Never Such a Wild Leaf Ride

The Magic School Bus

The Wild Leaf Ride is a book that starts out in Ms. Frizzle’s classroom. The students in her classroom have been studying different types of leaves and trees. The students have made a poster labeling the different types of leaves they have found however, they have a problem! They are missing the maple leaf! Ms. Frizzle and the students jump on the magic school bus to take a wild ride to find the missing leaf. They see the birds flying south for the winter, and learn how acorns can turn into trees while on their leaf hunt.  They even learn why the leaves change their color in the fall. After running from a squirrel and a bird the class falls in a pile of leaves and the lost leaf is finally found!

S2L1b; is the standard that we use chose to use for this assignment.  This standard says that Students will investigate the life cycles of different living organisms, relate seasonal changes to observations of how a tree changes throughout the school year.

Since this story is based in the fall, we would want the activity to be as well. An activity we would want to use this book and standard in the class would be Fall Findings. Fall Findings is an activity that would get our second graders outside and excited about the changes of fall. After reading this book, we would ask students to get a notepad and pencil and get ready for a nature walk! I would ask each student to write down items that they see that is only popular to find in the fall. We would want the students to say things like leaves changing colors, leaves falling, cooler weather etc. After the students wrote down their ideas from the nature walk we would take them back to the classroom to share with others.  **This activity would be completed after a lesson on the fall season.                                            

Whitney Thinks:

This book can entertain a wide range of students and meet a wide range of standards. This book talks about seasons, leaves, seeds, birds migrating, and how squirrels save their nuts for winter. Therefore it can be used in many different classrooms many different ways.  Children  would really enjoy going outside and doing a nature walk instead of learning about fall in the classroom. Also, the book allows children to imagine riding in a magical bus and opens up and world of imagination. 

                                                                          Karen Thinks: 
I love Fall - there are so many changes taking place and the colors are my favorites! This book can be used to begin talking with your students about the life cycle of a tree. In the book it explains how an acorn turns into a tree. Many children love getting an opportunity of taking their lesson outside, and the Fall season is a perfect opportunity to get them outside observing the many changes  taking place all around them. Bring literacy into the Science lesson by having the students compare Fall to another season using a graphic organizer.

It's been another great week and we hope you will enjoy finding ways to use this book in your classroom.  Let us hear some of your ideas in using this book and share with us what your favorite season is and why.  Thanks for checking us out and we will see you next week!

Chrysanthemum - a type of flower?? Yes, and......Oh! So much more!!

Hello friends!
Welcome back to this week's edition of our literature blog!

This week's focus is not on the genre of the book, but instead, using a fiction book to teach a certain content that many students often resist - a math lesson. 

For all of you that just said, "Math lesson?!" Yes! Chrysanthemum, by Kevin Henkes is an adorable story about a mouse with a very long, beautiful, perfect, name! Chrysanthemum absolutely loved her name.  She loved everything about it!  Ya'll, she was so proud of her name that she constantly recited it to herself, over and over! Until..the first day of school!  As the teacher took roll, all the children laughed and teased her about her name being so long.  It was so long it barely fit onto her name tag. Dreadful!  Absolutely dreadful!  Her name was spelled with thirteen letters - half of the entire alphabet! Suddenly, Chrysanthemum did not feel like she had the most beautiful, perfect name. It was horrible. She even dreamed of changing her name to something shorter - Jane. At least until the day she met the music teacher, Mrs. Twinkle.  Delphinium Twinkle!  She too had a long name that was a type of a flower, and was expecting a baby. In the end, meeting Mrs. Twinkle restores the love Chrysanthemum felt for her name and after delivering a baby girl, she names her, Chrysanthemum! After all, it is the most beautiful and absolutely perfect name!
So how is Chrysanthemum math?
It teaches children the concept of linear measurements, comparing two or more objects, determining which is longer, shorter, or equal, and using non-standard measuring tools to measure an object.  In this case - their name!
 How??
One way is using an activity that correlates with this book called How long is your name?   You can actually review it in its entirety on the CCGPS site.  Just click on the attached link at the end of this page and scroll to page 14.

The two standards used include:
MCC.1.MD.1 Order three objects by length; compare the lengths of two objects indirectly by using a third object.
MCC.1.MD.4 Organize, represent, and interpret data with up to three categories; ask and answer questions about the total number of data points, how many in each category, and how many more or less are in one category than in another.  

Most children like their name and this activity allows them to compare the length of their name to your example name (maybe Chrysanthemum or your name), fellow classmates, and  to the entire class. Using linking cubes for each letter in their name, they compare the names within their small group.  They determine which is longer, shorter, or the same and record their findings. Have the students return to a common area.  Draw a table on the board and have each student take turns indicating the number of letters in their name while you chart them. Discuss who has the shortest and longest name in the class, and how using the linking cubes is a non-standard measuring tool they used to measure their name. 

