Recent reads

This year I have read with my class Nanberry by Jackie French I had to censor it for my stage 2 class as I didn't feel I needed to get into life for females in the early Australian colonies. They fell in love with the character Nanberry and wanted to find out about how life was for him before British Invasion and the early colonisation. 

I have shared with them one of my childhood favourites The twenty seventh annual African hippopotamus race I remember having had this read aloud to me and then rediscovering it again on my own again in my middle primary years. My class has loved this book as much as myself.

A title I have read but haven't had a chance to share yet, is the classic originally told in German Emil and the detectives. An engaging and quick read, a little boy travelling on the train to his family in Berlin has some money stolen from him... This book tells of his adventures to get his money back and to catch the thief.

Gallipoli... Kerry Greenwood

With this book I examined context, I used a teaching unit from PETAA to support this teaching, one of the initial tasks I did was to predict whose point of view is this story written... The children were considering the Australian soldiers or the Turkish soldiers. One of the things they noticed on the front cover were the two soldiers, and they were wearing slouch hats... Australian soldiers wore slouch hats. We compared this to the uniform of the Ottoman Empire to confirm this. I am also trying to get my students to use two pieces of evidence to support their thoughts so I had them examine the words on the cover and they then made the link between Cannankale and Gallipoli and confirmed it must be a story from the ANZACs... I loved this story and the children made lots of connections to what we have learnt in class, we examined maps and the children could visualise where Eygpt was, Lemnos, Lone Pine all settings names in this story. When they heard Simpson and his donkey Duffy mentioned they all shared a connection to prior learning. We deeply analysed the historical and cultural contexts for this story and will continue this learning until our Anzac Day service.

More ANZAC stories! and writing with a purpose

Last term I read quite a few ANZAC titles, the children really enjoyed the contrast in Anzac Biscuits by Phil Cummings.

 A mother and child make biscuits whilst the father is away fighting war. Each page has a link with the next- the flowers on Mum's apron is a contrast to the flowers in the field where dad is, the thick mud dad is walking through is compared with the sticky treacle on the little child's fingers. The children enjoyed seeing the contrast between the two scenes. I was at a conference this week and I had the lovely Kate make no bake Anzac balls with the kids and look at procedure writing. You can find the recipe here... http://www.mumsinthemix.com.au/healthy-bake-anzac-biscuits/

We then read Gary Crew's Memorial.

Another book the children can examine the visual literacy, these two amazing talented duo really know how to write books well.  After analysing this book, I had my class write arguments for and against whether the tree should be removed.

Anzac Ted... Everyone should have this title on their bookshelf.

It has such a lovely message, all of my students could make a connection to this title. After examining the Anzac spirit in these titles, I had my class write an imaginative text, I was really surprised by their efforts. Someone wrote a story as the unknown solider, another used the structure of Anzac biscuits to compare life at war and home, and a student tried to retell life as an Anzac through letter writing back and forth from home. 

The Red Poppy

I have just finished using the book The Red Poppy by David Hill in my Stage 2 classroom. We will be reading a few stories based on war as it is the centenary on Anzac at Gallipoli.

I started the unit with children filling in a before and after web (from Sheena Cameron's orange comprehension book) about what they already knew about Anzacs and Gallipoli, this was to activate prior knowledge. We read the book and before reading it again, I had my class sit eye to eye, knee to knee (EEKK) and recall something that happened in the book. Hmm... Some kids said they couldn't remember a thing, whilst others recalled many details. I planned for my class do a stretch to sketch (from Linda Hoyt's 3 R book). We folded a blank A4 page into four sections and the children had to visualise the story and think what would they draw in the first box, second box etc. After the second reading, they again sat EEKK and discussed what they would draw before going back to their desks and working independently... I was impressed. They shared their drawings and retold their story to a new partner.

On a different day, we broke into a character hot seat discussion. This allowed my students to have a good background to the book so we could discuss the theme and key ideas.

It was an AMAZING  book with a friendship developing between two enemy soldiers. The children loved the realistic illustrations and the compassion between the two soldiers. I think it will stay in their memories for a long time.

Li Lun, Lad of courage

This is a short read but is a great story about Chinese culture and overcoming difficulty. Li Lun, is a boy aged ten, who has come of age, and is to show his worth by joining the men from his village to become fisherman. Li Lun is afraid of the sea water and is labelled a coward by the other fisherman and his father. To show his worth he must grow seven times the number of rice grains his father gives him at the top of the mountain.

This is where we see Li Lun's character develop and the story unfold. This will be a good story to read to stage 2 children.

Yoko's Diary

This book was one of the shortlisted books for the 2014 Children's book council awards in the information text category.

This book was complied a few years ago but only recently translated into English and this edition is written so Australian children can relate to the story. For example, Yoko travelled in one day the distance of two City to Surf courses. 

This is the real diary of school girl who lived in Hiroshima during WWII. Tragically Yoko did not survive the dreadful bombing. I learnt a lot from this book and life in Japan in this era. I would suggest stage 3, grades 5 and 6 or older would like this book.

Frindle

When I first looked at the grammar scope and sequence, even I had to look up the term "neologism". For those of you who have never heard the term, or are teaching Stage 2 for the first time, neologism is the name for a newly coined term, word, or phrase that may be in the process of entering common use, but that has not yet been accepted into mainstream language. Neologisms are often directly attributable to a specific person, publication, period, or event.

The book Frindle is the perfect book to illustrate this term. It is an easy light read. I can't wait to read this book to my class. It is about a boy called Nick who has a Grade 5 teacher who has high expectations about grammar, vocabulary and spelling. She loves the dictionary. Nick tries to waste time in class one day asks who decides what words are important enough to go in the dictionary. Cleverly the teacher asks Nick to find the answer and present a report to the class. After presenting his findings, he continues to question and on the way home makes up the word "frindle". I won't reveal what this word means, you will have to read the book to find out.

A highly engaging read.

26 Fairmont Avenue

This is a really easy read, and the first in this series. It is the autobiography of author Tomie DePaola. He has written books such as Strega Nona, as well as Big Anthony, and the Cloud book. This year I am moving down to middle primary and I wanted to read a book that children can examine the author's craft to improve their own writing. This is one of those books. The author has written about ideas which are familiar to him with detail. I am hoping by examining this book with my class I can improve their writing.

The book is set in 1938, which is very unfamiliar to the class, but since Tomie's book reflects his life before going to kindergarten, I am hoping that the children can still make connections.

My favourite chapter is Tomie's reflection of seeing Walt Disney's Snow White and the Seven dwarves for the first time. I can't wait to read this chapter to the class.

A very  enjoyable light read.