November 1, 2018 by plemmonsa

Happy Picture Book Month 2018

It’s November 1, which means the beginning of picture book month. We’ve been celebrating this special month since it was created back in 2011 by Dianne de Las Casas. Today, we launched our annual picture book challenge. The challenge has been a bit different each year. Some years, students have earned stamps for reading a certain number of picture books. Other years, students have set their own personal goals for what to read whether it was reading a certain number, all the books by a specific author, every book on a certain shelf, etc.

This year, I decided to focus on the genres of our picture book section. I made a sheet that lists out each picture book genre/format in our library with a check box by each one. I also included a line. The goal is for students to read 12 picture books across the month of November, 1 book from each section. They simply write the title of the book on the line when they finish reading. At the bottom of the sheet, I asked students to list their favorite book they read for the challenge and tell why picture books matter in the world.

At the end of picture book month, we hold a picture book smackdown where we do a virtual hangout with authors and schools to book talk favorite picture books. I hope that the challenge will get some students prepped for the smackdown by already having a favorite book and a reason picture books matter.

Today, we launched the challenge on our morning broadcast by going over the instructions and showing the sheet. I’m also highlighting a diverse selection of books in my read alouds and encouraging students to think about windows and mirrors as they read for the challenge.Every student who finishes the challenge will get a certificate and a special bookmark. We will also announce their name on our morning broadcast. Each finisher will also have their name entered into a drawing for an autographed picture book. I try to get an extra autographed picture book each time we have an author visit or I go somewhere to hear an author. This year I’ll give away signed copies of More-igami, King Alice, Love, Last Stop on Market Street, and Hansel and Gretel. I showed each of these books on the morning broadcast too.

If you go to our school or want to take a look at our challenge sheet, you can download it here.

January 9, 2015 by plemmonsa

New Year’s Resolutions: The Barrow 2015 Reading Challenge

One of the new traditions at our school is to hold a schoolwide assembly when we come back from winter break. This assembly focuses on goal-setting. The new year is often a time to make resolutions, but in the education world it is a time to check in with the progress made in the first half of the year and think about what we strive to accomplish in the second half of the year. Last year, I invited all of our students, teachers, and families to join me in “expecting the miraculous”. We created a Flipgrid where we shared our expectations for 2014 and “expect the miraculous” because a common mantra in our school. My principal asked if I would once again share something at this assembly. I wasn’t quite sure what to share at first, so I spent some time thinking about the goals for the library that I established over the summer. One of those goals is to “support the reading habits and curiosities of students, teachers, and families. I’ve done several things so far this year to support this goal. We’ve held 2 author visits, a storybook celebration, Polar Express Day, a picture book month challenge, and a picture book smackdown. However, I feel like I haven’t done something that really encourages reading a variety of texts for students, teachers, and families.

As I was pondering, I was reminded of something in my Facebook feed about Mark Zuckerberg’s new year’s resolution. Each year he “takes on a challenge to broaden his perspective and learn something about the world beyond his work at Facebook.” This year, a crowdsourced list helped him decide on his resolution. He will choose a new book to read every other week and post about his learning on Facebook. His selections will have “an emphasis on learning about different cultures, beliefs, histories, and technologies.”

I thought this idea would make an interesting challenge for our students, teachers, and families. What if we invited students, teachers, and families to choose a reading goal for themselves? Maybe it could be something they want to learn more about. Maybe it could be about selecting books from a genre that they haven’t tried. The goal would be completely up to them.

The second piece of Zuckerberg’s goal is a frequency of reading, so I wondered what it would be like to invite students, teachers, and families to choose a number of books to read across the next 3 months of school or a goal for how often they might finish a book.

The 2015 Barrow Reading Challenge was born. I created a log that explained the challenge. I made 2 versions. One could be copied to hand out to our prek-2nd grade students who do not have 1 to 1 computers. The second version could be digitally shared with students.

Since our 3rd-5th grade students are 1 to 1, I setup a Google Classroom and sent an email to all students inviting them to join the classroom if they wanted to participate in the challenge. Once students join, I will assign the Google doc reading log to all of them so that they have their own copy to edit and turn in by April 1st.

In addition, our principal will email the digital copy of the reading log to all families on her listserv and I will copy additional paper copies to have on hand in the library.

I made a slideshow to show students, teachers, and families at our assembly. It includes slides on the story of where this challenge came from as well as the details. I hope the assembly will get the whole school excited about participating.

Along the way, I hope to spark some conversations about what we are reading within the Google Classroom as well as offer opportunities for all students, teachers, and families to talk about their reading through tools like Flipgrid, Padlet, and our library glass board.

Students and teachers have been sharing their goals for 2015. #tlchat #studentvoice pic.twitter.com/yIWja5tmpi

— Andy Plemmons (@plemmonsa) January 8, 2015

Once the challenge ends, I hope people will consider continuing their challenge through the year. There will of course be some rewards beyond accomplishing your goals. Participants who turn in a log will receive a certificate, a bookmark, and be entered into a drawing for lots of new books and anything else I can round up over the next 3 months!

