Month: November 2015

Posted in Uncategorized

BOOK FAIR IS COMING THIS WEEK!!!

Posted on by lisafairbanksrossi

To get excited about the books available at the upcoming Colbert Book Fair, (starting this Monday, November 23, and continuing after Thanksgiving Break, thanks to the advocacy of PTO president Tami Dillon and the generosity of Scholastic, to give our families more time to shop..the five days without power put all things like this on hold! So now that we (hopefully?)  all have power, Please take time to watch these wonderful book trailers presented by the authors and illustrators themselves!

http://www.scholastic.com/bookfairs/books/book-trailers

Also, please watch this beautiful little film that talks about the vital opportunities for reading and development that are made available by book fairs, Feel good about purchase you make, and the contribution they are to your children’s lifelong relationship with reading.

https://www.facebook.com/ScholasticBookFairs/videos/10152888378215522/?video_source=pages_finch_trailer
There will also be a chance to donate books to Colbert families who may not be able to spare as much extra funding.. in keeping with this fair’s theme “MONSTERS” you’ll be able to place the gifted books into the mouth of a “book eating monster”

betha
Ok well this is how Bertha the book eater looked on my daughter’s head. She will look different attached to whichever mechanism her body will be. 🙂

 

Posted in traditional topics, non-traditional teaching

Old media and new media!!

Posted on by lisafairbanksrossi

I loved this week of further developing our writing in the “spooky” stories we started last week. And without my telling him, a fourth grader went and grabbed a dictionary both for word meanings and spelling! I can not tell you the levels of joy this brought me! And third graders going through frustrating learning curves (really?! Three capcha codes!?) to access their gmail accounts and write me notes!? They were so proud.

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Continue reading “Old media and new media!!” →

Posted in Awesome Apps, Best Books, traditional topics, non-traditional teaching, writing

On Creating a Creepy “Voice”

Posted on by lisafairbanksrossi

This Halloween week was about scary stories: both reading them and writing them. We (4-6th graders) used Storybird (www.storybird.com) and searched “creepy” artwork, then started writing! Here’s a quick synopsis via “book trailer” of “The Graveyard Book” narrated by Author Neil Gaiman (also author of “Coraline”):

https://youtu.be/P_UUVwTaemk

Also, here’s a link to an excerpt I read from the first chapter of “The Graveyard Book.” http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/15/books/chapters/chapter-graveyard-book.html?_r=0I

I read it with a flashlight under my face and played creepy music. Then we wrote!!

Here’s our targets by the end of the next two weeks which I have slated for the young Stephen Kings to complete their projects:

I can … use a variety of technology tools to organize and present data and information.

I can … create an original response to a writing prompt and establish a tone appropriate to the task.
Check out the book (the real physical copy; all the Mead elementary schools should have it! And read it with a flashlight under your chin!photo 3photo 2(P.S. Grade 3 classes did a screen-time study after a reading of Goodnight Ipad and first and second graders worked on National Geographic Online–the Halloween games section 🙂