How the Grinch Stole Christmas has been a part of my holiday celebrations for over 40 years. I love this story! The humour, drama and rhyming text build to expertly give the message that toys are not what this time of year is about. It's about celebrating and being thankful for the love of friends and family. Although this is a Christmas story, the message can be appreciated by anyone. I read this story as a preamble to our watching the cartoon version.
The class watched this as a companion piece to hearing the book version read aloud. Hearing Boris Karloff's voice telling the story of How the Grinch Stole Christmas brings back lots of memories for me and my children. This cartoon stays faithful to the story by Dr. Seuss, but adds some wonderful songs to help the story along. When my children were little, I bought the video version of this cartoon and to my horror, there was a different voice telling the story over the original cartoon. How disappointing! I believe that Boris Karloff makes this verison the classic that it is. The director, Chuck Jones (he directed many of the "Loony Tunes" cartoons) did a brilliant job adapting the book. In my opinion, this cartoon is perfect.
Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer is another holiday classic. Even though many students do not celebrate Christmas, it is important to give them context for many of the songs and images they see this time of year. This is a great story to discuss important universal themes like bullying and being different. The students are now becoming more sophisticated in their ability to discuss books by answering questions like, "Why was Rudolph so sad at the beginning of the story?" and "How do you know" and giving evidence from the text to support their answers. It was a powerful lesson for the students when they realize that the very thing that Rudolph was bullied for (having a different nose) was the thing that saved the day at the end of the story.
Thursday, December 16, 2010
Friday, December 10, 2010
Read Aloud Books for December 10
Dinner at the Panda Palace is an engaging story that uses the basic structure of a "+1" growing pattern, to tell a story. The Panda Palace is a restaurant and different groups of animals enter to eat there (i.e., one elephant, two lions). After repeated readings, the students were able to read along with the predictable text. The ending is sweet, showing that Mr. Panda was a kind host, but also showed how the numbers 1 to 10, when added together, equals 55.
Snow is my Favorite and my Best is a cute story about winter and winter activities. I also chose this book because there are two children in my class with the same name as the little girl "Lola" in the story. Many of the illustrations use paper snowflakes and I will use this book later as a link to when the children learn how to cut paper snowflakes in class next week.
Dewey - There's a Cat in the Library is a non-fiction story of how a small, abandoned kitten became a world-famous library cat. I found this book after I read the book that Vicki Myron wrote for adults about her 19 year relationship with this amazing cat. People from all over the world came to visit the library in the small town of Spencer, Iowa, just to see this cat. I also brought in a small, stuffed Dewey look-alike for the children to play with.
As a connection to the first book, Dewey's Christmas at the Library, is a nice companion story for the children to listen to. The students can then use what they know about the character to help them understand the second story. As not everyone celebrates Christmas, this is a good story to talk about the kinds of activities that people do to celebrate this holiday.
Snow is my Favorite and my Best is a cute story about winter and winter activities. I also chose this book because there are two children in my class with the same name as the little girl "Lola" in the story. Many of the illustrations use paper snowflakes and I will use this book later as a link to when the children learn how to cut paper snowflakes in class next week.
Dewey - There's a Cat in the Library is a non-fiction story of how a small, abandoned kitten became a world-famous library cat. I found this book after I read the book that Vicki Myron wrote for adults about her 19 year relationship with this amazing cat. People from all over the world came to visit the library in the small town of Spencer, Iowa, just to see this cat. I also brought in a small, stuffed Dewey look-alike for the children to play with.
As a connection to the first book, Dewey's Christmas at the Library, is a nice companion story for the children to listen to. The students can then use what they know about the character to help them understand the second story. As not everyone celebrates Christmas, this is a good story to talk about the kinds of activities that people do to celebrate this holiday.
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
Read Aloud Books for December 3
Eric Carle's book, Today is Monday is a great review of the seven days of the week. As well, the students learned the names of some new animals (e.g., pelican) and followed and repeated aloud the growing word pattern of the text. The illustrations were also a talking point for the class as Eric Carle uses torn and cut paper for his collages (as did Leo Leonni in Little Blue and Little Yellow that we read last week) and the students also made tissue paper collages in class this week.
In this classic TV special, now on DVD, the story of Frosty the Snowman is told through animation and songs. Personally, I am quite fond of this video as I remember looking forward to watching it every year on TV when I was a child and then watching it with my own children at this time of year. The class talked about how a video is also a story but just told in a different way. There was a lot to discuss as the children realized the science of why Frosty couldn't be inside with his new friends (he would melt) and why he was trying to get to the North Pole (where it is winter temperatures all year round).
Frosty the Snowman, the book, was a new find for my teaching practice this year. I wanted to illustrate to my class the different ways to tell a story by watching the video of Frosty. Then I found this wonderful book that illustrates the lyrics to the song, "Frosty the Snowman" (which I learned was written in 1950). After reading the story, the students talked about how it was the same as the video and how it was different. When I pointed out that the words were actually the words in the song and then "sang the story" to them, they realised that a song is another way to tell a story.
The story, I Have a Little Dreidel, is a book about the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah. It is very accessible to young children as the focus in on how Jewish families celebrate this holiday over 8 days by lighting the candles on a menorah (candle holder), making potato latkes (potato pancakes) and playing the dreidel (spinning top) game. As my family celebrates both Hanukkah and Christmas at our house, I was able to bring in a menorah, candles and dreidels to show the children. The students also learned that the words in this book are also the lyrics to "The Dreidel Song". Another example of song as a way to tell a story!
In this classic TV special, now on DVD, the story of Frosty the Snowman is told through animation and songs. Personally, I am quite fond of this video as I remember looking forward to watching it every year on TV when I was a child and then watching it with my own children at this time of year. The class talked about how a video is also a story but just told in a different way. There was a lot to discuss as the children realized the science of why Frosty couldn't be inside with his new friends (he would melt) and why he was trying to get to the North Pole (where it is winter temperatures all year round).
Frosty the Snowman, the book, was a new find for my teaching practice this year. I wanted to illustrate to my class the different ways to tell a story by watching the video of Frosty. Then I found this wonderful book that illustrates the lyrics to the song, "Frosty the Snowman" (which I learned was written in 1950). After reading the story, the students talked about how it was the same as the video and how it was different. When I pointed out that the words were actually the words in the song and then "sang the story" to them, they realised that a song is another way to tell a story.
The story, I Have a Little Dreidel, is a book about the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah. It is very accessible to young children as the focus in on how Jewish families celebrate this holiday over 8 days by lighting the candles on a menorah (candle holder), making potato latkes (potato pancakes) and playing the dreidel (spinning top) game. As my family celebrates both Hanukkah and Christmas at our house, I was able to bring in a menorah, candles and dreidels to show the children. The students also learned that the words in this book are also the lyrics to "The Dreidel Song". Another example of song as a way to tell a story!
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