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Showing posts from 2018

Here Comes Santa Claus

November flew by quickly!  My New York and Alabama family were here to visit for the week-long, Thanksgiving break.  We made some fun memories together, and I cooked the biggest meal of my life! After they left, we promptly put up our Christmas tree. :D Before it snowballs into December, here's a catch-up of all that I've been up to at work this past month with my students: Kindergarten has been reviewing and learning about plot elements: Character (who or what the story is about), Setting (where and when the story takes place), and Plot (the events in the story).  Then I showed them the Early Reader shelves in the "E" for Everybody section, to encourage them to get a book that they will definitely be able to read to themselves. First grade has been practicing locating books in the "E" section by looking at the shelf labels and looking at the book spines.  It's a work-in-progress, and something we'll definitely be practicing again this yea

Incredibly Busy in the Library

Guess what?!? When eating at Your Pie in Suwanee, I saw an advertisement in the side of the napkin dispenser. It got me to thinking, 'Do our school napkin dispensers have this feature?  How could I leverage that into getting my students to read even more?'  It turns out that our Cafeteria Manager, Mrs. Mathis, is cool with me having students share their book reviews in the sides of our cafeteria napkin dispensers!  So, I pulled typed, book reviews that students had already submitted on Biblionasium, and formatted them to fit.  I added a picture of the book cover with the students' name, teacher, and grade.  I emailed their teachers to send them down for a photo to share on our school's Twitter feed, #SharonStrong.  Fingers crossed more students take the time to write an engaging book review to share with the school!   I set up a Biblionasium challenge for Newberry books where students have to read and log 10 of 25 Newberry winning books from 1994 - 2018

Tweet, Tweet ;)

I'm doing it!  I'm posting before it's been 6 months! Haha!   I've been posting new books to our school's #SharonStrong as often as I can, to promote the new books we have purchased.   Through promoting our new books, author Ame Dyckman, saw one of my posts, contacted me, and sent our school enough "Misunderstood Shark" bookmarks and stickers, so that each child at school got both!  I posted her letters up next to our bulletin board.  The kids LOVED them, and continue to love reading her stories! And, before our county subscription to TeachingBooks.net ended, I entered a book contest and won this book for our school!  It's going into our Professional Library, since it's a paperback.   C.A.S.T.L.E. (Collaborative and Social Technology Learning Environment, also known as the library) Apprentices, or 5th grade helpers, have started working to create our monthly bulletin board and shelf display.  They're doing a marvelous j

5th Year Librarian

I can’t hardly believe it, but it’s my 5th year as a librarian! I’ve decided to dial back my expectations on myself this year.  Over the summer, I read Susan Cain’s “Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking”, and it really brought me a sense of peace about being myself; not pushing myself to be more extroverted than I am.  To keep following my passions, but to do so at a pace that doesn’t leave me feeling exhausted and depleted. :D For this new school year, I used the Avery template for file folder labels to update the nonfiction shelf labels.  And, though the pictures turned out tiny, they really help to give a visual cue to students who don't look in the media catalog before going to the shelves.  I also divided up the sports section into major sports, so that it's MUCH easier to keep them organized.  :) My professional goal this year is to work on promoting reading through a variety of outlets.  One is by creating an ECH (Early CHapters) Bo

Resolutions: Changing Habits

I am currently plowing through one of the most interesting books I’ve read in quite a while, thanks to one of my 2018 resolutions to read more books that are of personal interest, and not just juvenile literature, like I did last year.  (Thanks also goes to Goodreads’ book goal email-50 novels for the year, and The Gwinnett Public Library for having such a wide variety of eBooks.) The book is  The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business by Charles Duhigg.  Lots of awesome insights, based on scientific studies, into how people’s habits drive them and how they can change those habits.  It also discusses the role of groups in creating culture. I’m only halfway through the book, but I started it yesterday and had two semi-final, college football games to watch last night. :D #RollTide This 2017-2018 school year, our administration and school put forth a culture of #BeTheChange, in which we not only enacted purposeful times to do good within our school community-bringin