Raz-Kids

Another picture book app that I have come across that I would recommend for students would be Raz-Kids. The animated books and interactive quizzes are but two aspects of this award winning site that makes it popular among students.

Raz-Kids boasts to having more than 400 titles on its website, and that it adds more books every month. Each of the books can be listened to so fluency can be modeled for the students. Even better, the students can record themselves reading the books. What a great learning tool! The teachers can go on each student's account so they can monitor student's progress.

In order to aid comprehension, each title is coupled with an eQuiz for that particular book. Again, teachers can go into that student's account to receive skill reports on each student, as well as online cumulative records.

Raz-Kids has made its app kid-friendly, which makes it easier for students to understand how to interact with the digital picture books. This makes for an ideal situation, since once students have this understanding, they are able to derive a beneficial relationship with reading and, ultimately, literacy.

Raz-Kids is always available on the internet and can be accessed on nearly any mobile device. That means that kids can take their reading with them anywhere, anytime. A little summer reading, anyone?

Reading Eggs

Digital picture books can be some pretty useful tools, and I'm not just talking about just downloading books onto iPads and Kindles. There are many digital picture book apps available for beginning readers in order to enhance literacy learning.

Reading Eggs (www.readingeggs.com) is a digital picture book app that my elementary school utilizes for its students. The app has many online reading games and activities for the younger
readers. As the students get older and learn to read, they can move on to Reading Eggspress, which has digital books available for students to read and utilize.

Reading Eggs will send students through a series of activities that are supposed to help their fluency and vocabulary, as well as their comprehension. There are rewards along the way for the students to motivate them to continue learning. For the younger and older students, Reading Eggs and Reading Eggspress is fairly simple to navigate. Nearly everything is 'clickable.' I've found it to be a good program for the younger and older.

As the younger students progress to Reading Eggspress, however, they get avatars. In order to make it more personal, students can create their avatars however they like. While a great concept, many of my kids will spend an entire session dressing their avatars in different clothes, as well as changing their looks.

While Reading Eggspress does have titles available from which to choose, the number of titles is limited. The books on screen look like books and the students click to turn the pages. The students are able to listen as they read along, but the interactivity between the reader and the program seems to be somewhat limited.

The important thing, though, is that the students are able to progress at their own pace. It's easy for them to go back and reread (and hear) pages if needed. I have also found that, despite shortcomings, Reading Eggs holds students' attention well, even those who tend to be easily distracted.

Overall, I would say that Reading Eggs seems to be a good program. If you're looking solely for interactive books, I would suggest that you keep looking. However, if you're looking for engaging activities and reading, Reading Eggs would most likely be a good fit for you.

Monarch Butterfly

Sometimes, the best books come through suggestions. I had a classmate suggest I try a Gail Gibbons

title, and Monarch Butterfly (1989) found its way into my hands. Like many of her books, Monarch Butterfly is an informative, straightforward text that delves into the life cycle of the monarch butterfly.

Gibbons does an artful job of illustrating the butterfly's life cycle through text and illustrations. One of the wonderful things about her books is how they dive right in to the text on the first page. In Monarch Butterfly in particular, her opening illustrations are double framed, and look like a photograph within a picture. However, Gibbons likes for her illustrations to stray outside of their frames sometimes. Gibbons writing sets a warm, inviting tone for the reader. Her use of detail almost personifies the butterflies that she passionately writes about.

Monarch Butterfly would be an excellent text for kindergarten through second grade. The illustrations are well labeled and the difficult words are illustrated and explained for the reader. After going through this book, I feel certain my kindergartners would be able to fill out (with some help, of course!) a graphic organizer with their own illustrations mapping out the life cycle of a butterfly!

Any Gail Gibbons titles are a welcome addition within my own personal library. I would strongly suggest Monarch Butterfly, or any other Gibbons titles, for your personal and classroom library!

