Favorite Books of 2018

At the end of each year, it's fun to look back at your reading journey to reflect on your favorite books of the year.  I use Goodreads to set reading goals, create lists of books to read, and keep track of the books that I've read.  In 2018, my goal was to read 70 books (not including picture books) and I crushed it by reading 94 books! 

Here are my favorite middle grade books read in 2018 (in no particular order).

The Remarkable Journey of Coyote Sunrise by Dan Gemeinhart

The Remarkable Journey of Coyote Sunrise is an amazing book full of interesting and diverse characters, adventure, beautiful language, words of wisdom, and heart. Coyote and her dad, Rodeo, lost the rest of their family to an accident five years ago and the two have been on the road in their school bus-home ever since. For Rodeo, looking back is too painful. When Coyote receives news that an important link to her mom and sisters back in their hometown is about to be lost forever, she’s in a race against time to get her dad to drive them across the country before it’s too late. The thing is, she has to do it without Rodeo knowing they are headed back to their hometown because going back there has always been a no-go for him. 

Similar to Joseph in Some Kind of Courage (also by Dan Gemeinhart), I love how Coyote and Rodeo show compassion and generosity throughout the book by helping others along the way. Dan Gemeinhart is such a good storyteller. His characters are interesting, the story moves quickly, and the language is rich. This book is full of happiness, sadness, love, courage, and hope and is now one of my all-time favorite books! Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing an ebook copy of the ARC. I can’t wait to share this book with my students when it comes out in January, 2019!

The Benefits of Being an Octopus by Ann Braden

The Benefits of Being an Octopus is a powerful book about poverty, abuse, and the influence that one caring teacher can have on her student! Zoey (seventh grader) struggles to balance taking care of her younger siblings with school and other life demands while also witnessing her mom struggle with an abusive relationship.  When a caring teacher decides to take Zoey under her wing and convinces her to be on the debate team, Zoey begins to look at her life in a new way and becomes empowered with the skills that she needs to make positive changes in her family situation.  This is such a well-written book and I couldn't put it down.

A Boy Called Bat by Elana K. Arnold

I loved Bat and his view of the world! Bat, a sweet boy who is on the autism spectrum, sets out to convince his veterinarian mom that he's up to the challenge of taking care of a baby skunk who needs rehabilitation. We’ve all had students like Bat and this story would make a great read aloud. I’m so glad it was chosen as a Global Read Aloud book and I look forward to reading more in the series!

Lily and Dunkin by Donna Gephart

I LOVED this beautifully written book. This story has the power to open the eyes of readers to become more understanding and empathetic of those who are different. It also provides representation to middle grade readers who are transgender and those who have a mental illness.  Lily struggles with bullies in school as she transitions from boy to girl while new student, Dunkin, struggles with the secret that he is bipolar.  As their paths keep meeting, an unlikely friendship and bond emerges. While tough issues such as acceptance and bullying are presented, they are handled in a way that is hopeful and also in a way that is anchored with positive relationships (through friends and loved ones in the story).

Good Dog by Dan Gemeinhart

I love Dan Gemeinhart’s other books and this one was just as good. Recently deceased Brodie, the dog, can’t "move on" until he knows that his boy back at home is safe.  In order to do this, he must find a way back to the boy again. Along the way to finding his boy, Brodie and his dog companions face many challenges. However, Brodie continually shows what it means to be a good friend and a good soul. This book has lots of action, danger, and sadness but it is also full of hope and love (and plenty of positive messages).

Amal Unbound by Aisha Saeed

Amal Unbound is a beautiful story about gender inequality, class, resistance, and hope.  Amal loves school and dreams of one day becoming a teacher.  When she's forced to stay home from school to take care of her siblings because she's the oldest daughter, she finds ways to continue learning.  Then, one day, she has an unfortunate encounter with the son of the influential and corrupt landlord and she is forced to become his servant to work off a seemingly insurmountable debt.  I love how Amal never stops fighting for her freedom and works to help others in her community.  

Ellie May on Presidents' Day by Hillary Homzie

Ellie May on President’s Day is a delightful story about a spirited girl who tries really hard to do the right things and impress her teacher in hopes that she will be chosen to be the flag holder. Unfortunately, her misunderstood actions often get her into trouble and she becomes sure that she won’t be picked. In the end, she learns the importance of honesty, but will it be too late? Ellie May is a likable character that children will relate to. The short chapters and frequent illustrations combine to make this an easy chapter book for younger readers. Diverse characters, facts about presidents, humor, and lots of teachable lessons make Ellie May on President’s Day the perfect read aloud. I’m looking forward to reading more Ellie May books in the series and sharing them with my students!  Thank you, Hillary Homzie, for the opportunity to read an ARC of this book!

