Because of Winn Dixie

Because of Winn Dixie by Kate Dicamillo is the book I chose when we were learning about names.  I remembered this book because it was a Lifetime movie that was very intriguing to me.  Learning about names was a different way to look at this book that I had never thought about.  Not only can [...]

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Shared Readings

I never knew there were so many different ways that incorporated shared readings.  When I was in elementary school I always sat on the carpet in front of the teacher with a “big book” in her hands and listened to her read each page as we “oohed and ahhed” about the pictures.  I do believe [...]

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Judy Brown article

I particularly enjoyed this article because it pertained to the primary levels which easily could be used in the upper levels as well.  When given the task to complete a WRI with a student at Hardin Park I was a bit nervous.  I learned all about WRI and teaching students to read this summer in [...]

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Social Studies Trade Books for Struggling Readers

This article directly relates to our conversations in class the past couple of days.  I was extremely intrigued in class when I found out that reading groups and math groups directly correlate to students reading in the classroom.  What I mean is that, if I have 4 reading groups in my classroom that obviously means [...]

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Pirates

The Pirates article was interesting because I was introduced to Twin Text and pairing fiction and non-fiction books.  I enjoy that idea because students can not only explore and use their imagination with ficiton, they can also learn facts from non-fiction and notice that between the two the story could closely resemble their facts.  This [...]

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all the small poems and fourteen more

This book is a little touch and go for me.  I’ve never fully grasped poetry and meanings that other people pull from something I have just read do not usually match up.  Not that this is a bad thing, I am not a very abstract thinker.  I like stability and meaning and sometimes interpretation can [...]

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Brown Angels

I read this book and found myself reading some pages more than once to fully understand the meaning.  Once I read Love that dog and saw that Walter Dean Myers was such an influence I went back to the book to read the full excerpt of Love That Boy.  Everyone has someone in their life [...]

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Ordinary Inspirations

These two items go together … “Squish” and “Bank”.  I’m not sure why I leave the “L” out of blanket or my abbreviation, I just always have.  Squish is the “pillow” I take with me everywhere minus my real pillow.  I am very territorial of Squish and share Bank when necessary.  I don’t like Squish [...]

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Love That Dog

This book was nothing like I expected it would be.  Jack made me look at Poetry in such a different light.  I was always the student that didn’t have anything to write about or if I had a subject I couldn’t make it into a poem that I thought was good enough.  As the book [...]

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What’s in a name

I’ve never really looked up my name like this before but found it pretty interesting.  My name is Casey Ryan Gill and I am quite happy with it! Casey: From an Irish surname . The name Cathasaigh means “vigilant” in Gaelic. It is also given in honour of Casey Jones (1863-1900), a train engineer who [...]

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