Third Grade Biography Research Puppet Preview!

Third graders are beginning to do research in groups on famous North American people. They will collect information from books in our library as well as online to fill in a Biography Information Booklet. Then they will use the information collected along with a puppet they are creating in art (see cutest ever Einstein & Houdini puppets photo shown on left!) to perform a puppet show. Stay tuned to see the puppet shows once they are complete. See a list of people we are researching below as well as a list of some of the Common Core and American Association of School Librarians standards that this project will cover.

List of biographies by class:

Monteiro Helen Keller Chief Joseph Gabby Douglas Neil Armstrong Steve Jobs Roberto Clemente Charles Drew Ella Fitzgerald

Brun Albert Einstein Harry Houdini Christopher Paul Curtis Jeff Gordon Georgia Okeefe Althea Gibson Sacagawea Barbara Park

D’Ambra Louis Armstrong George Lucas Hillary Clinton Wilma Rudolph Grace Lin Sally Ride Snowflake Bentley

Multidisciplinary projects like this touch on a slew of standards plus offer students a fun and engaging way to learn. Here are just a few of the Common Core (CC) standards and American Association of School Library (AASL) standards that our puppets will cover. I haven't included the art standards here but you can be sure that the puppet piece hits quite a few.

• CC.3.W.7 Research to Build and Present Knowledge: Conduct short research projects that build knowledge about a topic.
• CC.3.W.8 Research to Build and Present Knowledge: Recall information from experiences or gather information from print and digital sources; take brief notes on sources and sort evidence into provided categories.
• CC.3.R.I.2 Key Ideas and Details: Determine the main idea of a text; recount the key details and explain how they support the main idea.
• CC.3.R.I.3 Key Ideas and Details: Describe the relationship between a series of historical events, scientific ideas or concepts, or steps in technical procedures in a text, using language that pertains to time, sequence, and cause/effect.
• CC.3.SL.4 Presentation of Knowledge and Ideas: Report on a topic or text, tell a story, or recount an experience with appropriate facts and relevant, descriptive details, speaking clearly at an understandable pace.
• AASL 1.1.1 Follow an inquiry-based process in seeking knowledge in curricular subjects and make the real world connection for using this process in own life.
• AASL1.1.4 Find, evaluate, and select appropriate sources to answer questions.
• AASL1.1.6 Read, view, and listen for information presented in any format (e.g., textual, visual, media, digital) in order to make inferences and gather meaning.
• AASL 2.1.2 Organize knowledge so that it is useful.
• AASL 2.1.3 Use strategies to draw conclusions from information and apply knowledge to curricular areas, real world situations, and further investigations.
• AASL 2.1.4 Use technology and other information tools to analyze and organize information.
• AASL 2.4.1 Determine how to act on information (accept, reject, modify).

Finger Puppet Fables

Second graders are studying different kinds of folktales in library class. We spent several weeks listening to classic fables and identifying their three main characteristics:
1. short
2. animal characters
3. moral or lesson.
Students then created their own short fables in groups using finger puppet animals and presented them to the class. See a sample fable below. To view all fables, visit our SchoolTube page and search for the following depending on your classroom teacher:


"fable & Silveira"
"fable & Paiva"
"fable & Macnie"

The Chasing Friends

Finger Puppets & Jan Brett Stories

In first grade we explored setting and characters with Jan Brett's The Umbrella and The Mitten by creating similar finger puppet stories.  In The Umbrella, a boy drops his umbrella and one by one rainforest animals pile inside. When it gets full, the umbrella tips over and the animals fall out. In The Mitten, a boy loses his mitten and northern animals climb inside. When the mitten is full, a bear sneezes and all of the animals fly out. First graders were given a template of a story and had to fill in the main character, the object that animals would climb into, the setting, and create an ending. For the animals, each group was given random finger puppets. Students filled in their story, created an ending, and presented it to the class, puppet show-style. View an example below. To see all of the Jan Brett Stories, go to our School Tube page and browse or search for "Jan Brett Stories & your teacher's name."

GeoCards: Around the World with Atlas', Google Street View, & National Geographic

For the past few weeks, fourth graders have been making GeoCard trading cards about some region in the world. We are doing this as part of a collaborative year-long theme on continents at Myron J. Francis. Students were given a region to study in groups. We started with exploring in an atlas and globe. Next, they explored their region on Google Street View and chose a scene that best represents their area. Using National Geographic Kids country section (and Fact Monster for Antarctica) students chose a few fun facts about their areas. Finally, using Google Presentation (Google's version of PowerPoint), they created GeoCards to gather their information in a visually pleasing way. At the end of the unit, students were given two color-printed cards to trade with their classmates. There was a frenzy of excitement as trading began. The most popular cards were Rajadamnern Road, Thailand & Paris, France. During this unit, students learned to use a print atlas, globe, online mapping tools, and explored trusted websites for their research. During the creation of the cards, they learned how to copy and paste images, add information to an existing template, and the importance of citing their sources. The trading piece was just plain fun but also got students to interact with each other and talk about different regions of the world.

View a sampling of our GeoCards here >>

Hank Finds an Egg & Book Scramble

The month is only half over, but already I have a favorite book of the month. I fell in love with Hank Finds an Egg as soon as I saw the cover, and the story and illustrations measure up to the cuteness and intrigue that the cover displays. I am planning on reading this to my extra kindergarten class this week as part of our "Book Scramble" class.  Book Scramble days have 3 parts. First, I read a story to the students and they share their favorite part. Second, students go back to their seats where there is a book waiting for them to read. We put on a timer and they read their book for 3 minutes. At the end of the 3 minutes, each student passes their book to the right and we repeat this process. Toward the end of class, I think of a letter A-Z and whoever guesses the letter, gets to have their favorite book from the Book Scramble read aloud. The books I choose for the scramble are all early readers or books with illustrations so that emerging readers won't get frustrated. There is an equal amount of both fiction and nonfiction. Students enjoy the scramble and I love the ideas of kindergarteners getting to listen to/read four books in one session. Sharing our favorite part and having students pick their favorite book help students in forming opinions with literature and show how sharing opinions of books is an enjoyable life long activity.

