Next week I begin a new part time job that seems like it will be a better fit for my skillset than washing dishes at Sur la Table: I’m the Reading Specialist for the Clintonville Resource Center’s Kids Clubs, their after school program. There are three sites, and I’ll spend about two hours a week at each site working to help K-5 children become better readers (and writers).
I know exactly what to do, and yet I have no idea what I’m doing.
I have no classroom to prepare, no classroom library from which to easily pull books, no real context for the work we will do or real influence outside of the bits of time we will spend together.
If it was true as a classroom teacher, it is even more true now: I have to make every minute count. Guess what I’m planning to use as short texts that are brimming with all kinds of instructional moves for students of all ages? POETRY, of course! And because poetry is often neglected in the regular classroom, that is where I hope to find my opportunity for context and influence.
Just like in the classroom, we will begin by getting to know each other. We’ll start by sharing our favorites — favorite foods, favorite things to do, favorite (and maybe not so favorite) ways to feel.
We’ll talk and read and draw and write. I’ll listen, ask, and notice. All very good places to begin, even when you think you have no idea what you’re doing.
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I worry when people think board books are only appropriate for infants and toddlers. Although they are great for that age, they are also great for older readers. I am a big fan of a laundry basket of board books for K-5 as part of the classroom library. The books I am sharing this week are fun and sturdy and great for all ages!
If you don’t know the Mathical Book Awards, then you must! It is a fabulous award “for fiction and nonfiction books that inspire children of all ages to see math in the world around them”. 1 Smile 10 Toes is one of this year’s winners and I LOVE IT!! It is an interactive board book and you can flip it around and make so many animals with different combinations of features. This can be a fun counting book for younger children, but older children can think about the many combinations and all readers can just have great fun creating new combinations! One of my favorite board books of all time!
I love this series by Sophie Beers and Love Makes a Family is one of my faves. (Change Starts with Us and Kindness Makes Us Strong are two others in the series that I love). I love this book for young children but I also think this series can be used in word study for older children. Anytime a whole book defines a single word or concept, there is lots to think about as word learners. Highly recommend this whole series! s
Our Skin: A First Conversation About Race is part of another board book series that I love–the First Conversations series. The others in the series are Yes! No!: A First Conversation About Consent and Being You! A First Conversation About Gender. These provide great anchors for good conversations around important topics. The books are done in developmentally appropriate ways with lots of access points and several opportunities to extend with conversations. There is great backmatter to support adults with having these conversations with children. Another series that is incredible for all ages.
Circle Under Berry book is fun for children and adults. Really, I don’t even know how to explain it but it is brilliant. There is so much on every page of this book–spatial concepts, colors, shapes, etc. And the whole design and concept behind the book is worth study. So much to love about this one!
I recently discovered this oversized board book-Little Cat Hide-and-Seek Emotions— that is a fun way to talk to children (of all ages) about emotions they may be feeling (and how to read those emotions when others may be feeling them.). The colors and illustrations make this book extra engaging, making it a great anchor for conversations around emotions.
This week’s books were linked at Bookelicious and/or Cover to Cover Children’s Bookstore. If you are looking for a fabulous local children’s bookstore to support, Cover to Cover is an amazing one. We are lucky to have them in Central Ohio! If you don’t have an independent children’s bookstore in your town, check out Bookelicious. They are an online independent bookstore for children with an incredible curated collection.
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Texts for this Text Set have been posted daily on Instagram.
Follow @TextSets there to get daily updates!
Often, nonfiction is written with older elementary students in mind. This week, we take a look at a set of nonfiction that is perfect for younger readers. These books are actually perfect for all ages and they would be great writing mentors for middle grade writers. When we think about having enough quality nonfiction for our youngest readers, we want books that not only appeal to them, but books that meet their developmental and reading needs. These books do just that!
Love this new nonfiction guide for young readers-How to Say Hello to a Worm. There is so much content packed into this book but the question/answer format that is embedded in a narrative works well to share the information. The illustrations are bright and I love that the questions and answers are in different color font. This is a great feature that young readers will notice and just enough to begin thinking about the visual set up of some nonfiction texts.
