New Authors in the Library
I'm
so excited! I have authors in my library. My first graders created an animal
fact book while the second graders created their own collective biography. I
have been trying to find fun ways to integrate Common Core Standards into the
library. I decided that one way to
accomplish this was for my students in K – 2 to write their own book (with
guidance of course!). This way I could cover a lot of standards with one
activity. It took us the entire nine week grading period to collect pages for
our book. I fixed a file folder for each student to keep their work
organized. I quickly figured out I’m not ready my Kindergarten to create a book.
I’ll try again with them a little later.
I started out with writing templates I found on TPT.
For the 1st graders I used Casey Lewis’s template from Kindergarten Korner. My second graders used this template I got from
Listen and Achieve. Each time they came to
library we read about a different animal or person. Then we talked about
“facts” not opinions about the animal/person. Then we created sentences about the topic. I picked animals/people that I
thought they might have misconceptions about or correlated with what they were
learning in the classroom. (Ooooo I snuck some teacher collaboration in there!)
Topics varied anything from trap-door spiders and cicadas to Florence
Nightingale and Christopher Columbus.
I
created a basic Title page and Table of Contents page for the students to
complete. It was very simple. If you want a copy, email me and I’ll be happy to
forward it to you. (As soon as I learn how to load documents into this blog,
I’ll start posting any handouts I create.) We ran out of time so I filled out
their table of contents for them.
We
used construction paper for front and back covers. Students picked their
favorite color or two. The lightest was used for the front. Then the students
assembled their books. I wanted to sew the pages together but with time constraints
I ended up stapling the pages together. The duck tape covered the staples and
made their books colorful. The students and their teachers loved the books. I
hope the parents get a big kick out of their child’s creation. It was so
exciting to see the students’ writing improve over the nine weeks.
I'm so proud of them. Have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
I'm
so excited! I have authors in my library. My first graders created an animal
fact book while the second graders created their own collective biography. I
have been trying to find fun ways to integrate Common Core Standards into the
library. I decided that one way to
accomplish this was for my students in K – 2 to write their own book (with
guidance of course!). This way I could cover a lot of standards with one
activity. It took us the entire nine week grading period to collect pages for
our book. I fixed a file folder for each student to keep their work
organized. I quickly figured out I’m not ready my Kindergarten to create a book.
I’ll try again with them a little later. 
I started out with writing templates I found on TPT.
For the 1st graders I used Casey Lewis’s template from Kindergarten Korner. My second graders used this template I got from
Listen and Achieve. Each time they came to
library we read about a different animal or person. Then we talked about
“facts” not opinions about the animal/person. Then we created sentences about the topic. I picked animals/people that I
thought they might have misconceptions about or correlated with what they were
learning in the classroom. (Ooooo I snuck some teacher collaboration in there!)
Topics varied anything from trap-door spiders and cicadas to Florence
Nightingale and Christopher Columbus. 
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