SERIEous Breakthrough Readers

If you are a girl in Gr. 3-6, you should check out the American Girl “Be Your Best” and “Body & Mind” series that was recently added.  American Girl celebrates a girl’s inner star – that little whisper inside that encourages her to stand tall, reach high, and dream big.  We take pride and care in helping girls become their very best today, so they’ll grow up to be the women who make a difference tomorrow.

If you are a boy in Gr. 5-8 and you love basketball, you should read the new Walter Dean Myers basketball series that was recently added!  According to Publishers Weekly, these books are “Heart-thumping hoop action in a novel that, like most good sports stories, is about more than just sports.”  See Mrs. Gustafson or your homeroom teacher if you are interested!

If you are in Gr. K-2, we have three new book series for you – Plants (non-fiction), Families (non-fiction) and Puppy Mudge (same author as Henry & Mudge).

We have also added an author series – Robert Munsch.  He has written classic books such as Love You Forever, I Have to Go! and The Paper Bag Princess.  These could be read as a read aloud with a parent, or read on your own (DRA 24-34).

Finally, for our baseball lovers, we have a new biography series called “Baseball Card Adventures”.  These include books about Jackie Robinson, Shoeless Joe Jackson, and Babe Ruth, just to name a few.  The DRA level is 40-50.

If you are interested in starting any of these new series, tell your teacher or come see Mrs. Gustafson!!!!

If you are in Grades K – 2, we just added 3 new series to our SERIEous book series program!  Noodles by Hans Wilhelm, Five Litte Monkeys by Eileen Christelow, and Little Critter by Mercer Mayer.  If you want to read more about these 3 series and find out if they are right for you, go to the K-3 tab and scroll down to the bottom of the page!    Happy reading!!!!

For the older students, these were the top 3 series that were picked on the book series “wish list”…

#1 –  39 Clues

#2 – Hunger Games

Dragon Slayers’ Academy – Students and parents had a choice of the following activities: design a dragon out of construction paper, color different kinds of dragons, draw step-by-step castles or wizards, and compose a dragon Haiku poem

Arthur - Character study of the first book, sharing details of their favorite book, creating posters illustrating and writing about their favorite part of a book, and an author share at the end!

My Weird School - They did a dramatic reading of Ms. Daisy is Crazy, naming literary devices as they encountered them

Horrible Harry - Jeopardy game

We had a wonderful turn-out Wed, Nov. 14 for our Breakthrough Parent & Child Extravaganza – thanks to all the parents and families who made the effort to come to this event!!!  Here are some of the exciting book series activities that were happening all over the building…

Mallory - Made a “green” bird feeder out of a milk carton

How I Survived Middle School - Answered Jenny’s quizzes and created their own quizzes

Maximum Ride - Acted out a scene from the book and went on Flock’s blog

Judy Moody - Made Fabulously Famous Photo Frames and started their “Me” collages

Hank Zipzer - Answered trivia questions about the book (Derrick C. WON!) and watched a video about the author

Nancy Drew - Found clues in a scavenger hunt in the library

Magic Tree House - Completed games and puzzles

39 Clues - Made bookmarks and explored the book website

Guardians of Ga’Hoole - Did a virtual and REAL owl pellet dissection

Henry & Mudge - Sat by a “campfire” made out of construction paper, listened to a book on tape, and wrote scary campfire stories

Young Cam Jansen - Had to figure out what didn’t belong on the bookcase, and looked at pictures and tried to remember details

Mr. Putter & Tabby - Made Rainbow best friend picture frames

Boys Against Girls - Answered questions about the books (Izeyah D. WON!)

Jigsaw Jones – Wrote notes in secret codes to friends and then decoded each other’s notes

Candy Apple - Found 2 examples of figurative language in the book, made bookmarks with an illustration of their favorite scene

Biscuit - Made posters and wrote about their books 

Guardians of Ga’Hoole is a very interesting series about friendship, Soren and Gylfie especially.  The series is about 4 friends – Twilight, Digger, Soren and Gylfie.  Of course Soren and Gylfie wouldn’t have met if it weren’t for Kludd, Soren’s brother, who later on turns out to be metalbeak.  The four friends travel together to the great tree where even though they get separated for different chaws, they became to be knows as the Chaw of Chaws along with friends from the great tree – Ruby, Martin, and Otullisa also.

In book #2 Twilight in Search and Rescue and Digger in tracking find Eglantine in a daze but Madame Plonk’s music snaps them out.  Eglantine was also knocked out of her nest by Kludd and soon becomes part of the Chaw of Chaws and the band.  When Ezylryb, Soren’s favorite ryb, disappears, at first it is just the band who saves him but soon it is the Chaw of Chaws.  The friends also go on many more adventures together – some secret, some assigned.

When I finished the 5th book I didn’t want to stop so I went to my town library and got the next books.  In Book 6, the Chaw of Chaws go to the Northern kingdoms where they learn to fight with ice weapons and make new friends there.  Gylfie is also captured by pirates but escapes and helps by getting more soldiers.  Next they siege the pure ones who took over St. Aggies and 2 days later, Soren’s nephew Nyroc is born who is destined to retrieve the ember of Hoole.  He also changes his name from Myroe to Coryn because even though he was born to the pure ones, he had a good heart.  Even though his mother kills his best friend, he follows his plans to leave.

Mrs. Soto-Gomez will be leading 2 different Mindfulness book series groups, which have just been added to our list!  If you are interested and would like to check them out, look under the Gr. 5-8 series tab.  Or talk to Mrs. Soto-Gomez and let her know you are SERIEous about Mindfulness!