If you want to read more about Hank Finds an Egg, read my review on Goodreads.

Top Ten Books in 2013

We've been very busy reading at Myron J. Francis this year. In 2013, students and teachers checked out 12,204 books for recreational reading, school projects, and curriculum connections. Below is a list of "top tens" sorted by chapter books, picture books, nonfiction books, biographies, and graphic novels. I'm happy to see that last year's Newbery Award winner, The One and Only Ivan is in the top ten list for chapter books. The chapter book list was dominated by RI Children Book Award nominees mostly because our 5th graders participate in the Rooster Games with Gordon School in February so they are eager to get seven out of the twenty books on the list read.  Mo Willems and Dr. Seuss stole the show for picture books. It's no surprise that the almanac, world record book, and book of facts were in the top ten for nonfiction. Also not surprising is the Patriots, Celtics, and Haunted America as sports and "scary" books are very popular. I was pleased that Dogs on Duty and Nic Bishop Snakes made it on the top ten nonfiction being excellent science and social studies titles.  Our number one biography this year was about Tony Sarg, the Macy's parade puppeteer. Others in the top ten were Barack Obama, Harry Houdini, Taylor Swift, Joe Louis, and LeBron James - twice!  Captain Underpants and Diary of a Wimpy Kid books took four total slots in the graphic novel top ten but the remaining six had a nice variety. Although Squish by Jennifer Holm made it in the top ten, I was surprised that Babymouse did not. However, Babymouse and Lunch Lady would have made it into the top fifteen. It's always fun to run these stats and reflect on our school's reading habits. I think out of all the lists, the one that struck me the most was the biographies. Next year, I'd like to continue with the sports and entertainment bios enthusiasm but also see more females, scientists, artists, and Native Americans on the list as we have an excellent selection of biographies representing a wide variety of these and other backgrounds in the library. 2013 was a fun filled year.  I am grateful that we have a wonderful collection of books in our library and am excited that students have access to read a wide variety of genres for learning and supporting their life long reading habits. Happy New Year!

Top Ten Chapter Books
1. My Life as a Stuntboy by  Janet Tashjian
2. Wonderstruck by Brian Selznick
3. The One And Only Ivan by Katherine Applegate
4. When Life Gives you O.J. by Erica S. Perl
5. Pie by Sarah Weeks
6. Fractions = Trouble! by Claudia Mills
7. Jake and Lily by Jerry Spinelli
8. King of the Mound: My Summer with Satchel Paige by Wes Tooke
9. The Whole Story of Half a Girl by Veera Hiranandani
10. The Great Wall of Lucy Wu by Wendy Wan Long Shang

Top Ten Picture Books
1. Won-Ton : a Cat Tale Told in Haiku by Lee Wardlaw
2. Green Eggs and Ham by Dr. Seuss
3. The Lorax by Dr. Seuss
4. One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish by Dr. Seuss
5. Can I Play Too?  by Mo Willems
6. Don't Let the Pigeon Stay up Late! by Mo Willems
7. I Am Invited to a Party! by Mo Willems
8. Interrupting Chicken by David Ezra Stein
9. Knuffle Bunny Too : a Case of Mistaken Identity by Mo Willems
10. Pigs Make Me Sneeze! by Mo Willems

Top Ten Nonfiction
1. The World Almanac for Kids 2007
2. Nic Bishop Snakes by Nic Bishop
3. Adventures in Cartooning by James Sturm
4. Big book of Why by, John Perritano
5. Dogs on Duty : Soldiers' Best Friends on the Battlefield and Beyond by Dorothy Hinshaw Patent
6. Meet the Red Sox by Mike Kennedy
7. Guinness world records, 2012.
8. Haunted America : Ghost Stories and True Tales of Terror by Jeff Bahr
9. New England Patriots by  K.C. Kelley
10. Boston Celtics by  K.C. Kelley

Top 10 Biographies
1. Balloons over Broadway : The True Story of the Puppeteer of Macy's Parade by Melissa Sweet
2. Barnum's Bones : How Barnum Brown Discovered the Most Famous Dinosaur in the World by Tracey Fern
3. Taylor Swift by Sarah Tieck
4. Who was Harry Houdini? by Tui Sutherland
5. A Nation's Hope : The Story of Boxing Legend Joe Louis by Matt de la Peña
6. Justin Bieber by Sarah Tieck
7. LeBron James by Mike Kennedy
8. Who is Barack Obama? by Roberta Edwards
9. Jeff Kinney by Megan Gunderson
10.  LeBron James by Jeff Savage

Top Ten Graphic Novels
1. Sidekicks by Dan Santat
2. Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Third Wheel by Jeff Kinney
3. Adventures in Cartooning by James Sturn
4.  Captain Underpants and the invasion of the incredibly naughty cafeteria ladies from outer space by Dav Pilkey
5. Diary of a wimpy kid 4 : dog days by Jeff Kinney
6. Bad Kitty Meets the Baby  by Nick Bruel
7.  Squish : Super Amoeba  by Jennifer Holm
8. The Flying Beaver Brothers and the Evil Penguin Plan by Maxwell Eaton
9.  Captain Underpants and the Wrath of the Wicked Wedgie Woman : a Fifth Epic Novel by Dav Pilkey
10.  Zita the Spacegirl by Ben Hatke & The adventures of Ook and Gluk : Kung-fu cavemen from the future by Dav Pilkey