Number one, and probably two through ten, on my list are the Elephant and Piggie books by Mo Willems.  If you have never witnessed the power of Mo Willems on a six-year-old, I command you to get thee to your local bookstore and purchase a copy of My Friend Is Sad.  Casually leave it around (or excitedly read it to) your neighborhood first grader.  Give up on the idea of him or her noticing anything you say after that for about ten minutes, as he or she proceeds to read the book to him or herself again.  Gleefully.  With expression.  No, really!

Today I Will Fly!

Mo Willems is also the author of Caldecott Honor-winning Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus! and Caldecott Honor-winning Knuffle Bunny and Knuffle Bunny Too (and soon to be released Knuffle Bunny Free!).  He deserves a cult following for so many reasons.  His blog is excellent, and his Twitters are hilarious.  His web site has the best ad-free games out there for preschoolers. He just has this amazing knack for writing exactly what kids want to hear (and drawing what they want to see).

The Elephant & Piggie books fall nicely into that first-grade range of average readers (about a guided reading level of E through H).  This means even the most struggling reader can successfully enjoy an E&P book without too much effort.  Magically, readers who read far above the reading level presented here will still love them.  Oh, did I mention he has a brand new set of even EASIER readers about Cat the Cat and her friends? And they still manage to be engaging and funny?  How the heck does he do it, folks?

Hi, Fly Guy!

My next favorite choice, and closer to the H-I end of the guided reading spectrum, is the Fly Guy series by Tedd Arnold (Parts, More Parts and Even More Parts).  They tell the story of Buzz, a fly, and the boy he adopts.  These are especially popular with reluctant readers in my library, which is odd because I don’t find them particularly funny (engaging and dear, yes; funny, no).

My last choice, and one I am almost reluctant to put on here, is the seemingly neverending series of books by pseudonymous Daisy Meadows about fairies.  You know the ones I mean – those books your son or daughter demands to have read aloud every night?

The thing about the Rainbow Fairy books is, they are a huge hit with first graders (good) and they are actually not bad.  But they are all the same. All.  The.  Same.  Parents will come to dread reading them aloud.  This will never happen with Elephant and Piggie,  not even after sixty+ repetitions in seven days (and I speak from experience).

Rainbow Magic books are designed to be read by independent readers.  They fall solidly in the level M books, several levels beyond what first graders are “supposed” to comprehend, but they have very predictable stories and keep the vocabulary easy to read and clear.  By agreeing to read them aloud to your children, you are cheating them out of an interactive read-aloud experience with you. They’ll be able to eat this cake themselves in just a few months, but they can easily comprehend read-alouds at least two grade levels above where they can comprehend their own words — so why not share with them some nutritious AND delicious Despereaux, say, or Toy Dance Party? Let them wait to eat cake.

I do find that many of my first grade students can read these books themselves by the end of first grade, but it is not typical.  On the other hand, my four-year-old is reading Ruby the Red Fairy herself.

I think every classroom needs books kids will beg to read.  Otherwise, we’re asking them to do something really challenging (read on their own) with material that is only so-so.  That makes it that much harder.  When a child is engaged in their material, whatever it is, they will do whatever they have to to understand and consume it.  That’s the kind of learner I want to teach!

What books do you use with your beginning readers?  What books do they absolutely love?

What do you think about saving certain books for reading independently?

What are your favorite read-alouds for first graders?

That Workshop Book

I count myself lucky that I’ve had the literacy training I’ve had.  I was classroom educated at a time when balanced literacy was just coming into its own.  I read (and tabbed) Fountas and Pinnell.  I got guided reading, writing and word study training right along side my upper elementary teachers and lower elementary teachers, for several years. We had one of the district’s only literacy coaches right in our building and I’ve learned so much from her.

Now, getting ready to go into the classroom as a content teacher for the first time, really, ever, I stumbled across this glowing recommendation for Samantha Bennett’s book, from two educators I respect very much. So of course I had to run out and ILL it.  I inhaled it over the course of two days, not even stopping to take notes, knowing already by the end of the first chapter that this would be a book I would return to again and again — not only as a fantastic analysis of several teachers’ teaching in workshop, but also as a mentor text for writing about assessment.

I am anxious about assessment, it being one of those things I’ve dabbled in but never really did as a media specialist (and no “participation grade” here).  I’m also suspicious about the benefit of many kinds of assessment.  Bennett alleviated all my fears and more — she made me excited about assessment.