I doubt that The Thing About Bees is officially nonfiction but it has enough nonfiction elements that I include it here. The subtitle “A Love Letter” lets readers know that this is a type of tribute to Bees. And the poetic language makes it a perfect read aloud. The way the information is embedded along with bigger themes is brilliant and there are so many access points for all readers.
Animals are often a top of interest for young readers and these two books are perfect. Animals!: Here We Grow! is filled with incredible photographs showing how animals change and grow. The combination of text and visuals make this one perfect for young readers. And in Steve Jenkins’ and Robin Page’s Who Am I? readers can guess the animal described based on the informational clues. (Another great mentor for older writers too!).
Lift, Mix, Fling! Machines Can Do Anything an engaging introduction to simple machines for young learners. There is so much on every page and key vocabulary is embedded into rhyming text. This makes for a great read aloud and there is also lots to explore in the illustrations on each page.
I discovered This Pup Steps Up and This Cat Loves That on Bookelicious and they are great fun. They are both filled with rhyming text and incredible pictures. The dog book focuses on all that dogs can do and the cat book focuses more on the things cats like and don’t like. Readers will learn a lot while they enjoy so many adorable pictures of dogs and cats. What could be better!
This week’s books were linked at Bookelicious. If you don’t know Bookelicious, check it out today. It is an online independent children’s bookstore with an incredible selection of children’s books and many supports for young readers. Lots of great free events for teachers coming up that you can check out and register here.
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This week, we’ll celebrate some incredible Black authors who write and/or illustrate picture books (and more). I worry when we use February to share books by Black authors because these books should be read, studied and incorporated into the curriculum all year. However, I do appreciate a time to celebrate the work and one event I have loved for years is NCTE’s African American Read-In. Whether you are participating or not, the authors I highlight this week have so many incredible books that have so much to teach young readers and writers. And these are 5 must-have Author Baskets in your classroom library.
Oge Mora has become a favorite author/illustator for me lately. I love so much about her work and the power of her stories for our youngest readers. Fiction, nonfiction, cumulative stories–no matter what she writes, love is a thread through all of her books. So much for readers and writers across elementary and beyond.
Vaness Brantley Newton’s Just Like Me is my go-to for baby girl gifts. The cover is one of my favorite covers of all time. Vanessa Brantley Newton writes fiction, nonfiction and poetry and her illustrations are colorful and draw the reader into every story.
Derrick Barnes is another author who writes incredible picture books (he also has a great nonfiction baseball book that I had to include because I LOVE it!). Each of these books is a celebration and I was thrilled to see that The Queen of Kindergarten is coming soon! (You may recognize Vanessa Brantley Newton’s illustrations on a few of his books.) The stories that celebrate children and the poetic language make these books must-haves.
If you’ve heard me talk books lately, you know that Daddy Speaks Love is one of my new favorites. I think it took this book and looking up the author to realize how many of Leah Henderson‘s books I love. Her writing, the topics she chooses, and her author’s notes are all gifts to readers.
Carole Boston Weatherford shows up in so many of my Text Sets (as you may have noticed) as her work is brilliant and so good across grades and ages. Her writing teaches us about people and times in history in a way that is accessible and honest. Her expertise combined with her writing means that I need every book she writes. I can always count on Carole Boston Weatherford’s work to be work I want to share with children and that I know will help us understand our world better.
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Finding authors we love is also so important to any reading community, and when we find an author we love, we want to read everything by that author.I love authors whose work spans formats and genres. I love this for readers and for writers in the classroom. As a middle grade teacher, it was so important to. me that both chapter books and picture books are valued in the classroom. Making sure we had author baskets that spanned both is critical. I also love authors that children can grow up with-who have written books for a variety of stages. This week, we’ll take a look at several authors who have such a huge variety of books. This is important for our readers and for our writers.
