All in a day's work...

From sunrise to sunset and beyond, this was a full day if I ever had one.

World Feast

Mrs. Yager's third graders have been working for weeks in preparation for our World Feast on Tuesday night.  They have researched and taken notes on a country using Culturegrams, Britannica, World Book and print books.  This week I am interviewing them as an 8 year old from that country in the library and in the classroom they are designing displays with information and pictures.  At home they are working with their parents in finding a food to share from their country.  I love this project!

Gala Kickoff

In less than two months, Caldecott medalist Matthew Cordell, will be walking through our Castleton Elementary hallways. What?!  I still can't believe it's happening!  It is very unlike me to do the same project two years in a row but we are.  It's our #PictureAPoem Gala collaboration between fifth grade ELA, art and library.  Today we kicked it off by talking about how illustrators and authors don't usually get together to discuss the book and how our students will be illustrating someone else's poem for our gala in May.  I collected poems without names on them. Tomorrow they will "shop" for a poem that speaks to them written by a student from a different class.  It will be glued into their sketchbook and the rest of the work will be completed in art. Mark your calendars--May 9 will be here before you know it! I can only hope we don't have to worry about the threat of snow then.

Pi Day

I love this day, 3.14...probably because it's an excuse to throw a party in the library, a place of many numbers.  And boy did we party.  Between PI cookies, pie, cookies and more, it was quite the dessert feast.  We did watch the Brainpop video on "Pi" and started a 3.14 scavenger hunt.  One thing I learned today:  I want to visit Garden City, Georgia.  They are home to the PI zip code.

Book Exchanges

Sadly, I don't have a library assistant and haven't for many years.  But I more than manage with my three grandmother volunteers.  Until one of them goes on vacation or calls in sick.  That's what happened today.  Fortunately, teachers are flexible and classes came in when I was able to help them. I do love book exchange.  I love when kids find books by people we love.

Note: Both of these books are illustrated by Matt Cordell!

The Wild Robot Escapes

My third grade book WILD ROBOT group is chomping at the bit to begin a part II book group with the sequel.  Arletta and I preordered the book so we are READY!  Of course, I already have three books going on right now and adding a fourth might send me a little over the edge...

ReadOver/SleepOver Prep

Second and third graders were invited to sleep over at school Friday night.  FUN!  I got involved in this PTO event a few years ago and now invite an author or illustrator to be a part of it. No, they don't (and neither do I) have to sleep over.  This year we are doing a Jigsaw Jones mystery themed evening starring our own local author, James Preller.  Dewey Duty and Reading Ambassadors began working on welcome signs for Jimmy this morning.  

Here's Mrs. Charsky checking out a Jigsaw Jones book to read aloud to her class.

NYLA Conference Call

Wait? What?  This was a fun sight to see.  I promise I was listening, just multitasking.  I carried my phone around with me in the library as I picked up to get ready to go and listened in on our Continuing Education Committee meeting call.  Don't worry! It was on mute when the custodian asked me if there was any pie left.

Music in Our Schools

This is a national month celebration, right?  Anyway, our whole community comes out for an evening of performances by students from the elementary school, middle school and high school.  We had second graders singing, middle schoolers rockin' out and high schoolers jammin'.  It really was awesome.  Yes, I had two performers in it but I did say more than once, you'll see me there in 2025 when I don't anymore.  But that's getting just a little ahead of myself...

When the day was happening, I didn't think I would ever get horizontal tonight.  But finally I see the light (or the dark if you want to be literal).  All in all, a great day with so much going on. This isn't even all of it!  Looking forward to see what tomorrow brings...

Relationships, Stephen Savage, and Twitter! Oh my!

A few weeks ago I attended a Binghamton University (SUNY-Binghamton when I was there) alumni event.  The school is trying to relaunch the club since 3000 alumni live here in the Albany area.  I was curious, especially since my daughter is a rising HS sophomore, and went with my cousin, class of '08.  There was a guy from the class of '77, me (class of '91), a guy from '98 and then more people from the 2000's and later.  I spent the most amount of time chatting with Rodell, '16. Rodell was there alone and had been living and working in Albany since November.  Maybe he came to make friends? Network? See old friends? Find a date?  Whatever it was, I was impressed.  An elementary school librarian may not be the person he was hoping of meeting that night and I might not be the most helpful in his engineering career but it did get me thinking about...

