Author of the Month: Kevin Henkes

For Each month I pick an author for the kids to focus on. For the month of March I chose Kevin Henkes. I usually will go to the library and pick out all at the books that the particular author has written and place them in the reading corner. Since most of my kindergarteners can not read and only look at the pictures, to possibly create their own story in their head, I choose an author who uses many different colors with vivid pictures.
One of Kevin Henkes's famous books is Lilly's Purple Plastic Purse. I like to take this book and read it to the children. I usually do this reading before the literary stations. I do this because after reading the book each child will do an activity within their reading group.  The reason why I choose this particular Kevin Henkes book is because my children can relate to what Lilly goes through. In the story Lilly has her favorite purple plastic purse that she wants to bring to school so badly! When she finally brings it to school for show and tell she doesn't want to put it away and the teacher has to take it up. As a class I always start a discussion about how we all have had something taken away from us for a little while but at the end of the day we will get it back. Usually I can find a few students who will provide input and have the ability to grow in conversation from there. I finish the book about Lilly and her favorite plastic purse and then describe what the activity will be.
While each student is in the reading station of the rotation I hand them a piece of white paper with the shape of a star on it. I do not use a purse outline because I don't want the boys in the classroom to get worked up about drawling inside of a purse. So inside of the star I have each child drawl a picture of something that they would bring into to show and tell. During the station I will go up to each student and have them tell me what they are drawling. I then encourage them to come up with a one sentence. With me dictating the sentence I write it down on the bottom of the paper for them. For some of the students this will be difficult coming up with the sentence but for others I have to make them focus on one thing! I do this for every group, even if they are not done drawling the picture I will still write the sentence for them, that way I can get through every student.
When stations are over I have each student come to the front of the room and tell the class about what they have drawn not the paper. After they are done telling about their picture I have them attempt to read the sentence that we just wrote together. I am standing in the front of the room so for the students who struggle with one or two words I am there to help.
Most of the students love this activity and especially enjoy the book before! Hope this gives everyone some good ideas about an activity to do with author of the month!

                  Dr. Seuss's Birthday

            and Read Across America! 

As many of the fellow teachers know Saturday March 2, it was Dr. Susses birthday and this was also national read across America Day! My students were able to participate in this day on Friday since we were not on school on Saturday!

The first activity that we had was to do the Dr. Seuss read a thon, where each student was required to read one Dr. Seuss book and then drawl a picture summarizing what was just read in the book. The students loved this activity and were very thrilled when we then made paper cat in the cats. I ended the Dr. Seuss party by reading to them on of my favorite books by Dr. Seuss, One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish.  The students were very surprised when I then gave each of them a pack of goldfish where they were able to have their own fish! 

At the end of the day we discussed read across America day! I was able to explain to th children that everywhere there was at least one student who was reading a book. Since some of my children in the lower learning groups could not read yet I decided to pick out a book and read it to them. The book that I chose to read was Make Way for Ducklings by, Robert McCloskey. The children loved the book and did not want it to end. We had a fun little activity with the book by then requiring them to go home and find another book about a duck and read it with their parents. For their homework this weekend I asked each one of my children to read a book with their parents every night, either have their parents read to them or they read to their parents and then write it down. As an incentive to do this activity for every book each child reads I will give them a gold star. I will be explaining my gold star general in a later post! 

Hope everyone else had a good Dr. Seuss Birthday and were able to pick up a book to read this weekend for Read Across America Day!