This week, we’ll start off with the two authors who inspired this text set-Kyle Lukoff and Donna Barba Higuera. Last week, when the awards were announced, I was THRILLED to see Too Bright to See because I am a huge fan. A must read for everyone. And The Last Cuentista was one I had on order but hadn’t read yet. When I looked dup the author after she won the Newbery, I realized she had written a picture book I love-El Cucuy is Scared Too!–and I mentioned to my friend Stella, how much I LOVE authors who write both picture books and chapter books. For our readers, especially in middle grades and beyond, having baskets of books by authors who write both picture books and chapter books can put renewed value in picture books for older children. And as writers, studying an author’s body of work, across formats is always so powerful. Thinking back, I don’t think I thought hard enough about all of the author baskets I SHOULD have had in my classroom like these.
Since we are talking about awards, let’s move right to Grace Lin, who won the 2022 Children’s Literature Legacy Award!! Grace Lin has written so many incredible books–from middle grade novels to picture books, to early series books to math board books. She writes across so many formats and genres. One of my favorite authors to read and definitely a favorite to study as a writer.
Kate Messner and Jess Keating are two of my favorite middle grade writers. I love that they write fiction and nonfiction that is so engaging for this age. And they both write a great deal of both fiction and nonfiction which I love. And so many interesting topics across nonfiction. I also love how often they weave their nonfiction interests into their novels. Both authors have nonfiction series books which I am a huge fan of!
Andrea Davis PInkney and Kwame Alexander have each created such a beautiful collection of poetry in various formats and genres. These two authors have so much to offer both readers and writers. I love that both authors invite readers into poetry in various ways and also invite readers to expand what they read–once they discover one book, they’ll want to read others by the author and naturally expand the types of things they read. And our writers can learn so much about word choice, etc. Love these two!
I will read anything and everything that Jacqueline Woodson and Kate DiCamillo write. These two are both brilliant writers who understand children so well. Their books are well loved by all ages. As with the other authors, they both write such a variety of books. These are also two authors readers can grow up with, always finding something new as they grow as readers. Lucky us to have these two in the world of children’s literature.
This week’s books were linked at Bookelicious. If you don’t know Bookelicious, check it out today. It is an online independent children’s bookstore with an incredible selection of children’s books and many supports for young readers. Lots of great free events for teachers coming up that you can check out and register here.
Follow @TextSets on Instagram for daily books/weekly text sets!
Texts for this Text Set have been posted daily on Instagram.
Follow @TextSets there to get daily updates!
There is nothing like the day when a new book is released that is part of your favorite series. When I was in elementary school it was the Betsy books. Series books are so important for so many readers. And, being in-the-know about a new book by a favorite author or one that features a favorite character is such fun. This week, we’ll take a look at series books that are newish–series that have a few books at most–series that have us already looking forward to the next book. These books are perfect for transitional and middle grade readers.
If you have not read Stuntboy: In the Meantime by Jason Reynolds and Raul the Third, you must read it asap! This is a great new book in a hopefully long series. This is going to be perfect for our Diary of a Wimpy Kid and Captain. Underpants readers to expand a bit in their reading. This book has everything-great story, incredible illustrations, real issues to discuss, strong characters and humor. There is so much to this book and series–I am excited for our middle grade readers!
These three new series (Sona Sharma, JoJo Makoons, and Definitely Dominguita) feature strong girls who bring fun and humor to their stories. I love each of these characters. I also love that the books are all heavily illustrated and are perfect for transitional readers in grades 2-3 especially. I often find it hard, as an adult to fall in love with books for this age but I fell in love with the writing and with these 3 characters. Although perfect for grades 2-3, they are really great stories for all ages. Sona Sharma and JoJo Makoons have 2nd books coming soon and Definitely Dominguita has 3-4 titles available now.
I loved the Ryan Hart series from the start and was so happy to see Renée Watson writing for a younger audience! Ryan Hart is a great character and these books are perfect for 3-5th graders. This series will have wide appeal. I think there are 2 out in the series (Ways to Make Sunshine and Ways to Grow Love) with another coming soon!
Dragons in a Bag is another series I’ve loved from the start. Fantasy is not an easy genre when it comes to transitional series books but this one is perfect. I love the length of these books as well as the characters and the stories. It is a perfect series for readers ready to start some more sophisticated books and who love fantasy. It is brilliantly done for this age. I think there are 3 available now with hopefully lots more to come!
