Author Letters

Grade 1 put wrote letters to the visiting author. I got this idea from Tara Etheridge's blog. I modified it by having students use the Epson Brightlink interactive whiteboard but switched to paper because I needed to fill some bulletin boards up for the author visit. You can get the idea from the photo. I put the photos on Youblisher and sent them to the author. It helped generate excitement about the upcoming author visit.

Here's the look on Youblisher. I put it in a PowerPoint and saved it as a PDF file. Click on the box and it will enlarge, then click on the arrows in the lower righthand corner to turn pages.


Here's the Epson Brightlink photo. I had saved it originally but can't find the image so here's a photo of what we did. The original will show up in some weird place. I have photos on my photos...

Art & Max: story mountains

This lesson involved students creating a story mountain from the book, Art & Max, by David Wiesner. A story mountain is a way to look at the structure of a story and examine how the story has a main character with hopes and desires who gets into trouble or has a problem that is resolved by the end of the story. Grade 4 students have been working on story mountains in readers and writers workshops.

First, I asked students if they knew anything special about this author. David Wiesner has won 3 Caldecott medals and only one other writer has done this in the history of the Caldecott medal. One of the library standards in elementary school is for students to understand the purpose of children's and young adult book awards. In addition, Wiesner is a brilliant artist and I try to show his contributions to literature throught the medium of this work. The story in this book is about the creation of a piece of art and the exploration of the medium. I pointed out to students throughout the story the illustrations shift from acrylics, to pastels, to watercolor. Art also changes at the end and is inspired by Max's pointillism and creating an abstract piece of work on the cactus.

The objective of the lesson is to create a story mountain. To begin, I asked students to describe the two distinct character traits of Art and Max.  (This ties in with grade 4 language arts where they study how characters change from the beginning to the end of the story.) From the first page, Max is high energy and loveable in an annoying way. He flies across a double-page spread running over two assistants and knocking Art's paint brush out of his hand. Max is so excited to see Art paint he's a bit reckless in his enthusiasm. Art is the expert who has three assistants and is a bit of a snob. Art is annoyed with Max in the beginning but changes at the end when Max opens his eyes to new possibilities in creating a work of art.

The structure of this book is fairly easy to follow and the pictures are hysterical. Students were able to recreate the story mountain although there were debates in every class as to what the climax was in the story.  Art lets Max paint with him but tells him to stay out of the way. Max doesn't know what to paint and asks Art. Art replies by telling him to paint him. Max takes Art literally and paints him. The acrylic paint hardens and cracks on Art before exploding off the page to reveal pastels beneath Art. Max is fascinated by what the medium is doing while Art is furious with Max. Excited, Max rushes off the page with one finger in the air indicating he has an idea and that Art should just wait there for him. He comes back with a fan and blows the pastels off of Art who is feeling dry-mouthed from inhaling pastel dust. He asks for a drink of water and the medium turns into watercolors. Art drinks the glass of water and the watercolor washes off him completely leaving only his outline. Completely fed up with Max, Art stomps off the page while Max says "wait a minute" and grabs a hold of his outline. Art completely unravels so that he has disappeared from the page. Max holds the tangled outline in his hands and with a baffled look says, "Arthur?"

Max then sets to work with determination, his long lizard-like tongue hanging out of his mouth, as he concentrates on putting Art back together. His first attempt is quite comical and the students laugh the hardest at this page no matter what age group I read it to. Next, Max puts art back together and the students "ooh" and "aah" as the simple lines become more complex and Art becomes recognizable. Once he is back together Max holds his finger up because he has another idea. (Uh-oh, the students groan, along with the assistants who are shaking their heads). Max comes in with a vacuum cleaner and blasts Art with paint. Art looks completely different covered in dots to represent Pointillism. I then have a slide of famous paintings in Pointillism by Paul Signac and Georges Seurat. Last, I show a 2 minute video that Wiesner narrates about how he writes this book. [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZuIsAIKiNgY[/youtube]

The last part involves writing a story mountain and we used the Epson projector for this part. I projected a graphic organizer and the students filled in the blanks. The climax was usually hotly debated by the students. Except for the class where the student yelled out dramatically at the point where Arthur has disappeared, "Oh-no! He killed him!"

I had a student videotape me giving this lesson and there were several things I would do differently. I should drop the Pointillism slide. It takes away from the story mountain. While the students found it interesting I think it was distracting and made the lesson too long. Children's picture books and how it relates to fine art is a personal interest of mine and while it adds to an appreciation of illustrators it muddied this lesson and the objectives. Also, I should have had students turn and talk to a partner before they came up to write on the Epson interactive whiteboard with the story mountain worksheet . In another class the answers were way off and I think I should have intervened with the correct answer sooner. It can be a challenge mastering the "art" of teaching.

Here's some highlights from the book when I was reading it to the students. [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9UzJEPC1nE[/youtube]

Neighborhoods

I read a  book called, Be My Neighbor, by Maya Ajmeria & John D. Ivanko to grade 1 students. The book was too long but the pictures were nice so I started making up my own story. Grade 1 is studying neighborhoods and will go on a field trip around the school looking at what makes up a neighborhood. I can't find a book I really like on neighborhoods and would love any recommendations.