Love listening to all of the goals for 2015 that our students are making public with @flipgrid http://t.co/gJ3Gt9G9Gn #tlchat #studentvoice

— Andy Plemmons (@plemmonsa) January 8, 2015

I can’t wait to see what happens. We will continue to expect the miraculous, and I hope to see lots of people join in the challenge and fun.

April 14, 2014 by plemmonsa

2014 Battle of the Books 3rd & 4th Grade

Today was our 3rd and 4th grade Battle of the Books. Students in these grades read the same 10 books. We build our battle of the books program in stages from 3rd through 5th grade. Each year, we add a few layers to the competition.

Natalie Hicks, spectrum teacher, leads our 3rd grade program. In 3rd grade, students focus on reading the books for enjoyment and working together on a team. We still hold a competition for them, but it is very low key. All teams are in the final battle. Each team gets 10 questions during the competition, but if they miss a question, the question does not get passed on to a new team. The team with the most points at the end of this small competition is named the grade level winner.

Heather Carlson, spectrum teacher, leads our 4th grade program. In 4th grade, all teams compete with one another in the final battle. However, if a team misses a question, the next team has a chance to answer the same question for a lower point value. Teams can also challenge a question if they feel that their answer was actually correct.

In 5th grade, we do the full battle of the books. We have 2 rounds of competition with all of the teams. The points from those 2 rounds are added together to decide who battles in the final battle. The final battle has 20 questions and teams can steal questions from the other team as well as challenge questions. The winning team from 5th grade moves on to the district competition. There is no district competition for 3rd and 4th grade.

Many thanks to all of the classroom teachers, families, and students who make this annual program a success. You can listen to today’s competition at the following 2 links:

Watch the 3rd grade battle

Watch the 4th grade battle

April 7, 2014 by plemmonsa

2014 Battle of the Books District Champions!

Today was our district battle of the books. Our school level champions, the Rainbow Glitter Sweet Tooths, represented Barrow at this year’s district competition.

To get to this point, this team of 5 girls has spent time since December reading and rereading the 10 books for this year’s battle. They competed against 5 other teams at the school level to become the school champions. They spent hours upon hours practicing questions at school and at home to prepare for today.

At the district competition, the 14 elementary schools all brought their winning school team to compete against one another. The girls participated in 2 rounds of 20 questions. The points in those rounds were totaled and the top 2 scores moved on to the final battle. Barrow batted against Timothy Road Elementary in the final.

The 2 final teams had 20 new questions for the final battle. It was an extremely close battle because both of these teams were strong. The questions went back and forth with Barrow and Timothy both getting almost every question correct. The points were so close, but Barrow came ahead with just a few points above Timothy. Both of these teams should be extremely proud of their hard work.

When we returned to school, the entire 5th grade lined the hallways and cheered on the team as they walked to the library for a pizza and cookie cake celebration. We are all exhausted, but very proud. The girls immediately checked out some new books in the library. They have spent so much time with the 10 battle books that they are eager to move on to many new adventures in reading.

Way to represent Barrow School Cate, Irene, Sophia, Italia, and Lauren, aka the Rainbow Glitter Sweet Tooths! We are so very proud of you.

November 15, 2012 by plemmonsa

Our Staff Recommends: A Participatory Idea for Picture Book Month

November is Picture Book Month. This is the 2nd year of the event, and we kicked things off on day one by starting a reading incentive. Students & teachers are trying to see how many picture books they can read during the month of November. To encourage their participation, each student and teacher received a sheet explaining the incentive with blanks for writing down each picture book read this month. Each grade level had their own number of books with smaller numbers for lower grades and 25 picture books for upper grades. All students who finish their sheet will receive a cool bookmark: Scaredy Squirrel, Ladybug Girl, Elephant & Pigge, Babymouse, or Duck for President. Students will also receive a certificate and be entered into a drawing to win autographed books by: Kevin Henkes, Suzanne Bloom, Eric Litwin & James Dean, and Meghan McCarthy. These incentives really inspired students because we have several sheets already turned in on this mid-way point of November.

On the Picture Book Month website, there are multiple resources for celebrating picture book month. One of the tools is a shelf talker that says, “Our Staff Recommends”. These can be displayed along a shelf for library staff to place books that they recommend to students. At first, I wanted the shelf talkers to say something besides “library staff”, but the more I thought about it the more I realized that as part of the participatory culture of our library, I really consider every person who enters our library a part of our staff. I ask students to be accountable for checking books in and out, placing books in the reshelving area, teaching other students how to use technology, etc, so why not consider everyone staff?

So….I made a quick video with iMovie and advertised to the school that anyone could put books on the shelf talkers just inside the library doors.

The shelf sat empty the first day, but it didn’t take long for people to start recommending picture books to one another. Several students have checked out books from this area and several have replaced the books that they have selected. It’s a small thing, but it gives one more opportunity for our school community to participate in our library.

Happy Picture Book Month!

March 10, 2011 by plemmonsa

Battle of the Books 2011

Congratulations to the Fantastic 5 for winning today’s school level 5th grade battle of the books competition. It was a very close match and went into a tie-breaker round, so a huge congratulations is also in order for Dumbledore’s Army who came in 2nd. The Fantastic 5 will compete against the other 13 elementary schools on April 14th.