Mystery Animal Research with Kindergarten

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     Conducting research with kindergarten students can be a daunting task, but I think I found a way to make it fun for them AND manageable for me!  I’ve been spending the year getting them to understand the difference between Fiction and Non-Fiction books, and would often pair two books over similar content to…

Book Care with First Grade

     Have you ever gotten an idea in the middle of the night and just had to get up and go work on it?  That’s what happened to me a few weeks ago, about book care nonetheless!  I was dreaming and came up with what I think will be a really fun idea. I’m…

Researching with 1st Grade-Teaching Good Research Steps

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     Teaching good research habits to younger grades is a very important part of being a librarian.  In the past, I have introduced the research steps using a lesson that connected the Big 6 steps to following a recipe for making an apple pie.  You can read about this “Recipe for Research” lesson on…

Starting a Makerspace in the Library

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     I have been using centers in the library for several years now and absolutely love them.  They work really well at giving students choices of activities to do after the lesson and checking out new books.  Now that I have 50-minute library classes as part of the Special’s rotation, this has proven to…

New Year’s Reading Goal Bookmark

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     For the second half of the year, I wanted to do an activity that would encourage my students to reflect more about the “type” of books that they were checking out, with the hopes that they might explore some new genres instead of just checking out the same books or series over and…