horeback riding

Our reading challenge reward celebration (with Mrs. Prescott riding a horse )
has been postponed until Monday, May 17, at 1:55 in the afternoon.

reading challenge celebration

After a successful "Saddle Up and Read" reading challenge in February, we celebrated with ice cream sundaes for all on April 7. Now it is time to get the reward of watching Mrs. Prescott demonstrate her riding skills in front of all the students.

Though the May calendar calls for a May 7 occasion, we have had to reschedule for Monday, May 17th at 2:00. Addison, who graduated from Barstow and is a student at Rutland High School, will bring her horse Star down to the playground for the event. She will demonstrate her own riding skills before inviting Mrs. Prescott to try it herself.
Since it has been 20 years she has ridden, she is hoping that she can get on the horse and "will" the horse to walk her in a brief circle.

Should be fun!

librarian dabbles with boatbuilding, again

Today marked the start of another elective aimed at completing eight new plywood canoes to be launched before school lets out for summer.

This picture is from an earlier year, but on our first day, we traced patterns and started to cut the pieces, and we will somehow manage to put it all together for, I think, the seventh year.

What does this have to do with the library? Not a lot, except that this librarian loves to share in diverse experiences, and that's also what I like about reading.

How else can you so easily immerse yourself in curious mysteries with ghost ships in Cornwall, England, or spend time with wonderfully dysfunctional families run by self-indulgent lost souls, or perhaps enter the world of a cloned boy who is excited to live a dual life, but crushed to discover the complex dilemmas it presents?

Reading is an amazing time travel machine and and a journey of empathy- a vicarious romance or an independent adventure. The written word is still capable of delivering depth that just can't be offered in the brief framework of a movie.

Read, float in a boat, imagine a world that allows you to feel balanced and wise

research projects

Research is a lifetime skill that will allow all students to continue to open doors, adding to their learning and making new things possible.

After mastering the use of a "Table of Contents" and an index, third graders learn the skills of using an encyclopedia. They understand that a person's last name is their access to biographical articles, and that guide words, headings, sub-headings, and text boxes all contribute to finding the facts they need.

It's time to send home the biography cubes they used to display the information retrieved from encyclopedias and biographies, and move on to creative writing with the "publication" of their own bound thumbprint story books. Students use a storyboard planning sheet to plan out their story and illustrations before thumb printing the base shapes of their characters on index cards corresponding to each page of their plan. The story is then bound using a hand-crank spine-punch machine and plastic binders. The resulting miniature picture books are simple reminders of the complex steps of writing and publishing. It is both eye-opening and satisfying for them to complete their own small books.

our new ambassador

I am proud to know that the new National Ambassador for Young People's Literature is Vermont's own Katherine Paterson. The appointment gives her the job of promoting lifelong literacy to encourage the development and and betterment of the lives of young people.

She has not only written many remarkable novels for young people, but has also participated on national committees working toward making literacy a priority for our nation. Her book Bridge to Terabithia was made into a popular movie, despite the mature themes of loss for a its younger audience. Katherine writes with honesty and and is never one to shy away from tough subjects, or more often, tough emotions.

Our students may spend more and more time engaging with media, but they will always need the literacy and the critical thinking that develops through reading as they move froward to the important work that awaits them in adulthood. Welcome, Katherine!

are graphic novels for REAL reading?

Parents and teachers may be struggling to accept graphic novels as anything more than comic books. It is certainly a shift in reading skills to process stories through both word and picture interpretation. And just because visual literacy is a different skill, dose it mean it doesn't belong in the language arts classroom? Watch this video for one person's view based on research:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RHBQSMve2s8

I know I am slowly coming around on the value of this type of reading. It should not replace more complex written works, but it can supplement them in a truly enriching way.

how winter should be

I like to read this picture book and visit not only the rituals of winter, but those of all the seasons here in Vermont. The snow has not been heavy lately, but the chore of filling the wood box has been steady. The moon that appeared on the horizon last Friday night was bigger than any moon I remember, but that is probably because it is a rare event to see it so large. The crunch of snow underfoot, and the instant freezing of the linings of your nostrils, let you know that the
temperatures have plunged and that the time you spend outside should perhaps be more abbreviated.

Students at Barstow proudly donated over $900 to the Red Cross to put toward relief efforts in Haiti. A simple Hat Day with a small fee managed to grow an enthusiastic participation, and it encouraged some extra donations from folks who prefer not to be caught wearing any kind of hat as well. In the shadow of disaster, it is always rewarding to see the outpouring of generosity to help the people in need.