Knockout by K.A. Holt

Great stand-alone sequel to House Arrest! Levi just wants to be a normal 7th grader but his family still treats him like the sick, preemie baby he used to be. When dad suggests he try playing a sport (not something mom would approve of), Levi picks the least likely sport and surprises everyone, including himself. I found myself rooting for Levi the whole way! Free verse is my favorite and the shape poems added interest. Excellent!

When Friendship Followed Me Home by Paul Griffin

When Friendship Followed Me Home is a beautifully written story! This book is about the power of friendship, being there for others in a time of need, and how one chance encounter can alter things forever. Ben and Halley show us how to handle what life gives us with grace and a positive attitude. This story will stay with me for a long time!

Mighty Jack by Ben Hatke

Mighty Jack is a fun, action-packed graphic novel loosely based on Jack and the Beanstalk!  Jack is not looking forward to a boring summer filled with watching his little sister Maddy while his mom works.  One day while at a flea market, Maddy, who almost never speaks, convinces Jack to trade his mother's car for some mysterious seeds.  Soon, the seeds grow into a magical and dangerous forest that provide Jack, Maddy, and neighbor Lily with a summer full of adventure.  Ben Hatke's illustrations are gorgeous, the characters are endearing, and this fantasy story is so much fun!

Honorable mentions:
     

What were your favorite books of 2018?

Week of December 17th

Battle of the Books!

This week, we kicked off our Battle of the Books program with our kick-off assemblies!  We will have three Battle of the Books levels this year: third grade, fourth/fifth grade, sixth-eighth grade.  



At our kick-off assemblies, we introduced the books for the year through booktalks and book trailers and explained the program to our students.  For our 6-8th grade kick-off, we tried something new.  Instead of simply booktalking the books, we played a Kahoot game and the students loved it!  We created ten-word summaries, emoji summaries, or summary tweets of each book and then students had to guess which book the summary was for.

New this year, we now have many of the books available as ebooks and audiobooks.  Here is a video that explains how to access the books.

It's so exciting to see so many students already reading the books!  Several students have told me that they already finished one of the books and I think we will have an awesome Battle of the Books year!!


Holiday Makerspace

After checking out books this week, students were able to participate in a variety of different holiday makerspace activities.  Students made holiday bookmarks, created Christmas cards to give to others, and folded fortune tellers that told "kindness" fortunes.  One of the most popular activities was coding on the iPads.  Students explored the Grinch Hour of Code and Google's Santa Tracker Code Lab.  Both were easy to use and worked great on the iPads.

Rubik's Cubes

For the past six weeks, we borrowed a set of 50 Rubik's Cubes from You Can Do the Cube.  Students had so much fun solving one side of the cube to complete various mosaics!

The final week, we challenged students to try to learn how to solve the entire Rubik's Cube.  Junior high students were invited to come to the library during their recess and Miss Mueller and I showed them how to do it.  Several students were able to solve it and they were SO excited!  We returned all 50 solved and were placed in a drawing to win a set to keep.  Fingers crossed!!

Happy Holidays and Happy Reading!

Post from Student Teacher

Hi! I’m Miss Mueller and I have been a student teacher at Harrison in the school library for the last six weeks.



It’s been an awesome experience and I’ve learned a lot these last six weeks. Student teaching at Harrison has given me so many great hands-on experiences. I’ve gotten to teach and design my own lesson plans, learn how to solve a Rubix Cube, and build relationships with students. One of the many units we have been working on in the library is an author study on Candace Fleming to prepare our students to meet her in January.


Candace Fleming is a great author, with books for all students at Harrison. She writes picture books, fiction, chapter books, and non-fiction books. With the PreK and Kindergarten students, we read Muncha Muncha Muncha and Tippi Tippi Hide, two classics that the younger students enjoyed. We’ve also read Oh No! which is a fun story about a dastardly tiger that’s trying to eat a motley crew of jungle animals. With the 3rd and 4th grade students we read the Amazing Collection of Joey Cornell. This is a true story about an artist who creates art by collecting and arranging things that he finds interesting. The 3rd and 4th graders then made their own digital collection by creating a collage though Pic Edu. Students loved this activity and realized that art isn’t just drawing and painting, but also can be made through found objects.




With the 1st-4th graders, we dove deep into one of my favorite Candace Fleming books, Giant Squid. This book is about the mysterious giant sea creature that lurks at the bottom of the ocean. The students listened to the books and then went to research more about this amazing animal. Students used Pebble Go and Britannica School to find out more information about the giant squid and then took this information to turn it into a talking puppet through Chatter Pics. Students drew their own giant squid and then used Chatter Pics to record themselves retelling their fact. The students had a lot of fun making their giant squid drawings ‘talk’, and gained skills in research and retelling.




