Let's Talk about Books - Toys in Space

Hello!

I'm linking up today with Deanna for Let's Talk about Books, a great linky for discovering amazing books!

This week I'm sharing a book by Mini Grey - Toys in Space.

This is a great story within a story about some toys who are left out in the garden one night. Each toy has a distinctive personality and the little interjections they add throughout really demonstrate this.

( I like the thoughtful green dinosaur!)

While lying out in the garden and looking up and the night sky, they toys get beamed aboard a spaceship and meet Hoctopize.

He is searching for his own lost toy and goes around beaming up toys he finds while searching and searching for his lost Cuddles.

The toys from our story explain to him that this isn't right and help him to return all they toys to their rightful homes.

As the alien returns the toys from our story home, he finds his lost toy which had been there all along (and if you look back to the beginning, you will see it was there in the illustrations all along!).

There are so many things you could do in the classroom with this book. There are lots of writing ideas (writing address labels, describing the characters, writing your own speech bubbles for the characters, creating lost toy posters, postcards, researching and writing about the night sky etc.), reading ideas (finding evidence to describe characters, looking at the idea of a story within a story, author technique, themes etc.) and crafty ideas (making a Hoctopize, parachutes, star gazers, designing and making a new toy etc.)

I haven't actually used this book in the classroom other than reading it to the class but I plan to design a unit of work based on it for next year!

I'm heading back over to Mrs Jump's Class blog to read about all the other great books people are sharing. Don't forget to share yours!

Let's Talk About Books - Penguins

It's time to share fabulous books again with Deanna over at Mrs Jump's Class!

This week I thought I would share a non-fiction story with you. 

It is a factual account of the life of a male Emperor Penguin which is beautifully told and engaging.

It is full of information and interesting facts about how the penguin cares for the egg and chick until Mum returns - lots of things I didn't know and that both the children and I were fascinated by!

The main story of how he cares for the egg and chick is added to by additional facts on some of the pages giving further information for older children.

The illustrations are great and my class loved this book when we were doing our topic on Ice. When writing their reports on Penguins, they seemed to remember more facts from one reading of this book than from the time spent researching on laptops and from other non fiction books!

Very child-friendly and absolutely worth a read!

Enjoy!

The Dragonsitter!

Hello!

I'm linking up today with Deanna for Let's Talk about Books, a great linky for discovering amazing books!

Last week we had Josh Lacey, author of the GRK books, in to work with classes from years 2-5!

He talked to the children about his books and answered their questions about being an author, inspiration for his stories and about himself. It was so exciting for them to meet and work with a real author and see what they can aspire to in the future if they want to and work hard!

As I work in year 2 (6-7 year olds), the story he focused on with us was this:

It is perfect for this age group at the end of the school year because it is a chapter book but pretty short (I read it aloud to them in about 20-25 minutes) and very manageable. It is written as a series of emails which means it is easy to dip in and out of and holds their attention. 

Each email has an attachment of a picture too so there are illustrations to show them as you read which always helps (and mine struggle without!).

This is Eddie at the beginning writing the first email to his Uncle Morton Pickle who has left his pet dragon with Eddie and his mum (and sister Emily) to look after for the week. The first email informs Uncle Morton that his dragon has just eaten Jemima, Emily's pet rabbit!

The dragon causes all sorts of bother and we hear about this throughout. It had my class giggling (especially as there are more than a few mentions of dragon poo) and they now can't wait to read more Dragonsitter books.

They did some email writing themselves with Josh Lacey after the whole school assembly about a pet they were sitting for who was causing lots of trouble.

After our writing workshop we went back to class and wrote messages to Josh (email style) thanking him for visiting us and telling him what we enjoyed. I quickly made these messages into a book using copies of the front and back cover of the book and a bit of ribbon. He loved his thank-you gift!

This series of books would be a great first venture into chapter books for young children - you should check this one (and his other books) out!

Don'f forget to link up your favourite books!

Mr Big by Ed Verne

Hello!

I'm linking up again with Deanna for Let's Talk about Books!

This week I am sharing a book I have used recently in my class. We needed a good book to write character descriptions as part of our assessment week. I know there are SO many good books out there with amazing characters, but I really struggled to pick one that would suit everyone. It needed to be a character who had an interesting appearance so my struggling writers could at least write about that, but one with a bit of a story and character development so my high flying writers could really delve into it.

In the end I chose this book:

It was new to me but fit the bill perfectly. Mr Big is a lonely Gorilla who is BIG on the outside but feels small on the inside because everyone is afraid of him. He sees an old piano that looks as lonely as he is one day and takes it home. His sadness makes him play beautiful music which drifts out the window for the town to hear. By the end of the short story, he is playing in a band and is surrounded by people who have got to know the real him and he is happy!

I loved how they noticed things like how his clothes changed from dull, as he didn't want to be noticed, to bright and cheerful as he became more confident!

My class loved the little speech bubbles which litter the pages and thought the expressions they used were really funny.

We wrote our character descriptions and they did a great job!

We also revisited a couple of days later and I asked them to map out the story so I could get a bit of reading assessment evidence from it (to be able to retell with some detail).

It's obviously great to talk about how we shouldn't judge people by looks alone but there are lots of other reading and writing possibilities too!

I'm heading off to see what other great books people are sharing this week at Mrs Jump's Class. You should too!

Let's Talk about Books!

Hunter's Best Friend at School

(by Laura Malone Elliot, Illustrations by Lynn M. Munsinger)

When doing our 'Good to be Me' unit of work, I stumbled across this book and ordered it without knowing very much about it. I am so glad I did though as it has to be my favourite books about teaching children how to behave, peer pressure, being a good role model, helping a friend and being your best self!

Hunter and Stripe are best friends and do everything together and like all the same things. One day, Stripe comes to school and is full of mischief. He makes lots of silly choices including tearing up the paper frog he had made in class. Hunter feels the pressure to do the same as his best friend but ends up feeling very sad about what he has done. 

He learns though, that the best thing he can do when his best friend Stripe is being silly, is to be a good role model. 

Being a good friend is about helping your friends be their best selves.

I read this to my class and it was easy for them to understand the message and I saw an immediate improvement in (some) children's behaviour - they were trying to ignore their friends when they were making the wrong choices and show them the correct behaviour!

It's a book I'll definitely be using again at the start of the new year and throughout the year when needed!

What are the books that you find best teach the children about good behaviour and making the right choices at school? I'm always looking for more!

Don't forget to link up with Deanna at Mrs Jump's Class to share your favourite books!

Happy Reading!