Happy Thanksgiving

In honor of the fall season and Thanksgiving, an art project from Mrs. Facendini’s first grade class.

Buzz Boy and Fly Guy by Tedd Arnold

The holidays and major gift giving time is upon us. For the next few weeks we will be featuring book reviews by kids on the books they like. Our first review is by Zach a second-grader at Yulupa School. He reviewed Buzz Boy and Fly Guy by Tedd Arnold. No, I am not Tedd Arnold’s publicist; this second post about a Fly Guy book just shows you how much both boys and girls love these books. In this book, Buzz has written a comic book called The Amazing Adventures of Buzz Boy and Fly Guy. In it he and Fly Guy are SUPERHEROS! One day Buzz wakes up and he is the same size as Fly Guy. They soon find that a pirate ship has taken their house to a dragon cave! After many adventures Buzz boy and Fly Guy save the day. Zach said he loves this book because it is funny, there is a dragon (and pirates) in it and he likes that Buzz  writes a book to share with Fly Guy.

Zach’s picture shows Buzz reading his book to Fly Guy. Thanks, Zach for a great morning.

You can read what Tedd Arnold says about this book here.

Treasures

The third story in book 2 is On The Map. Where do you live? What is your neighborhood like? The sight words are live, place, many and out. Here is the link to the spelling and vocabulary activities On The MAP.

New York Times Special Children’s Book Review Section

The New York Times publishes a special children’s book review section every November.  It was published today and can be accessed online at NYT Children's Book Reviews.  Because of the ages of three of my grandsons, I was especially interested in the review of three books under the title of Picture Books About Boys With Heroic Alter Egos. Roger Sutton reviews The Astonishing Secret of Awesome Man by Michael Chabon, The Amazing Adventures of Bumblebee Boy by David Soman and Jacky Davis and Superhero Joe by Jacqueline Preiss Weitzman. All three authors have written proven kid favorites. Chabon wrote The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay which about ten years ago was a favorite of my oldest grandson .  Bumblebee Boy was a character in Soman and Davis’s Ladybug Girl series. Weitzman earlier book was You Can’t take a Balloon into The Metropolitan Museum. One or more of these Superhero books might be just the one for your child.

Sight Word Games and Activities

Play  Some         Sight words are the words used most frequently in written language. Some like “play” can be sounded out using phonics but others like “some” must be memorized because they do not obey the phonics’ rules. Each week your first grader is given a short list of sight words to memorize. The more words your child knows by sight, the better reader he or she will be. The Educator’s Spin On It blog has some great ideas to help you help your child learn  sight words: Sight word games and activities

Technorati Tags: First Grade

Why Books? The Zena Sutherland Lecture

 

Mo Willems is the author of the Caldecott Honor’s Book Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus and a few dozen other children’s books. On May 5, 2011 he delivered the Zena Sutherland Lecture at the Chicago Public Library titled Why Books? This article from Horn Books is an adaptation of the lecture.

Last week I was having a conversation about exactly this topic with my son who has two young children. I think you’ll find the definitive answer to that question in this article.

Hat Tip to Imagination Soup

Technorati Tags: Authors