Live Oak Elementary Library

Right now our Kindergarten, 1st, and 2nd grade students are participating in a program called “Read It Forward.”  The way that it works is that the students have to find a book that is hidden in their classroom.  When they find it, their teacher reads it to them.  The teacher then signs her class’s name in the book.  After school the teacher hides it in the next teacher’s classroom and the book continues to rotate until each class has read the book.

The program is designed to gain excitement about reading and to allow all students in a grade level to have an experience with the same book.  Then teachers and students can talk about the books that they have been seeing in the program.

After a class finds all the books they return their top secret reading log to the library for a prize.

If you have a Kindergarten, 1st, or 2nd grade student ask them what their favorite “Read It Forward” book has been!

It’s time for our Spring bookfair.  We have it in May because we really want students to purchase books that they can have to read over the summer.  We have a great selection of books this year.  There is definitely something for everyone.

We are open for selling Tuesday, May 10, through Thursday, May 12, from 7:15 am- 3:45 pm.  We are open Thursday night from 5:30 pm- 7:30 pm.  We will have the bookfair, Spring Musical, and PTA Family Fun Night all in one!  It is going to be awesome!  On Friday, May 13, we are open from 7:15 am- 12:00 pm.  Hope to see you there!

The winners for the Texas Bluebonnet Award have been announced.  First place goes to The Uglified Ducky by Willy Claflin, second place to Dying to Meet You by Kate Klise, and third place to Umbrella Summer by Wendy Mass. 

You’ll notice that the 3 winners were our 3 winners at Live Oak!  They’ve already posted the 2011-2012 list, so if you want to get started on reading books for next year, visit the website below.

http://www.txla.org/sites/tla/files/groups/TBA/docs/Annotated-isbn.pdf

The Bluebonnet results are in for Live Oak.  Students in 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade who read 5 Bluebonnet books were able to come to a voting party in the library and vote for their favorite Bluebonnet book.

In 1st place was 11 Birthdays by Wendy Mass with 15 votes, 2nd place was The Uglified Ducky by Willy Claflin with 9 votes, and 3rd place was Dying to Meet You by Kate Klise with 7 votes.  We had 35 3rd graders vote, 14 4th graders votes, and 19 5th graders vote for a total of 68 voters!  Two 5th grade students even read all 20 books!!!

Thanks to all of our students who participated in this fun program!

Our book fair is running from November 30th through December 3rd.  The theme is Everyday Heroes, Reading Saves the Day.  We had Dads and Donuts on Wednesday morning and had a great turnout with many parents coming and eating a donut with their children.  Tonight is Clay Night and the Book fair from 5:30-7:30pm.  Tomorrow will be our last day for selling and we will be closed at noon.

Each bookfair we have a door decorating competion.  The door’s are judged by overall aesthetics, use of the theme, and evidence of student participation.  This year our winner’s were: Ms. Nicosia (3rd place), Ms. Ninomiya (2nd place), and Ms. Sawyer (1st place).  The winning teachers get money to spend at the bookfair to buy books for their classrooms!  Thanks for everyone who participated in the competition!

On November 18th, we were able to have Liz Garton Scanlon, the author of All the World and A Sock is a Pocket For Your Toes, come to visit the students in PPCD, Kindergarten, 1st, and 2nd grade.  She spoke to the students about being an author.  She talked about the tools that she uses to write books.  She also discussed how a book goes from idea to becoming a published book.  Liz had the students think of other “pockets” like her book A Sock is a Pocket For Your Toes and the students had great ideas that they could use in their own writing.  We really enjoyed having her come to Live Oak!

On November 8th, Chris Barton came to visit the Kindergarten through 5th grade students.  He spoke with the students about his two books, Shark vs. Train and The Day-Glo Brothers.  He did an interactive read aloud with students of Shark vs. Train and showed some of the pages that didn’t make it into the book.  Students were amazed that it took so long (3 1/2 years for Shark vs. Train) for Chris’s books to be ready for publishing.  Chris also signed copies of his books that students had purchased.

Chris Barton, the author of The Day Glo Brothers and Shark Vs. Train, is coming to visit Live Oak students in Kindergarten- 5th grades on Monday, November 8th.  We are getting super excited to have him come to our school.  If you want to learn more about Chris and his books, visit his website at www.chrisbarton.info.

Looking for something free to do? Attend the 15th Anniversary of the Texas Book Festival in Austin. It is October 16th-17th at the Texas State Capitol. They have a ton of fun things for children including a children’s book signing tent, where author’s sign books for children, an entertainment tent, and a children’s author tent where children’s authors talk about what goes in to creating books they have published.
I have volunteered at the Texas Book Festival the last three years and have loved it every year. Two years ago I met Mo Willems (author of Elephant and Piggie and the Pigeon books) and got my picture taken with him. Last year I was there when they released the list of the Bluebonnet books for this year which was really cool. Plus they have food that they sell including fresh squeezed lemonade, foot long corndogs, and funnel cakes…need I say more? If you haven’t been, I would strongly suggest going to this awesome event. Here’s the website if you want to learn more.
http://www.texasbookfestival.org/

Welcome back students!  We are very excited for a new school year here in the library.  We have 20 brand new Bluebonnet books that are just waiting to be read.  We also have a new Armadillo Readers Choice list.  I hope you had a great summer!  I’m excited for you to come in and see what’s new, so stop by when you get a chance.