We've had a lot going on the last couple of weeks! Here's the rundown:
In 5th grade, we have been learning how to use VoiceThread to prepare for a future project with it. I will be making a MCBA VoiceThread for students to comment on, as well as one for our incoming new books from the Bookapalooza Grant! This week we started a unit on cybersafety, digital footprints, and cyberbullying.
    In 4th grade, we have been working on our fairy tale comparison project. We also have been learning VoiceThread. Students are writing thoughtful comments about their chosen fairy tale and then recording those comments to our class VoiceThreads. We're learning how to have an online conversation.
    In 3rd grade, we're doing activities related to their study of the Pilgrims. We have used print books and done collaborative learning strategies together to gather information. We explored several Web sites about Plimoth Plantation that had many cool videos, interactive activities, and 360 virtual tours of the plantation. This week we are just listening and connecting books to the curriculum by reading aloud Pilgrim Cat by Carol Antoinette Peacock (historical fiction) and We Gather Together...Now Please Get Lost! by Diane deGroat.
    Second grade has been working hard in the computer lab doing online research into the animals they picked. They will be writing a book with Mrs. Kelley about their animal after all the research is done. In the library, we practiced finding information using nonfiction features on Web site printouts. This week we're talking about the Caldecott medal and reading the latest winners from 2012 (A Ball for Daisy) and 2011 (A Sick Day for Amos McGee). Then we're voting on which winners from the last 10 years are our favorites (stay tuned for the results).
    In first grade we have talked about illustrative storytelling (telling a story with only pictures, no words) with The Lion and the Mouse by Jerry Pinkney. Then we talked about othe fables, such as Town Mouse Country Mouse. This week we are talking about the American flag (following what they are learning in the classroom about American symbols) and reading Red, White and Blue: The Story of the American Flag by John Herman.

Last week, we did a combination of activities. Fifth grade took time to view their classmates' book trailers. Everyone did a great job! Fourth grade took a break from their fairy tale project and viewed their first Conley Library screencast, which was a tutorial review about how to use the library catalog. Third grade also took a look at the screencast and practiced using the catalog in small groups. First and second grade learned a little bit about Mo Willems, the award-winning author of the "pigeon" books, Knuffle Bunny series, and Elephant and Piggy beginning readers. We talked about the different methods he uses to create his illustrations (drawing, mixed media) and the kinds of awards his books have won (Caldecott and Geisel medals). We read Knuffle Bunny and watched a video version of Don't Let the Pigeon Ride the Bus! In kindergarten, we read Stella Louella's Runaway Book, a crazy and fun story about--you guessed it, a runaway library book.
    This week fifth grade is doing a lesson on writing bibliographies, an important skill to have when you're headed to middle school. Fourth grade has picked up their fairy tale project again, and we read aloud two tales from Shivers, Wishes, and Wolves, an anthology of fairy tales published in graphic novel format. We talked about the details that were changed in these versions of Rumpelstiltskin and Jack and the Beanstalk, and why the authors made those changes. We also talked about the graphic novel format and how the graphic format sometimes changed the story.
    In third grade we are learning how to use Kids InfoBits, an online database for children. This week we looked up information on leprechauns, as we get ready for the green holiday. In second grade, we started on a project that students are working on with Mrs. Kelley--an animal research project. We began doing some of our research on three animal Web sites and started practicing taking notes.
    In first grade, we continued to talk about Mo Willems. We read Knuffle Bunny Too and then we used Willems' mixed media method (using a black and white photograph and illustration) to create our own episodes of the Kunffle Bunny saga. Kindergarten as well was introduced to the wonderful world of Mo Willems this week, with both Knuffle Bunny books.

This week was a combination of activities, depending on which grade you were in. In 5th grade, we finished up our book trailers, which I am continuing to post on our new technology wiki. Fourth grade continued to work on their fairy tale research, working towards creating class-wide VoiceThreads of what we have learned. We worked in small groups, and then as a large group to talk about the similarities and differences between the stories we have read so far.
     In second and third grade, we did a President's Day activity and also learned a few skills on the computer. Using a PBS Kids Web site (Secrets of the Presidents) we learned some interesting trivia about the presidents. We also practiced using keystrokes to make Internet content appear bigger (very useful for second and third graders trying to read content often meant for adult eyes). Just hit Control-+ to make a window bigger and Control-Minus to make it smaller! We also practiced "hovering" with our mouse to get information, rather than clicking and navigating between two tabs of Web sites to gather and compare information.
     In kindergarten and first grade, we read Valentine's books this week. Kindergarten listened to Love, Ruby Valentine by Laurie Freidman and first grade listened to A String of Hearts by Laura Malone Elliott.

This week 5th grade continue to work on their book trailers! I have started to post finished ones on our Library Technology Wiki http://conleyschoollibrary.wikispaces.com/. Fourth grade has continued to look at our selected fairy tales, and was introduced to VoiceThread this week. I created some VoiceThread tales, which we listened to in order to start making our comparisions.
     Third grade listened to the story Baloney, Henry P. by Jon Scieszca. This story contains a lot of "nonsense" words that the reader has to figure out. In actuality, they are foreign language words! We read the story and then went back to take clues from the text to figure out the meanings. This is also a good lesson to start thinking about word choice when we do our own writing.
     Second grade listened to the story about Snowflake Bentley, the man who figured out how to photograph snowflakes. This week was his birthday (February 9th). We also watched a video about him to learn a little more.
     Kindergarten and first grade talked about President's Day, even though it is a week off, because it happens during winter break. We read President's Day by Anne Rockwell.
    