An Egg Is Quiet

There are not many informational informational non-fiction books that I would consider creative.  An Egg is Quiet (2006) by Dianna Hutts Aston and illustrated by Sylvia Long, however, I consider to be one of the most creative that I have read. The overall tone of the book is quiet, almost comforting and soothing, as we read about and discover all sorts of information about eggs and the animals that laid them.

An Egg is Quiet is all about eggs. And it is not just about bird eggs, either. It includes shark eggs, insect eggs, reptile eggs, turtle eggs, fish eggs, frogs eggs and everything in between. The main text is simple and straightforward and tells the reader what eggs can be. However, it's the captions and the photos throughout that give the reader the most amazing amount of information on all these eggs.

A fascinating, fun read, An Egg is Quiet utilizes a formal script type font for the main storyline of the book. The font used in the captions, however, is less formal, giving the book a friendly, 'let's talk about eggs' feel to it. The unframed illustrations exquisitely capture the amazing detail and color of the eggs, giving the reader as much detail as the text does.

An Egg is Quiet would be a wonderful hook into a science unit on animals. During a second read through, we could work on comparing and contrasting eggs of different birds, or eggs of different animals. With my kindergartners, we could do a graphic organizer labeling the parts of an egg, or the stages an egg goes through as the animal inside develops and is born.

Simple, but incredibly informative, An Egg is Quiet should have a place on the shelf of any classroom library.

Bone: Out from Boneville

Graphic novels are a relatively new phenomenon. I've never given them much thought, but that was before I read Bone: Out from Boneville (2005) by Jeff Smith. Having never read any of the books in the Bone series, it was a little unusual. However, I find the graphic novel aspect refreshing, as it is a different type of read since it is a change from the norm.

Out from Boneville is about three cousins -- Fone Bone, Phoney Bone and Smiley Bone -- who have been cast out of Boneville because of Phoney's financial indiscretions. The cousins get separated in the desert and each finds his way to the same large valley, which is filled with people and all sorts of creatures. After several misadventures, the three cousins manage to reunite on a farm deep in the valley. Being part of a series, the reader discovers some dark, behind the scenes characters who are out to get the three Bone cousins, and have future plans for the trio.

Graphic novels exercise a different set of reading skills. Because it is made up of a series of panels, the reader has to determine the order of the panels. Given that it has copious amount of illustration, the reader can and must use visual cues in order to fully understand the story. The reader doesn't need details in the text since many of those details can be given visually. Also, the graphic novel reader can "see" sounds. In Out from Boneville, for example, we see Phoney yelling at the other two through large, bold words in his text balloons. A page later, we see the "ZZZZ" of a cloud of locusts descending upon our hapless trio.

While Out from Boneville may not be appropriate content-wise for my kindergartners, it might be just about right for third-graders. I feel like we would do a read through together, so that I can help them get the hang of following panels in the correct order. However, we could also do some of the same things we do with other stories, such as comparing and contrasting the characters using Venn diagrams, as well as B-M-E organizers.

I've seen several students at my current school reading several books from the Bone series. I feel like any of these from this series would be good titles for a classroom library.

Woolvs in the Sitee

Of all the picture books that I have read, none have had as much of a lasting, profound effect upon me as Woolvs in the Sitee (2006) by Margaret Wild (illustrated by Anne Spudvilas). This award winning, yet controversial book sends the reader on a wild, heart pounding ride of an adventure. By the time you get to the end, you have to re-read it to make sure you didn't miss anything!

Woolvs in the Sitee is a brief, terrifying story a boy, Ben, who is trapped in a single room in a basement by himself. He is trapped by the "woolvs" who have taken over the city where he lives. In this first person narrative, Ben doesn't tell us who or what the "woolvs" are, but he lets us know they are there. His only ally, Miss Radinski, goes missing one day and Ben has to face his fears and the "woolvs" and go out to rescue her, the same way she had rescued him once.

