Big news at the American Library Association MidWinter Conference yesterday–Chris Raschka’s A Ball for Daisy won the Caldecott Medal for Most Distinguished Picture Book.    Looks like I’ll be placing an order for it soon!

This week in all classes we read the true story of Ella Kate Ewing.  Ella Kate was born in 1872 and by age 7 showed signs of gigantism.  She continued to grow until age 22 at which time she stood 8 ft. 4 in. tall!

We’ve had good discussions about the challenges that this condition brought about and we’ve had fun looking at some “actual size” mock-ups of her dresser, her shoe, and her glove.

The book is very well written, and a tribute to a young woman who made the best of a tough situation.  She embraced her gigantism as a way to achieve financial independence by working and touring with the circus, with the World’s Fair, etc.  At a time when many women didn’t own much themselves and rarely left their home town,  Ella owned her own house with custom-built furniture and she traveled all over the United States.

Before too long our third graders will read and discuss biographies during literacy time and perhaps do some research about a famous person.  To introduce them to a wide range of some of the most interesting biographies in our collection I planned a booktalk for this week’s lesson.  It included books about inventors, explorers, artists, athletes, etc.

To make the elements of a biography a bit more memorable I borrowed an idea from super-librarian and children’s literature expert Judy Freeman and we made…Biography Stew.  (sort of)

Using images of ingredients such as raisins, Cheerios, Goldfish crackers, nuts, etc. we talked about how biographies often include:

• something about the person’s childhood (Alpha-bits cereal–because we learn our ABCs as children)
• something about their education (Goldfish–because fish are part of schools)
• something about the person’s accomplishments (Cheerios–to cheer for them)

Many thanks to all who stopped by and did some shopping at our book fair last week. We hope you enjoyed it and got some great reads. Thanks, too, to Wendee Pringle and Nicki Stevens for pitching in the night of our evening shopping hours. And of course, a huge thank you to two (unnamed–I’ll never tell!) staff members who posed as Geronimo Stilton to stir up some excitement.

In addition to the shopping hours below we’re also offering an online component for the fair which will extend beyond the dates below.  So if you forgot something or couldn’t make it to the fair itself you can still participate.

Proceeds from the fair allow for visiting authors/illustrators, storytellers, books and equipment outside the regular budget.  Thanks in advance for your support!

Shopping hours (TUES/WED/THURS)

11-29 – 7:30 A.M. TO 3:30P.M. AND 6:00  TO 7:30 P.M.
11/30 - 7:30 A.M. TO 11:00 A.M.
12/1 –    7:30 A.M. TO 11:00 A.M.

View the Book Fair homepage here!  See samples of some of the books!

We’ll talk about what a catalog is, show the basic “anatomy” of the site, practice with a broad search (and then narrow it down), and practice recording the all-important call number (we call it “the code” for fun) for an adult to use to locate the desired book.

This worked extremely well last year and it helps our students become a bit more independent as library patrons.

If you want to see the catalog for yourself and have your child “show off” you can access it from the Hiawatha homepage or here.

Soon we’ll know which colors we have enough of and we’ll let you all know what NOT to send in anymore.

For the past few weeks, I’ve been introducing first graders to some series books.  Books like George and Martha, Mr. Putter and Tabby, Minnie and Moo, Morris and Boris, Henry and Mudge, etc. are perfect because they reinforce so much of what the first few months of first grade are all about–friendship!  These books appeal because children can see themselves in the books, they’re often funny, AND they have a chapter book format for that “big kid” feel.  Once you turn a child on to a series they can rely on its predictability as an aid in reading, since they know how that particular series “works.”  A winning combination all around!