This month, we've been doing a variety of new fun things! Fifth grade has been working on their book trailers using a program called Animoto. Students have been working in pairs and threes as they select a book, decide what elements will be most enticing to new readers, and then search the Internet for images to represent and describe their book. We also learned about how to legally borrow images from the Internet by giving the creators credit for them in our projects. My new link at the left will lead you to some of our technology projects; we also have a wiki where all our projects will be posted for all grades (http://conleyschoollibrary.wikispaces.com/). Fifth grade also has been completing their Voki autobiographies, which will be posted here as well.
     Fourth grade has been reviewing research skills for the past couple of weeks. We have been practicing using a dictionary, thesaurus, and encyclopedia in both print and online formats. We discussed the pluses and minuses of each one. Now are starting a research and presentation group project about fairy tales. Each class has six groups ("Teams"), and one fairy tale is being assigned to each team. They will research different versions of the fairy tale and create a slide for VoiceThread, an audio/discussion presentation tool, that discusses the basic elements of each fairy tale and how and why versions vary from one another. Each class will produce one VoiceThread presentation; each group will produce one slide. Other groups will be required to view and comment on at least one other group's slide as well.
     Second and third grade have been studying genres these past few weeks. We have learned about fantasy, science fiction, horror, humor, nonfiction, poetry, historical fiction, realistic fiction, adventure, folk literature, and mystery. We have used the SmartBoard to test our knowledge on what we've learned together and we have worked in small groups to think about and discuss the differences between the genres, especially the ones that are a little confusing, like science fiction and fantasy! If you'd like to test your knowledge, you can play our "Fling the Teacher" game on my new Learning Games page.
     Kindergarten and first grade have been listening to stories of the current season, such as Happy Birthday Martin Luther King by Jean Marzollo, The Runaway Wok: A Chinese New Year's Tale by Ying Chang Competine, and Go to Sleep Groundhog by Judy Cox. We have talked about all these holidays and celebrations, and alas, Punxatawney Phil has announced we have six more weeks of winter. More to come!

We're into our second week of the New Year, and we have several great things going on in the library. In fifth grade, we are going to be working on creating book trailers. Students will work in pairs to create an enticing, informative trailer about a book they would like to recommend to others. Last week we chose our book, and this week we began looking for images on the Internet to use in our trailers. We also learned about copyright law and how to properly borrow images from the Internet by giving their creators credit. Look for our trailers to be posted sometime in late January/early February.
    Fourth grade will be spending some time in the next few weeks learning about research tools. We had an overview lesson last week where we talked about tools such as the: dictionary, thesaurus, encyclopedia, atlas, almanac, globe, and more. This week we went online to learn how to use an online encyclopedia (www.factmonster.com) as well as an online dictionary and thesaurus.
    Second and third grades will be studying genres for the next couple of weeks. Last week we read "Joe Bright and the Seven Genre Dudes" on the ELMO camera/SmartBoard, which was a story based on Snow White that introduces seven genres. This week, we talked about the components of each genre. I added two genres to the mix and so we will be looking at: Nonfiction, Poetry, Folk Literature, Historical Fiction, Realistic Fiction, Science Fiction, Mysteries, Adventure, and Fantasy.
    In first grade, we read "The Mitten Tree" by Candace Christianson. We talked about how the characters in the story did kind things for one another. Then each student created a pair of mittens from paper and we hung them on our own mitten tree in the library (see photo). This week first grade read "Squirrel's New Year's Resolution" by Pat Miller. We brainstormed some new year's resolutions of our own, and then I created Wordles to represent each classes' ideas. Here are two so far:
Miss Jeannette's class: http://www.wordle.net/show/wrdl/4657162/1J_newyears
Miss Tingblad's class:
http://www.wordle.net/show/wrdl/4663536/1T_newyears
    Finally, in kindergarten we have read "The Mitten" by Jan Brett and also "Squirrel's New Year's Resolution" by Pat Miller.

The fall and winter certainly have been busy! Here is an update on what we've been doing in the library so far.
    Fourth and fifth grades have been working on Voki. Voki is a Web 2.0 tool where you can create talking avatars. We used Kids InfoBits (a children's online database) to choose a famous person to research. Then we wrote down details about the person. Last, we wrote a paragraph about that person (in FIRST person). Then we went to Voki.com and create an avatar that looks like our person, entered our paragraphs, and voila! We have animated autobiographies. I will post some of these great projects soon.
    Second and third grades have been doing a little bit of everything. We have been learning about and reviewing the Dewey Decimal System. We learned about the "Dewey neighborhoods" (where each book lives) and we also used some online interactive games to practice finding books using the system. Third grade also learned about the Caldecott medal, which will be given out in January 2012.  and in second grade we have used the ELMO camera quite a bit to read books on the large SMART board screen.
    For the past two weeks, second and third grade have been learning how to use Wordle, a program that creates word clouds. Each class brainstormed words about December, and then we combined all the words to create a Wordle for each class. Come see our Wordle printouts on the library doors!
    In Kindergarten and first grade, we have been reading holiday books for several weeks. We have read Imani's Gift at Kwanzaa, Latkes, Latkes, Good to Eat, and Mr. Willoughby's Christmas Tree. This week we are reading A Bad Kitty Christmas (1st grade) and Li'l Rabbit's Kwanzaa(Kindergarten).
    Second and third grade this week will be reading as well. Both grades will be listening to a picture-book version of The Greatest Christmas Pageant Ever (the original is a chapter book) and then as a class we will recite a reader's theater version of the story. Happy Holidays and New Year!