The spelling and dark colors on the cover of Woolvs in the Sitee set an ominous tone for the story. The reader can't help but wonder what has gone wrong. The edge to edge dark illustrations and childlike spelling of the actual text create a dark textured story. Throughout the story, the images are either what Ben sees looking up, or views looking down on Ben. Ben is always looking off somewhere else, except on the last page where the illustrator uses demand. On the last page, Ben is looking directly up at us, the readers, and saying, "Joyn me," as he goes out to face the demons that he fears and that have taken Miss Radinski.

While not appropriate for kindergartners, Woolvs in the Sitee would be better suited for third grade students and up. I would have my students retelling the story through B-M-E organizers. I would also have them do some character work, telling me how Ben changes. This exercise has them telling me how he feels at the beginning and at the end of the story and how he changed. Through this exercise, they would also tell me what the catalyst was that caused this change. And of course, we would discuss who or what the "woolvs" in the story represent.

Woolvs in the Sitee is a profound, thought provoking story. I feel like it might be a good book for an upper grade classroom library. I feel like the story is powerful enough to interest and hook students who claim they don't enjoy reading.

Gone Fishing

Big brothers prove bothersome, but little sisters are the worst! Don't believe me? Read Gone Fishing, a novel written in verse! I honestly couldn't have NOT read Gone Fishing (2013) which was written by Tamera Will Wissinger and illustrated by Matthew Cordell. It's a children's novel. It's poetry. It's fishing. Need I say more, except that you should read it?

Gone Fishing is mostly about Sam, a young boy who is very excited to be going on a fishing trip with just his father. However, Lucy, Sam's younger sister, manages to wriggle her way into the trip with her brother and father. Sam, who has been dreaming and planning for this trip, is not happy about this new development. The story takes place in the course of one day -- the actual fishing trip. Dad keeps the peace while Lucy causes trouble, has fun and out fishes her brother. While I don't want to give away a good ending, I will tell you that by the time of the fish dinner that evening, the story ends with fond memories for everyone involved.

The illustrations in Gone Fishing are nearly as fun as the story itself. Each illustration is an inset picture with no frame (except for two that are supposed to look like photographs taken and a frame around the dinner menu) that are scattered about the pages. Many stretch from one page to the next and several actually go "through" the text itself!

Gone Fishing's text is broken up by a multitude of different types of poetry. The story contains quatrains, cinquains, list poems, concrete poems, and more. Each different poetry style accentuates the point the author is trying to get across, such as the concrete poem, The Night Before Fishing, written in the shape of a fish above Sam, laying in his bed, dreaming of the upcoming trip. The author tells us whose poem is whose so that we, the readers, know whose point of view we're reading.

Where to start with my lessons?! I most certainly would read this to my kindergartners. Gone Fishing would be a wonderful introduction to different styles of poetry. Many of the poems rhyme and we could make anchor charts with rhyming words. We could practice some of the dramatic poems for three and perform them in class. There are list poems included, such as What To Pack? I think my kindergartners would enjoy creating their own list poems.

Additionally, Gone Fishing has a wonderful sequence to it. Some of the individual poems, such as What To Pack? do as well. My kindergartners and I would be creating timelines of the story, noting what comes first, next, then and last. We would make our own lists of what we would take on our own fishing trips...

I would definitely include Gone Fishing in my personal library. I would have to have a second copy to include in my classroom library. When you luck into a fun book like this, it's good to have a back up copy somewhere!

In the Night Kitchen

There are few books that both intrigue and perplex me at the same time. In the Night Kitchen (1970) by Maurice Sendak, an older book, still manages this after numerous years. It perplexed me in that I never understood why, or how, Mickey (the young boy and main character) fell out of his clothes. It also intrigued me because the bakers refer to Mickey as milk.

This controversial book is a rhyming story about Mickey, who has a dream. In his dream, Mickey falls out of his clothes and down into the Night Kitchen. In fact, he falls, naked, into a batch of cake batter. Three identical bakers mix him into the batter and try to cook him, thinking he is the milk for the batter. Mickey pops out of the cake, now dressed in batter, explains that he is not the milk, and sets off to retrieve milk for the bakers' cake. He loses his batter clothing in the bottle of milk. After climbing out of the bottle, he slides down the side until he lands safely back in his bed.