This activity ties back to the story because like most children, Chrysanthemum also loved her name. The story is centered on the length of her name and as seen in the illustrations, it is very long compared to many of her classmates.  They have short names such as Jo, Kay, or Rita.  One student even points out to the teacher, “Chrysanthemum’s name is spelled with thirteen letters - half of the entire alphabet!”

In closing, we leave you with our thoughts:

Whitney's Ideas:

Until this assignment I have never thought of Chrysanthemum as being a math lesson but it can be! This book shows children how to count as well as compare the letters in their names. Doing an activity like this would be fun for children because they can count the letters in their names and compare it to their friends names. In this book we can also remind children how to treat others and not to bully someone because they are different.

Karen's thoughts:
This little book can be used in a variety of disciplines, but who would have thought math! Other ways I think will make the name game fun is to incorporate it in your teachings about money.  Put a monetary value on each letter of the alphabet and have the students add up the "value" of their name and compare it to the class.  Who has the most expensive name?  Later as an integrated math and reading activity discuss and review consonants and vowels. Identify the name and number of both consonants and vowels in Chrysanthemum's name. As a whole group tally the number of vowels in our names and make a class graph. Here you are also teaching graphing. I think these would be fun ways to gain student's interest in learning math. 



 Don't forget to check out the full activity at this website:
https://www.georgiastandards.org/Common-Core/Common%20Core%20Frameworks/CCGPS_Math_1_Unit4FrameworkSE.pdf       Scroll to page 14.

 

Egg fight? Corn fight? Snakes in the wash?

 

The Day Jimmy's Boa Ate the Wash
Welcome back to Karen and Whitney's blog! This week we will be discussing a fantasy fictional piece. The Day Jimmy's Boa Ate the Wash by Trinka Hakes Noble is the book we chose.  It has an engaging plot for children because they can’t wait to see what unruly thing will happen next on the farm. They are not sure if the boa will be caught once he got loose. This book has a lot of action with little dialogue. It has a fun cliffhanger ending where Jimmy gets one of the pig’s as a new pet.We found this book to be a fun way to teach cause and effect. We found this book to be exciting and we enjoyed it, hope you will too!

The Day Jimmy's Boa Ate the Wash is about a little girl's field trip experience. She tells her mother how it was sort of boring until the cow starting crying because a hay stack fell on him, because the farmer ran into it, because of the pigs on the bus, because they were hungry and the kids used their corn to throw at each other after they ran out of eggs, which caused the farmers wife to scream because the boa was eating her wash! In the end Jimmy left in such a hurry that the boa got left behind, but lucky for him a pig never made it off the bus.

What makes this a fictional story??

• Type- This story is fantasy fiction because it contains elements that are not real in our world. Examples: "The cow was crying" and the pigs jumping on the bus to eat their lunches.
• Plot- The plot in this story is conflict/resolution. The reason is because it contains person to person conflict between the students (throwing things at each other).
• Theme- The theme proves to be another reason this story is fiction. It is not directly stated. However, we can read and find that their are hidden morals that teach telling the truth and understanding the situation before jumping to conclusions.
• Setting- The setting in this fiction literature is detailed. It is on a farm with the farmer, his wife, and animals. They are on the farm during a school field trip.
• Point of View- This story is told in third person. It is third person because the little girl is telling the story in her imaginative point of view about the school field trip to the farm.
  

 Karen’s thoughts:
I think this book offers children a humorous side of a third party’s point of view of what might have truly been a boring field trip to the farm. The little girl uses a great sense of imagination when telling her mom about her day. This gives the story a fabulous plot and keeps the story interesting. The author does a great job at keeping the reader guessing what silly thing the children or animals will do next. There is an interesting picture at the end of the book where the farmer’s wife is knitting a long tube while the boa is curled up happily in front of the fire. This would be an excellent picture to share with the students and have them continue writing their version of the ending of the story. All of the components of the story could really happen….with one exception – cows don’t cry! Have you ever been on such an exciting field trip? There are so many possibilities in teaching with this book. It would be great to teach younger students about which animals belong or don’t belong on a farm. It has such a defined beginning, middle, and ending which could make it fun for retelling, sequencing, or reader’s theater. You could also teach students about playing together and it’s not nice to throw things at each other. You could discuss your expectations and rules before taking a field trip. Pets could be another topic.

Whitney’s thoughts:
I felt like this book was entertaining and fun for students. Most people read about a snake and are scared, like myself; however, this book gives readers a different opinion of a snake. When the pigs are on a bus eating the children’s lunch and a cow is crying you can bet it’s an interesting book. I would also want to show my students a hidden moral message. This message is that you need to know the full details before jumping to conclusions. If you have the wrong impression, you can make the wrong decision about what to do. In the book the children were in the hen house and a chicken laid an egg. When it laid the egg, it landed on Jenny’s head. She assumed that one of the other children threw it at her and in return threw one back. Because she did not know the full details, and assumed, she started an “egg fight”. I would make sure to point out it is always best to understand what happen and how it happen before just reacting, a life lesson not only for children but also for adults.