I love her language, the way it always reflects the utmost respect for children as people, as autonomous learners, and celebrate our role as listeners and coaches.  Again and again (the book is repetitive, but never to excess — just another structure/routine/ritual/system that all readers appreciate!) she used the phrase, “Will this help my student become a better adult?”  How often do you hear education couched in that ultimate goal?  Nothing about grades.  Nothing about achievement or scores.  Just pure learning.  I basked in the glow of this book and let my dreaming self create a classroom in which children could REALLY be free to learn what they wanted, to proceed at their own pace, and to retain their wonder and excitement about school.

I also know I would give just about anything to attend one of Bennett’s workshops in Colorado. Unfortunately, mother of two small children as I am, I’m unlikely to have a spare weekend and several hundred dollars to spare anytime soon.  So, the book will have to do for now.  But I’ve got my eye on you, Ms. Bennett.

Amazon | more about Bennett’s workshop on workshops |  comments on her book

What teaching books have inspired you the most?  What books do you go back to when you need advice?

Yes.  I was unprepared, as most first-year teachers are.  But now I find myself doing it again for the first time.  Teaching in a classroom is, I already know, different.  The pacing is different.  The content, yes, of course, although as a librarian I dipped into most areas of content and became quite familiar with many.  But I really have no idea how to occupy a passel of little bodies over the course of an entire day.  That is my biggest hurdle.

So I started out doing what I do best: research.  I began by asking a series of questions (incidentally, I began with first instead of second because I feel more confident with second graders, and first grade curriculum will provide some basic building blocks all students can benefit from):

• What does a new first grade teacher need to know to be successful?
• What do first graders need to learn?
• What do other first grade teachers teach at my school?  How do they teach it?

Then, I mined my questions for keywords and key phrases, grouped using quotations:

“new first grade teacher” “need to know” learn teach

Then I Googled this keyword grouping.  If I were working with students, I would encourage them to use http://infotopia.info/ instead of Google, to maximize their chances of getting appropriate and useful hits, but I am an experienced data miner and able to sort through the enormous wad of chaff a typical Google search blows in one’s face.

I selected fifteen or so of the choicest top 100+ hits, and of course used the keyboard shortcut cmd-click to automatically put each one in a new tab.  Then I methodically read through each one and copied/pasted my favorite suggestions, and occasionally the URL to an entire page, on a Sticky.  Here’s a lovely one (and, unfortunately, I have not been citing my sources, since this is just for my own use, so I can’t tell you where I got it from – ack! bad librarian!):

After reading Chrysanthemum (or any book about names), I like to have the students write their name on 1″ graph paper (horizontally), cut it out and graph the names, shortest to longest. Glue the name strips onto chart paper to display. Then each child writes their name again on an index card. I have precut 3″ letters ready for them to come up and choose the letters in their names. Of course, for classroom management, I call those students who have an a (or a’s) in their name first, then b, and so on. When the entire class has the letters they need for their name, we then graph each letter. We analyze which is the most common letter in our classroom, least common, same amount and so on. It is a great way to get to know each other, and learn something about math, too. When the letter graph is complete, maybe the next day we will use unifix cubes to represent the quantity of each letter, display this concrete graph on a counter, and fill in a paper graph using crayons. My most important suggestion for a new first grade teacher is to keep your sense of humor and make sure that what you have the students do matters! They don’t need busy work, and neither do you. Good luck.

Any book titles that were recommended I immediately looked up on Amazon to read the reviews.  It’s the quickest and dirtiest method; if I were looking for ACTUAL reviews, I’d use Titlewave, but as it is, I’m in a hurry.  If the books still looked good, I added them to my Goodreads TBR list and tagged them “teaching” so I could easily find them later.  Finally, I wishlisted each of them on Paperbackswap, in the hopes I could get several of them for free (not likely for most of these classic titles, but I’ve gotten lucky before).

My next course of action is to choose one or two and ILL them from the local library.  I can get about 80% of all books I want for free from the library this way.  The rest will remain on my Goodreads list until I can ask my colleagues if any of them have copies I can borrow.

Along with that, I will examine the Michigan GLCEs (that’s Grade Level Content Expectations for you non-Michigan-teachers) for 1st and 2nd grade in depth, so I can be prepared conceptually as I begin to read and re-read the books on my TBR list.

Finally, I will begin to craft a scenario of what my classroom will look like and feel like, what the routines will be, and how students will achieve their goals.  This is a much larger hurdle and can’t be encompassed within a simple research question, but it’s a start.

What suggestions do you have for this new-to-grade-level teacher? Post them in the Comments field!  And subscribe to my RSS feed if you want to watch my progress along this journey.  Thanks for reading!!