Literacy Quilts

This past year I had a wonderful opportunity to 'team teach' with an amazing Grade 2 teacher.  Team teaching is a fantastic opportunity for the TL, classroom teacher and students to really utilise the Library space and resources.  Me and this teacher did some beautiful work together while focusing on literacy building skills.  Given the opportunity, I would love to team teach with every single teacher in the school, but due to budget and time constraints it did not happen.  Discussing with the staff at the end of the year, perhaps a rotating class roster where a class gets 4 weeks one-on-one for team taught project based learning may be order.  Hoping to find a permanent home at this school would allow this plan to come to fruition.  More on this topic later I'm sure......I will keep you posted.

The story The Quiltmaker's Gift by Jeff Brumbeau is a brilliant story of how a greedy king learns the joy of giving with the aid of a magical quiltmaker.  The illustrations in the book are gorgeous and it lends itself well to story prediction.  The grade 2 students really enjoyed it, and the following lessons got them really engaged with telling their own "happiness quilts".

The students each got a square of paper that was to be divided into 4 triangles.  Each student filled out 4 things or events that make them 'truly happy'.  A big discussion was on how not all things that make you happy are electronic....

After the rough copy was complete, they each got a square of 100% cotton that was pre-divided with a pencil.  They used crayons to colour their good copy onto the fabric.  I had pre-ironed the squares onto parchment paper to give them a bit of stability.

When the colouring was complete they each got to iron the crayon wax residue by placing plain newsprint over the image and ironing over the newsprint.  This melts the wax off and leaves only the pigment stuck to the cotton.

Then the students (with some amazing parent volunteer help) hand stitched their square 'x'.  I would strongly suggest some volunteer help here or you will be threading needles until you are blue in the face.....

You then give all the finished squares to your talented mother who will create a gorgeous quilt that can be proudly displayed in the Library!! *Thanks Mommy*

My Daddy hand carved the hanging pole for the quilt to be displayed.  (Having talented parents is a bonus when starting a project like this!!)

The students (and myself) were super proud of this creation.  The Grade ones were already asking if they get to make one next year! It took about a month (with a 35min block each week) and with some parents volunteers coming in during class time.  It was well worth the effort though!

 

What happened to June?

First off, I would again like to apologize for the lack of posts.  If you are anything like me, reports become due and then my world falls into the spiral that is the "End of the Year Time".  On top of that, my contract for the year ended which also kicked me into panic mode where the Library needed to be fixed up in case I don't return.  *sigh*

I held an end of the year Library Return Contest where the class with the least amount of outstanding books won prizes as follows: First place: Pizza Party, Second Place: Cupcake Party and Third Place: Freezie Party.  The students really responded well and the amount of books that came quickly pouring in made me really behind with my shelving!! The contest was a success since the winning class had zero outstanding books.  You read that right, ZERO.  I even did a happy dance.  Then pile on writing bills for books and reshelveing an insane amount of literature and then packing up my office and you have one tired Librarian.  I only put in two extra days during the summer to fixing up the hot mess that was the Non-Fiction section with the amazing help of my Mommy.

Now, onto the fun part.  Since I am new at the Teacher Librarian biz, I am quite behind with the popular 'literature' (and I use the term loosely) that fly off the shelves.  So for my summer project I took out what I figured to be enough books to see me through the next two months (keep in mind I have an insanely busy 18 month old).  These titles are: The Lightning Theif by Rick Riodan, Diary of a Wimpy Kid by Jeff Kinney, Distant Waves by Suzanne Weyn, The 39 Clues: The Maze of Bones by Rick Riordan, Rainbow Magic: Shannon the Ocean Fairy by Daisy Meadows, The Secrets of Droon: The Hidden Stairs and The Magic Carpet by Tony Abbott, The Adventures of Captain Underpants: The First Ever Epic Novel by Dav Pilkey, Girl in a Cage by Jane Volen and Robert Harris.

Now onto the professional books......

To use of the last of my glorious Professional Development money, I purchased the following books which I will be doing some reviews on in later posts.

The Art and Science of Teaching by Robert J. Marzano (this book is a re-buy since I had this book before and lent it out never to return), Literacy, Libraries and Learning by Ray Doiron and Marlene Asselin, Reading With Meaning by Debbie Millar and Fun-Brarian: Games, Activities and Ideas to Liven Up Your Library! by Kathleen Fox.  I also have Strategies that Work by Anne Harvey on order with Amazon.

I also gave the 'ol blog a bit of an update.  I found the old graphics to be really dark and boring.  How do you like the new look?

Happy Summer Reading!