Anansi Completed Projects

Class 3-1 have finally completed their work on Anansi the Spider.  They all did a great job working in groups to complete their projects and today we had the opportunity to watch the 3-1 Anansi Theatre Group perform their own remake of Anansi and the Seven Yam Hills by Elizabeth Lane. As you will see in the video, their version is called Anansi and the Six Potatoes and Anansi is up to his old mean tricks.



Class 3-1 is full of students who are anxious to learn everyday.  This ELL class spend a couple of weeks in the library listening to Anansi stories and sharing what they learned about Anansi tales.  This particular group performed their own remake of an Anansi tale in which Anansi tricks all the animals...until he meets Ms. Nancy the goose.

Anansi the Spider Has Arrived in the Library

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Class 3-1 has begun their African unit and have decided to focus their studies on the West African folktales of Anansi the Spider.  After learning some basic facts about Africa, Ms. Sosa and I read some of the more popular retold stories about this little trickster.  In each of the stories they learned that Anansi was a lazy, mean, and greedy character.  Students listened to:
Anansi and the Magic Stick by Eric Kimmel
Ananse and the Lizard by Pat Cummings
Ananse's Feast by Tololwa M. Mollel

They are currently working on group projects that include acrostic poems, 3D Anansi, Anansi and African animals, as well as remake performance of Anansi and the 5 Yams Plant with a class 3-1 twist.  Be on the lookout for some of the final projects soon, in the meantime check out the work in progress below:

Top Books

For the past 2 months students have visited the library in search of their favorite books of interest.  Here is a list of the top ten books that have circulated this school year so far.  Is your favorite book on the list? 

1. Goosebumps: My Friends Call Me Monster	Stine, R. L.
2. Diary of a Wimpy kid : The Last Straw	Kinney, Jeff.
3. Goosebumps: Phantom of the Auditorium	Stine, R. L.
4. Franny K. Stein: Attack of the 50-ft. Cupid	Benton, Jim.
5. Diary of a Wimpy Kid : Greg Heffley's Journal	Kinney, Jeff.
6. Diary of a Wimpy Kid : Rodrick Rules	Kinney, Jeff.
7. The Baby-sitter's Club. [2], The Truth About Stacey : A Graphic Novel	Telgemeier, Raina.
8. Diario de Greg : Días de Perros	Kinney, Jeff.
9. Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days	Kinney, Jeff.
10.Dragon Ball Z. Vol. 18	Toriyama, Akira

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Have you seen the Leaf Man and all the leaf characters blowing in the wind? Lois Ehlert creations using all types of leaves makes The Leaf Man very appealing to our students.  Today Kindergarten students listened to the story and found a bunch of characters made with real leaves in the pages of the book.  As they went on a journey for miles with the Leaf Man, they found cows, turtles, fish and even turkeys.  Each student colored leaves and then shared their own thinking about where the wind would blow their own leaves this Fall season.

Have You Met Dewey?

Class 5-2 and 5-3 have learned how the non-fiction section of the library is organized.  They now know that Melvile Dewey created the Dewey Decimal System many years ago in order to organize non-fiction books by a subject's category.   All non-fiction books are separated into 10 different categories, making it easier for students to locate non-fiction books for their research projects.  However, they should not forget how important the call number of books can be as well.  After using the OPAC to search for specific books in our library students can now pinpoint the category and reduce the amount of time spent searching the shelves.

If you come to the library just look for the signs that will help you identify each of the categories listed below:

000-099     General Works
100-199     Philosophy and Psycology
200-299     Regilion and Mythology
300-399     Social Sciences 
400-499     Languages
500-599     Natural Science
600-699     Applied Science
700-799     Arts and Recreation
800-899     Literature
900-999     Geography and History

Elephants and Piggie

They're funny!
They're silly!
They make me laugh!
They are best friends!

These are the words that some kindergarten students used to describe a couple of my favorite characters, Elephant and Piggie! This week they got the chance to hear two of Mo Willems' books, Elephants Cannot Dance! and Can I Play Too?  They quickly learned that Elephants can dance and snakes cannot catch a ball. What really made these stories fun was when the students acted out Elephant dancing and when they tried to catch a ball without using their hands.  Such simple actions caused a lot of laughter! Totally fun!

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