Before you leave please check out this smart board game....https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B-vfpaed7O-cMzQzMDM1ZjYtOGRiYS00NzY1LTg0ZWYtY2JhNmQwMWE3ZTY0/edit?usp=drive_web&urp=http://pitnerm.blogspot.com/2011/12/day-jimmys-boa

Not Your Typical "Happily Ever After"!

Welcome!

Would you kill or die for your "Happily Ever After"?

If we said to you, "Today, we are going to talk about a fairytale entitled The Little Mermaid", most of you would envision Ariel and all her sea friends from the Disney version of the book or movie. "Right"? That's because most of us have experienced the Disney beautiful interpretation where Ariel swims about the sea talking to her sea friends, Sebastian and Flounder, dreaming of becoming human, finding the love of her life, marrying the prince, and lives happily ever after. We are all left with that warm, mushy, hopeful feeling inside and everything in life is grand!

But...did you know?

The 1990 adaptation of author Oriol Izquierdo brings on a whole new light of the mermaid, love story, and ending. It is a beautifully illustrated, but grim, retelling of the old Danish fairytale. This version stays true to the tone of the original by Hans Christian. It is a rather dark, bleak, harsh story of a mermaid. She falls in love with a human prince, but her love is rejected and it doesn't have the same beautiful, happy kind of ending that Disney portrays.

 Soooo....Let's give you a little more insight on this version -

“Once upon a time”, there was a little mermaid. This little mermaid lived with her father, grandmother, and five other sisters, her mother had passed away several years ago. The grandmother looked over her granddaughters and told them that once they turned fifteen, they could go adventure out and lie on the rocks where they could see ships, and cities. On her fifteenth birthday, she went to the rocks and was prepared to see beautiful ships and cities. Instead, the little mermaid approached a sinking ship with a prince thrown overboard. The little mermaid saved the prince and fell madly in love with him as she laid him upon some rocks and left. She longed to return and be with the prince but he had no idea she existed.  So, the little mermaid went to the witch and begged to become human so that she could find and marry the prince. The witch agreed to help, but it would cost the mermaid her beautiful voice and she could never return to the sea. In addition, if the prince married another, the mermaid would turn to foam and die. Because of her love for the prince, she agreed to the witch's spell.   After she became human, she found the prince but without her voice, she couldn’t tell him who she was, so he married someone else. While the broken hearted mermaid sat waiting to turn to foam, her eldest sister appeared and tells her that if she takes a knife and kills the prince, the spell will be broken.  The mermaid takes the knife, sneaks onto the ship where the prince and his bride are sleeping....raises the knife....trembling....and then tosses the knife into the ocean.  She leaps over the side of the ship, and her body dissolves into foam. Melodious voices appear and carry the mermaid to live with the daughters of the air in the Realm of the Air.





   Now, let’s look at…..     

What makes this fairy/folk tale traditional literature?

·   It has a sequential plot (it goes in order from beginning to end    of the mermaid’s life.

·   The setting is vague (The setting doesn’t provide details, just says in the sea, and it starts off with “Once upon a time”)

·   Characterization – the characters don’t have given names- just mermaid, witch, grandmother, prince.  Most of them portray all good vs the evil witch.

·         Theme – represents kindness, true love, and making sacrifices.  Good overcomes evil – even if it means death.

·         It contains several motifs - journey/quest- the mermaid seeking true love with the prince. Magic – the witch’s spell.  It also uses flying and transformation – but the spiritual transformation at the end is left untold.

·         It also has variants (More than one version of the same story) For example: Disney version, and the original Hans Anderson.

We will leave you with our opinion of this piece of literature, along with a short video of the Disney ending version.  Please take time to give us your feedback and thoughts of both versions.  Do you think one version is better for the classroom over the other?

What Whitney Thinks

This was a fun version of The Little Mermaid that I have not heard before. Sometimes while reading fairy/folk tales (traditional literature) I get stuck on the most popular version and forget there are other versions out there. For this reason I feel the variance this story has is a great way to show students that there are many versions to many stories and its okay if it’s not the most popular ones. I would use this story in my classroom to get students interested in variance in stories and provide them with different versions to read. I feel students would find this fun and interesting to see how different versions of the same stories may end differently. I do believe this version is fine for most elementary classrooms. I don’t think the death of the little mermaid should keep it out of the classroom. After teaching the students that these stories are fiction, they will understand it is not real and will not be traumatized by the story. They need to be introduced to many different types of reading.

Karen’s thoughts:

I’m guilty as the next person….my thoughts of The Little Mermaid was the Disney, warm fuzzy, rainbows, and happily ever after version.  This story really opened my eyes to something new.  I think it would depend on the ages of my students as to whether I would share this in the classroom.  I did enjoy hearing another version of the story, but I tend to still favor the “mushy” story.  This book is also a bi-lingual book.  It is told in English and Spanish.  I think this would be great for your ELL learners.

 

Which version do you prefer... and why?