chrisgrabenstein.com/kids/mr-lemoncellos-library-olympics.php

Global Read Aloud

Fifth graders and first graders at Prospect are participating in the Global Read Aloud. What's that? Books have been chosen for classes to read together over a 6-week time period. During that time, they not only read in the classroom but also make connections to other groups and classes that are reading the same book, and even the authors!

There are different books for different age levels. Our fifth graders are participating by having a class read-aloud of Fish in a Tree by Lynda Mullaly Hunt. In addition to having class discussions and reading responses, they are also connecting with others outside of our school. They connected with other classes in a "Mystery Skype," in which they had to ask yes and no questions to figure out where the other class was. They will be connecting with these classes again later after they finish the book to discuss the story. They also have email penpals with students from The Lane school and are chatting about their thoughts, theories, and predictions about the story. In MRC, we are interacting with the author through videos in which she answers student questions.


First graders are participating in the Global Read Aloud with an author study of Amy Krouse Rosenthal. We just started this week with the book Chopsticks.
In Chopsticks, two chopsticks are always doing things together, until one gets hurt and needs to rest for over a week. The hurt chopstick encourages his buddy to go out and try new things, which in the end, helped strengthen them both. After reading, the first graders gave some ideas of what they like to do alone and what they like to do together with someone else. We shared these ideas online in three Padlets.
Here are 1G's ideas, 1M's ideas, and 1T's ideas.

After book checkout, some of the first graders tried out using chopsticks to pick up erasers.
We are looking forward to reading more of Amy Krouse Rosenthal's books in the next few weeks in MRC!

Aaron Reynolds Author Visit

On Tuesday afternoon, the kindergarteners, first graders, and second graders got a chance to hear from author Aaron Reynolds! He has written over 30 books, including Chicks and Salsa, Buffalo Wings, Creepy Carrots, and his newest book, Nerdy Birdy! He shared the book Nerdy Birdy and talked about his influences in writing the book. He wanted to include a message that what makes us different is what makes us truly awesome. Aaron also shared what it is like to be a picture book writer and how he came up with ideas for some of his other books, like Creepy Carrots. His presentation had students shrieking with laughter as well as listening attentively. Make sure you check out some of his books, and if you're interested in learning more about Aaron Reynolds, take a look at his website!

Linda Urban Author Visit

The fourth and fifth graders were lucky enough to be able to meet Linda Urban today! 
She had a wonderful message for students. She explained her journey as a writer. As a child, she loved getting positive comments about her writing and even won an award in elementary school. That felt great! However, later, a peer called her word choice weird. After that, she stuck to writing only nonfiction, including writing for her school newspaper. 

As an adult, she worked in a bookstore and used some of her writing talents to work in marketing. Being surrounded by authors during author events and running writing workshops sparked a desire to begin writing again. Still held back by fear, she began writing picture books in secret. Eventually, Mouse was Mad was published in 2009, followed by her middle grade books, including A Crooked Kind of Perfect.  She described getting great reviews, which made her feel good, although many mentioned her books how wonderful her character development was but that the books did not have much plot. She defined herself by these reviews, accepting that that was who she was as a writer - she was a writer who wrote more introspective, thoughtful books focused on characters. When her son asked her to write a book with "HAM" - humor, adventure, and mystery, she at first said she couldn't, but gave it a try! She looked at many other books as models, including Roald Dahl's works, and the end result was Milo Speck, Accidental Agent. Please run and get this creative adventure book immediately!

Linda also encouraged students to think quietly to themselves about something they really wanted to try to do, something they wanted to become better at. I 
The students were very engaged by Linda's presentation, which did not include any technology but kept them interested the whole time. Her themes of overcoming fear, taking small steps and finding models can connect with anyone. 

Floating Away

First graders enjoyed reading the book Float by Daniel Miyares in MRC, which is a picture book about a boy who enjoys floating a paper boat outside in puddles.  I won this book in Twitter contest and when I expressed my excitement, the author and illustrator, Daniel Miyares, started chatting with me and asked me if I would like to have some Float styled paper for classes to fold their own paper boats or planes. We tried it out today and some of the first graders made their own boats or planes! We will continue examining this story next week.