After reading the book we used the Epson Brightlink and matched photos to people, places or vehicles. The kids love to use the Brightlink but with 1st graders it takes too long to give everyone a turn. I lost the first class and after half the class was done they were pulling books off the shelves and rolling around on the stage. I talked to Grade 1 Teacher, Scott, and he suggested trying to have half the class (such as the girls) go checkout books while the other half (the boys) play the matching game and then switch. Or choose students who are listening to match the pictures and let them checkout books as they finish matching photos.[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDVBrqKtGOQ[/youtube]

I did try to make a game out of the matching with the next class where they had to tell me what picture went with what person. This kept their attention much better but it still got too long. I think if I combine both of the ideas the lesson would be much better; that is, I can ask how the pictures match and when they get squirmy, which varies with every class and the time of day, I can send them off to find books.

Head, Body, Legs

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mp9pZbxvrco[/youtube]This lesson is for kindergarteners and ties in with their social studies unit titled, All About Me, where they gain knowledge of individual development and study basic external body parts. I read the silly book, Head, Body, Legs: A story from Liberia by Won-ldy Paye & Margaret H. Lippert, which is about a disembodied head that can't get cherries or mangoes from the trees unless it cooperates with the rest of the body parts. It finds arms, legs, and body and they work together to get the food they want to eat. I have done this lesson in the past using cutout butcher block paper and magnets and decided to try the Epson Brightlink. The kids loved it. All of the students were able to manipulate the pen pretty smoothly. One boy had a temper tantrum because he didn't want to wait for his turn. When head cooperates in the story he says "This is perfect." One class picked up on that and when they finished their picture they said, "This is perfect." Attached is a video showing the students manipulating the pen.

Standards Accomplished in This Unit

Library Standard 3: The student who is information literate uses information accurately and creatively.

3.3 Communicates and synthesizes ideas in logical and creative or novel ways.

3.3.2 Presents information that visually conveys the main idea and supporting details about a topic.

ISTE.NETS Standard 1: Facilitate and Inspire Student Learning and Creativity

Social Studies: Individual Development and Identity

ISoc4B3: c. describe the unique features of one's nuclear and extended families

Integrated Unit: All About Me – Students learn how they are special and unique.

Reader's Theater

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wui_Q44YVVs[/youtube]Grade 3 performed a reader's theater of the book, Chester's Masterpiece, by Melanie Watt. The story involves the author leaving sticky notes to the character in the book which ties in with reading strategies being taught in the classroom. I used the document reader with Avermedia software on my computer to project the book onto the wall using the Epson Brightlink projector. Students read one page of the book using the microphone from a portable speaker. Props of the author, Chester, and Rat were used as they spoke their parts. Only one of the five classes stayed focused until the end. The words were a little too hard and the lesson was a little too long. Next year I will do this lesson in the springtime when students are better readers.

I had problems with the document reader freezing. The document reader is old and the software is new so I think it is just a compatibility issue but I'm not sure. Anyone had this problem?  I attached a video. In the beginning the girl is struggling with holding the script, prop, and microphone. I told her to put the pages on the chair but she forgot. Other students would mix up the pages or drop them. I put the pages in a three-ring binder and set it on the chair and that seemed to correct the problem. I also moved the videotographer by the speaker and the sound is better in the following person on the video. I had the students' who have problems focusing run the video and flip the pages of the book.

Harold and the Purple Crayon

Kindergarteners remind me of bobbleheads.

Watch the 7 second video of a bubbly boy who is so excited for his turn to use the interactive whiteboard. He is third in line which is why the girl next to him says "no."  

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XZY1tN3ycj4[/youtube] 

I created a lesson around the book, A Picture for Harold’s Room, by Crockett Johnson.  Through a PTA grant, I received the Epson Brightlink Interactive Whiteboard in our library. It is like a Smartboard except it uses any surface to project an image. In addition, the screen size can be adjusted which gives me more flexibility with height. For this lesson I scanned all the pages of the book and put them in a PowerPoint.  I read the pages and the students followed along with what was happening in the story by using the white interactive pen to draw in purple. For instance, one student would draw the purple line, another student would draw a house, etc. Each student received a turn with the "purple crayon."

This lesson aids students with comprehension strategies such as sequencing and story retelling. It addresses different learning styles by hearing the story (auditory), seeing the pages projected on the screen (visual) and using the pen to draw what is happening with the story on each page (kinesthetic). At the end of the lesson, students made up their own “purple crayon” stories.

According to Bloom’s taxonomy for digital citizens the lesson moves students to a higher order of thinking that involves creating. In addition, the lesson reinforces what students are doing in Readers Workshop which is story sequencing and retelling. I put together a short video showing the students retelling the story, making up new stories, and figuring out how to use the interactive pen. [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UmcrbQ6w9fM[/youtube]

There's a video on YouTube of the story that is good but when I showed it first in the lesson to students it made the lesson too long. The students got restless.