Skunk and Badger and J.D. the Kid Barber are two series full of humor. For our readers who love humor, these are great picks. The humor is different in each but perfect for the age. (I am always amazed at authors who get humor for this age so right!) Just like a few of the others I’ve mentioned, even though they are written for transitional readers, older readers will also enjoy these. I love the characters in both of these series. The J.D. series has 3 books available now and Skunk and Badger has 2.
This week’s books were linked at Bookelicious. If you don’t know Bookelicious, check it out today. It is an online independent children’s bookstore with an incredible selection of children’s books and many supports for young readers. Lots of great free events for teachers coming up that you can check out and register here.
Follow @TextSets on Instagram for daily books/weekly text sets!
Texts for this Text Set have been posted daily on Instagram.
Follow @TextSets there to get daily updates!
Happy New Year! This year, when I know lots of classrooms are getting ready to start thinking about informational reading and writing, I decided to kick off 2022 with some of my favorite nonfiction poetry books. I think there is so much that informational poetry can do for us as readers and writers. Poetry invites us in to think about important topics in new ways. And it gives our students new ways to think about how to write informational pieces. I love the books that combine poetry with other forms of writing too,
The books in this series (Where in the Wild, Where Else in the Wild, What in the Wild) were some of the first informational poetry books I discovered. These are great for introducing nonfiction poetry to children because of the “I Spy/Look and Find” feature of each page. The poems in this book give information and the word choice and descriptions are incredible. As a reader, lots of inferring happens. As a writer, so much to learn!
I am so not a fan of chapter book biographies for elementary students. I prefer picture book biographies because our students can read across texts, learn about lots of people and do more in-depth work when they aren’t reading a chapter book series biography. I put biography poetry right up there with picture books. I love what books like Bravo and Shaking Things Up provide. Not only do we learn about several different people and their impacts but we learn about how an anthology works as it is around one topic or idea. The writing in both of these are incredible and many readers will find a person or two who they’d like to research further. And books like this also tend to have great author’s notes with more info. I hope we can all rethink whatever work we do with biographies and think about the goals and the types of books that best meet the goals biography reading. #biographies
No Voice Too Small and Voices of Justice would be great follow-up reads to yesterday’s titles. Both of these books focuses on people working toward justices. The writing style is different and the focus is a bit different in each so these would invite many conversations. So many pieces beyond the main poem on each page. Both of these books would be great to study in-depth.
In the Spirit of a Dream is my newest favorite poetry book. This book celebrates 13 American Immigrants. I loved reading about people I knew and people whose stories were new to me. The illustrations in this book are worthy of study as well. This is one of those books that I see being in every K-12+ classroom as there are so many entry points for readers, writers and illustrators.
The Last Straw has been on a few #TextSets because I love it. The way Susan Hood combines poetry and information is brilliant and there is so much packed into this one book, with poetry as the anchor. And this would invite an interesting discussion on the ways the poems were put together, the overarching topic and theme of the whole, etc. This book can be studied as a whole or individual spreads can be looked at individually.
This week’s books were linked at Bookelicious and/or Cover to Cover Children’s Bookstore. If you are looking for a fabulous local children’s bookstore to support, Cover to Cover is an amazing one. We are lucky to have them in Central Ohio! If you don’t have an independent children’s bookstore in your town, check out Bookelicious. They are an online independent bookstore for children with an incredible curated collection.
Follow @TextSets on Instagram for daily books/weekly text sets!
Texts for this Text Set have been posted daily on Instagram.
Follow @TextSets there to get daily updates!
Young writers love to use talking bubbles and to play around with humor and graphics in their writing. But there are a lot of craft moves that go along with doing that well. Young readers love informational books with humor and lots of text features but the format often makes it challenging to navigate without some instruction and practice. A focus on talking bubbles in informational text will help students focus in on a few ways talking bubbles can be used and how they enhance the book. By focusing in on this one small way talking bubbles are used effectively, readers and writers will approach them in new ways. This is a great mini-unit to do before winter break as it is focused and short but will also carry into other units later because of the close study of something so specific. And I am thinking most of these books are more in the category of informational than true nonfiction although the field of nonfiction is changing a bit.