My time at Harrison has been an amazing experience, with amazing students and staff to help guide me along the way. Student teaching here showed me that I’m about to enter into the best job in the world. What could be better than sharing the love of reading and information with students?

Using Flipgrid to Teach Nonfiction Text Features

The past couple of weeks, we have been working on learning nonfiction text features with third grade students in the library.  This isn't the most exciting topic and I wanted to find a way to make it interactive and engaging.  Flipgrid is the perfect tool for this!

After a brief introduction to four different nonfiction text features (headings, table of contents, keywords, and captions), students were paired up and visited four different stations.  At each station, they were given the task of finding one of the text features that we talked about in one of the library books. 

After finding the text feature, they recorded a short video on Flipgrid showing an example of the text feature and how that feature helps the reader.  Students really enjoyed telling about the different features and the videos are a great way for me to assess what they learned.

This week, we added four new text features (fact box, glossary, diagram, and timeline) and repeated the process.  Next week, we will finish with the last four text features.  I found the text features posters on TpT.


Bernie's Book Bank

Harrison School is so lucky to be partnered with Bernie's Book Bank this year!  Bernie's Book Bank provides local PK-6th grade students with bags of six new and gently used books to keep forever!  This week, our first delivery of books arrived and we passed them out to our students.  After getting their bags of books, students had an opportunity to trade books with other students if they wanted.  They were so excited to get their new books and it was so much fun to watch!!

What a great program that gets books into the homes of students who might not otherwise own many books.  Thank you Bernie's Book Bank!!

Happy Reading!

Growth Mindset and Kindness!

After the Fall by Dan Santat

This year, our school is really focusing on helping our students develop a Growth Mindset.  There are several books on the 2019 Monarch Award list that are perfect to use as mentor texts for this.  One of the books on the list, and one of my favorite picture books ever, is After the Fall: How Humpty Dumpty Got Back Up Again by Dan Santat.



In this book, Humpty's body is put back together after his fall but now he is afraid of heights.  Since Humpty normally loves being up high and close to the birds, his fear of heights is getting in the way of the things that he loves.  Eventually, something happens that forces him to face his fears and he learns to soar!

After reading and discussing this amazing book with students in grades K-3, I asked students to tell about a time that they overcame their fears to do something that they wanted to do.  Here are a few of our kindergarten responses:

This was such a great book and activity for promoting a growth mindset!

Kindness Counter

This week, I opened a new center for students to visit...our Kindness Counter!  I've had an empty counter in the library for over a year now and I finally found the perfect use for it.  Students can visit the Kindness Counter after they check out books or during makerspace time.  At the counter, students can create inspirational bookmarks to hide inside books in our library,  They can write thank you notes and other cards to give to others.  Students can create awards to give to another student, or teacher, who is deserving of one.  Finally, students are free to create anything else that their imaginations can think of to spread kindness throughout our school.  

This new center has already been very popular and I can't wait to see what students will create!

Happy Reading!

Inquiry-Based Research: 1st Grade

Bugs, Bugs, Bugs!!

We recently finished a guided inquiry research project in first grade and the students did an amazing job!!  Early in the school year, many of our first graders are still not able to read or write very much.   However, I wanted to have them practice using PebbleGo as well as begin learning research skills such as using resources to answer research questions, learning text features, and sharing what they learn.  As we know, students learn more when the learning is student-driven, so I developed a unit that allows even young students to drive their own learning.

I began by asking students what they know about bugs and reading the book Some Bugs by Angela DiTerlizzi.  This simple book shows the many different ways bugs move and act.  The pictures are stunning and I really played up all of the different concepts presented in the book!  After reading the book, I asked the students what they are curious about with bugs.  What did they want to learn about bugs?  We brainstormed a list of questions on the Smartboard and I told students they would be researchers the next time they came to the library.  Each student chose one of the insects on PebbleGo that they wanted to learn more about.

On day two, students were paired up with another student interested in researching the same bug and were given a graphic organizer to write down their research.  The questions on the graphic organizer were the same ones that we came up with as a group so they were driven by the students (and I used pictures to help those not able to read the words yet).  Students used PebbleGo and either wrote words or drew pictures to record their information.

On the third day we were ready for students to share what they learned.  I created a Flipgrid board and students recorded short videos sharing the information on their graphic organizer.  Of course, I first modeled what a recording should look and sound like.  

Finally, on the last day students watched each other's videos to learn what their classmates shared.

This short unit was the perfect way to introduce research skills to young first graders while using a guided inquiry model.  Students were so engaged during the unit!  This is definitely a lesson I will repeat again in future years.

Happy Researching!