...relationships.  Personal connections and relationships.  I don't doubt we live in a world of high tech, instant contact, social media explosions, however, it got me thinking that when those tools are used wisely and with heart, you can move mountains. Or at least make a difference in the lives of some kids.

It's been a long time since I blogged.  June seems to have come and gone in a flash.  Now it is the end and summer has finally begun.  This summer not only am I hoping to read a #bookaday (chapter books, if possible) but to blog more (daily may be impossible), run so I can enjoy my sweets and lattes and forge more personal relationships with book creators.

My last of seven illustrator/author visits of the year was with, I think I can now confidently say, my friend, Stephen Savage. And even though we had Skyped a few months earlier, I believe that friendship became solidified with a tweet that got his school visit rolling:

From that one tweet, Rachel Person from the Northshire Bookstore, sent out an email and five months later Steve was walking my red carpet runway celebrating the book birthday of Little Plane Learns to Write. So, I will never knock social media but I will say, during that time he and I actually chatted on the phone twice, sent many emails back and forth to each other and I convinced him to have "dinner at Doe's" the night before his visit so we could form a 20th century friendship beyond social media.

Here are some snapshots from our great day with Steve. 
BTW--friend or foe, I highly recommend him for a school visit. Start knocking at his door today like I did...

Welcoming Steve the night before at Dinner at Doe's (far left)

Skywriting Like Little Plane at the Reading Ambassador Breakfast Little Plane Birthday Party

 

With the fifth grade Reading Ambassadors

Assemblies

 

More Birthday Celebrating with Dewey Duty Helpers

Flying out (and leaping) on our Runway

Until next time--Looking forward to you landing and leaping in Castleton again soon!

Thanks to Northshire Bookstore in Saratoga Spring, NY and Macmillian for making this possible.  Saratoga is a great place to visit and the bookstore is a lovely spot right there on Broadway.  What a great way to end our school year!

Endnote:

I have to throw this in here while we are talking about the positive power of social media.  Here's another friendship that was forged, again, just from one tweet on August 14, 2014:

Happy Pi/Pie Day!

Is that an amazing smorgasbord or what, just to celebrate Pi Day?!  What a fun afternoon we had!  And the pizza isn't even on the table.  Apple pie, pi cookies, mini-pies with Pi s on them, key lime pie (baked by my son!), brownies and circle shaped York Peppermint Patty's and even sphere shaped dum-dums.  

The first activity we did was a scavenger hunt around the library with Mrs. Pryde's first graders and the 4th grade Dewey Duty kids.  The Dewey kids drew the pies last week and Mrs. Warland glued them on poster board, drew the Pi on them, cut them into 8ths and then hid them all around the library.  We had a pizza (above), pumpkin (below) and apple to find and put together.  It was fun!

It was great watching the 1st and 4th graders work together.  Teamwork makes the dream work, right?!

When the 4th graders left for lunch, the 5th graders came in.  They had a way different task and activity--Make a chain with as many digits of pi as they can.  See the white paper on the table?  That has 100 digits of pi.  The colored pieces of paper have numbers written on them.  This was fun! Thanks to Mrs. Balogh, our math coach, for helping us out with this project and of course, cutting all the number strips!

He couldn't believe that the chain was longer than he was!

Finally, to wrap up the whole celebration, Mr. Reischer's class came in and read from Sarah Weeks's Pie Reader's Theatre. It was probably a little over the first graders' heads but we talked about it a little in their terms and encouraged them to read the book with their families.  

All in all, it was such a fun event!  I loved including Dewey Duty and Mrs. Pryde's students.  I couldn't have done it without Mrs. Warland, Mrs. Balogh, Mrs. Pryde, Mr. Reischer and the parents that sent in treats.  Such a collaborative effort!  Happy 3.14 Day!