There is so. much to learn about as readers and writers from this series. The format of the pages are filled with various text and features and navigating the page takes some intentionality. In The Truth About Bears, talking bubbles are used for both sharing important information AND to add side comments as humor. The author embeds both of these types of talking bubbles throughout the text. So you can’t ignore the talking bubbles and still get all of the information in the book. So much of the new information is being told to us by the animals themselves.
Arlo and Pips: King of the Birds is a great model for sharing information embedded in story. This entire story is told through a conversation between two birds. There is text other than talking bubbles but the dialogue tells most of the story with information embedded throughout. Sometimes the information is shared by one of the characters. At other times, we enjoy a story and realize we learned something about crows from the story. Lots of great craft moves in this one!
This is a favorite series for readers K-5. Such a fun way to share information. In each of these books, we get to know a bug or animal. We are introduced through text but the creature (The Cockroach in this example) interacts with us, the reader, thorough dialogue. It is a fun way to use dialogue and talking bubbles and this book makes this craft move visible for young writers so they can try it in their own writing. Since this is the 2nd book/series they will look at by author Elise Gravel, comparing what she does with dialogue would also be interesting.
There is a lot to study in Except Antarctica! The narrative is told through regular narrative and dialogue (and the talking bubbles are not actually in bubbles but talking is designated by a specific font which makes for a good discussion). The author uses these in a way to enhance the story, to give the characters personality. But not a lot of information happens in the dialogue–most happens in the main text. The humor is well done in this and children hoping to try humor can learn a lot from how this is done.
If you don’t know Look Up! Bird-Watching in Your Own Backyard, it is one that reader could spend hours with. There is so much information packed into this gem of a book and each page is worth study. I like this one because talking bubbles are used for so many reasons and in so many ways. Creating a chart of the ways and reasons the writer embedded talking bubbles and how each impacts the reading would be a great study. Then writers can decide if any of these ways make sense for their own writing. The combination of humans and birds that talk in this books is also worth exploring.
This week’s books were linked at Bookelicious and/or Cover to Cover Children’s Bookstore. If you are looking for a fabulous local children’s bookstore to support, Cover to Cover is an amazing one. We are lucky to have them in Central Ohio! If you don’t have an independent children’s bookstore in your town, check out Bookelicious. They are an online independent bookstore for children with an incredible curated collection.
Texts for this Text Set have been posted daily on Instagram. Follow @TextSets there to get daily updates!
Early in the school year (all year round, actually. But especially early in the year), I always think it’s a good idea for children to experience joy around word and language. So often we focus on the skills of words and forget to weave in all the joy that goes along with words. I have found that elementary students are much better able to pay attention to the skills of words (vocabulary, parts of speech, spelling patterns, etc.) once they see how amazing words are. This week’s books will invite students to delight in words. This can also serve as a follow-up to the Launching Notebooks Text Set from a few weeks ago–kids will want to try a few of these on their own because they are such fun!
I picked up this GIANT book at Cover to Cover last week. I mean who doesn’t need a GIANT joke book. One that is called Wee Hee Hee? I think jokes are a great way to talk about words with kids. So many jokes and riddles for kids depend on word play. This book is filled with fun jokes and riddles. The size of the book, the colors on the pages and the jokes make this book pure fun!
Words is a fun word play book that children will want to experiment with. The book is a small chunky book (another great fun size!) and each page has a single word and a sketch. Seeing how each book is imagined and then thinking about ways to create an image for a single word takes so much creativity.
Take Away the A and Fruit Cake are two books that provide more fun for readers. They also invite readers to try these things on their own. Take Away the A shows readers how much taking away one letter in a word can change it. Fruit Cake is often out of print so sometimes difficult to find but it is well worth it if you can find it. The theme combined with the play on words make it very unique.
