It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

It's Monday! What are you reading? was started by Sheila at Book Journey and was adapted for children's books from pictures books through YA by Jen of Teacher Mentor Texts and Kellee of Unleashing Readers. You can visit either site for a round up of blogs sharing their weekly readings and thoughts or search Twitter for #IMWAYR.

Other Posts this Week

Just wanted to share a shout-out for Part 1 of my new series about classroom libraries: Building Your Classroom Library. Tips and advice for how to starting building your library, as well as an overview of the importance of having a classroom library. Alright, now onto this week's reads ...

Picture Books

I am still having SO much fun going through all the books and posts from this year's Picture Book 10 for 10! Tried to whittle it down to just sharing my new favorites, since I didn't want to overwhelm.

Little Red Writing by Joan Holub and illustrated by Melissa Sweet. There are so many great things going on in this book! First, of course, is the fact that Little Red (the pencil) is writing her own Red Riding Hood parody, but I also love the inclusion of individual parts of speech and the "story path" for how to create a fiction story. This could be a touchstone text for students when writing their own fiction stories, as well as helping them use different grammar and parts of speech to bolster their writing. Fun! (H/T Megan at Fourth Grade Literacy Lovers.)

Bee-bim Bop! by Linda Sue Park and illustrated by Ho Baek Lee. This wonderful romp about bee-bim bop made me immediately hungry! This fun picture book covers the whole process for making bee-bim bop told by our hungry and impatient narrator. A joyful read and a great celebration of a favorite Korean dish. (H/T Jodie of Growing Book by Book.)

Exclamation Mark by Amy Krouse Rosenthal and Tom Lichtenheld. This fun look at punctuation presents us with the poor exclamation mark who is stick of always standing out from all the periods. Not until he is interrogated by a question mark, does he discover his true purpose. A fun book and great way to discuss or introduce punctuation to students in a humorous way. (Also, if you have the opportunity, Tom Lichtenheld is a wonderful speaker for an author visit. He came a few years ago and was such an inspiration to students!) (H/T Gigi at The Late Bloomer's Book Blog.)

Poetry

New book alert, What is Poetry? by Trudi Strain Trueit will be published on Sept. 1, 2014. This picture book sized introduction to poetry could be a great resource for early elementary school teachers. Click here to read my full review.

Middle Grade

The Misadventures of the Family Fletcher by Dana Alison Levy. I fell in love with the Fletchers nearly immediately. Four very unique boys with four different voices plus their two fathers, a crotchety neighbor, Zeus the cat, and Sir Puggleton (the pug, naturally) fill out this wonderfully enjoyable realistic fiction story, reminiscent of Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing. I really appreciated that this was a story about a very diverse family that did not make their diversity the center of the story. Instead, it is a story about finding your place, about learning who you are, and about how to throw the best Halloween party the neighborhood has ever seen! This one is a must have for my classroom.

Dash by Kirby Larson, publication date: tomorrow! Another must have. This incredible historical fiction novel tells the story of Japanese Internment through the eyes of 11 year-old Mitsi. You can read my full review here.

Rabbit Hill by Robert Lawson (Newbery Medal 1945). Another for my #nerdbery challenge (43/93). Cute, quick read about all of the small animals in the neighborhood and the big news that "new folks" are coming to live on the hill. Would recommend this one to students who enjoy 'talking animal' books.

Happy Reading! (And Happy Back to School! We start all-in on Thursday.)