Book Fair and Book Report

December 15, 2011 | Posted in: Class Updates

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The fall book fair is in full swing today!  Having opened yesterday, the book fair is accessible to parents today (Thursday) until 7:00pm and tomorrow (Friday) from 8:00am to 4:00pm.  There are some outstanding books there including “The Ultimate Writing Guide for Students” by Mignon Fogarty, who makes the Grammar Girl podcast online.  (She gave a terrific “shout-out” to our class a few months ago when she learned that I use some of her work in my lessons.)  There are, of course, other terrific books for sale, and your purchases help our school!  Please consider stopping by!

At the book fair, you and/or your student might find a perfect book for the new book report project.  Kids received the assignment yesterday afternoon and had the homework assignment of sharing the project with you last night.  As you may have seen, the kids have been asked to make a book jacket that shares information about a fictional book they will read.  They will need to summarize the text, make connections to the text, and describe the story’s main characters.  You may have noticed that the assignment also comes across as particularly detailed (read: picky) in terms of measurements, placement of information, elements to include, etc.  There’s a reason for this!  This book report serves three main purposes.  First and foremost, of course, is helping kids to practice reading comprehension skills and sharing information about what they have read.  Second, this assignment will help kids learn to manage their time as they work on a long term project.  A calendar has been provided to the kids so they can track their progress as they work on the project.  This is a difficult skill and a key life skill.  Third, this assignment will give the students an opportunity to practice following detailed directions.  It’s important that they learn to follow multiple directions at once, which this assignment certainly includes when specifying measurements, positioning, etc.  It may seem picky, but kids do need to master this skill.  Hopefully this will be a fun project for kids!  Please feel free to email me with any questions.  Remember, books must be approved by me, and kids’ selections are due no later than next Friday morning.