Who doesn’t like a good tongue twister? That’s what you get in Six Sheep Sip Thick Shakes. And Beach is to Fun is the most fun introduction to analogies I’ve ever seen. When I used Beach is to Fun with 4th graders a few years back, everyone wanted to write their own! I wish someone had introduced analogies to me with this book (instead of with multiple choice bubbles…).
The titles alone make both Llamaphones and Yaks Yak fabulous. These two help children start conversations about the discipline specific words we use when we talk about words (Homophones and Homographs, Nouns and Verbs). I mean who could forget what a homophone is if it is introduced as a llamaphone?
This week’s books were linked at Bookelicious and/or Cover to Cover Children’s Bookstore. If you are looking for a fabulous local children’s bookstore to support, Cover to Cover is an amazing one. We are lucky to have them in Central Ohio! If you don’t have an independent children’s bookstore in your town, check out Bookelicious. They are an online independent bookstore for children with an incredible curated collection. (Warning: You will want to create a bookmoji while you are there. This will be the highlight of your weekend I’m sure! Below is one of mine:-)
Texts for this Text Set have been posted daily on Instagram.
Follow @TextSets there to get daily updates!
Many of us can remember favorite series books from childhood–those books we read nonstop, those books that were so important on our journeys to becoming lifelong readers. We know how important series books are for young readers and that is true for both fiction and nonfiction. I remember when I read my first Scientists in the Field series as a teacher. I loved it so much that I read others that were not even on topics I thought I was interested in. During the last several years, having baskets of nonfiction series books was important for classroom library set up.
If we want our students to choose to read nonfiction, we have to invite them in in a variety of ways. Series books invited children into nonfiction reading by giving them a collection that could expand the topics they read and support them as readers as they knew what to expect from the next book in the series. They build different skills as different series require different skills as readers. Nonfiction series books are a great invitation for readers to read more nonfiction, to expand topics they love, to get to know nonfiction authors and to build strategies as nonfiction readers. This week’s text set will highlight some series books I’ve found to be popular with elementary readers in grades K-5. These books are perfect for all ages as there are several entry points depending on the reader.
Suzi Eszterhas is one of my favorite nonfiction authors. She is a wildlife photographer so the photos in every one of her books are incredible and they engage readers immediately. This series–Eye on the Wild–focuses on the first year in a baby animal’s life. Suzi Eszterhas has other books and series (Wildlife Rescue)–all about animals– so this series is a great way to introduce this incredible author.
Two other authors who have several nonfiction series books for young readers are Melissa Stewart and Kate Messner. A Place for Birds and Over and Under are two series that have so much interesting content. I love these because understanding of the bigger science concepts build across the series. So the more children read in the series, the better they understand the bigger, complex concepts of our environment.
The Truth About series is a fun series with lots of entry points. There is a lot of content packed into a fun format and readers enjoy the humor throughout. We are lucky to have so many great series books about animals as so many children are interested in animals. Reading across a series or finding a variety of books about a single animals support young readers and there are plenty of options for laddering their reading (Thanks Dr. Teri Lesesne for teaching us about Reading Ladders!).
The If Animals Disappeared Series is a powerful one in helping children (and adults) understand the interconnectedness of our world. These books are packed with information and also make for great read alouds. The author makes a very complex issue accessible for our youngest children.
Jess Keating is definitely an author that knows how to engage young readers. Her photos, her sense of humor and her expert knowledge of the topics she writes about make every one of her books a must-read. Jess Keating has two nonfiction series books that engage readers of all ages. Big as a Giant Snail and Set Your Alarm, Sloth! are both new this fall so celebrating these book birthdays would be a great way to introduce the series.
This week’s books were linked at Bookelicious and/or Cover to Cover Children’s Bookstore. If you are looking for a fabulous local children’s bookstore to support, Cover to Cover is an amazing one. We are lucky to have them in Central Ohio! If you don’t have an independent children’s bookstore in your town, check out Bookelicious. They are an online independent bookstore for children with an incredible curated collection. (Warning: You will want to create a bookmoji while you are there. This will be the highlight of your weekend I’m sure! Below is one of mine:-)
A(nother) Year of Reading 