As stated previously, the text rhymes. The illustrations, created in Sendak's incredibly recognizable style, make incredible artwork that parallel the text being read. Together, the artwork and text create a kaleidoscopic cornucopia for the readers' senses.

Despite the image of Mickey naked, In the Night Kitchen could be a marvelous read and good teaching tool for teachers. Using the rhymes and during the second read, I would stop before each rhyming word and ask my kindergartners what word is next? What would make sense there? Afterwards, we might read it a third time and create an anchor chart showing the different rhymes used throughout the book.

Classroom library material? Perhaps. I'll leave that up to you. In the Night Kitchen has a great story, but it does have images of a young, naked child...

When Gorilla Goes Walking

When Gorilla Goes Walking (2007) by Nikki Grimes (illustrated by Shane Evans) is one of the most refreshing picture books I have read in quite some time! However, readers should be warned... Firstly, Gorilla is not an ape, but a cat. Secondly, if you don't like cats, you will after this book. If you do, you'll either cry or laugh by the end. Maybe both!

When Gorilla Goes Walking is a series of poems, not all the same, that tell the story of how Cecilia, the character and narrator, got her cat, Gorilla. After Cecilia's mom got the cat, the girl and the cat became best friends, though in the poem titled "Learning the Rules," we see who the boss really is! Cecilia and Gorilla have some misadventures, as well as some spats, but the story shows us that the girl and her cat are inseparable and how they comfort each other. The very last poem gives us a little reminder as to who the boss really is!

The illustrations seem simplistic at first glance. However, a second look shows that Gorilla is often illustrated toward the "front and center" of the page, with Cecilia off the side of the same page or next page. She is nearly always looking at Gorilla. Gorilla is often in a position of power, which parallels the message the texts sends us. When he's not, he is usually even on the page with Cecilia, implying a mutual closeness. The only exception is the very first page, where it's implied that Cecilia got Gorilla and she is with her best friend, whose name just happens to be Cecilia as well. All we see on that double page spread is the top of Gorilla's head and ears.

A fun read, When Gorilla Goes Walking could be used as a launch for all sorts of activities in our kindergarten classroom. I actually have five sets of students in my current class whose names rhyme. We could do a name walk around the class and try to pair them up. We would follow this up with an anchor chart and a rhyme walk through the book, looking for rhyming words. I would love to read this book in April (national poetry month) and go over the different types of poetry in the book, as well as try to create some poetry of our own.

You can't go wrong with Nikki Grimes and I would highly suggest adding When Gorilla Goes Walking to your own classroom library!

Seedfolks

Looking for a different kind of read? Seedfolks (1997) by Paul Fleischman has a large cast of
characters, drama and suspense. So what is it about? It's about a community garden that has been created in the middle of an urban area, and how that garden brings members of a community together to become a family.

The most interesting thing about Seedfolks is that it is a series of stories. While no two stories are directly related to one another, they're all interrelated in that each one is centered around a community garden in the inner city in Cleveland. Previously, the garden was a junk lot where people threw all sorts of trash, until someone got the idea to try to plant something there. All it took was one person with the idea to get the garden started.

While this hasn't been one of my favorite reads, Seedfolks shares some interesting insights in human behavior, as well as teaches us things about ourselves that isn't always pleasant or pretty. For example, in the chapter about Amir, the character runs into another character in his store, and she called him a "dirty foreigner." He runs into her again in the garden and asks her if she remembers that day. She apologized over and over, telling him "'Back then, I didn't know it was you...'"

While my younger students wouldn't understand the story, third through fifth-graders should. I would enjoy doing a character study with them. I would have students broken up into different groups. Each group would take one character and research that character's background. Then, we would come back together with our findings so each group could tell the class what they discovered about each character. I would also like to pair this with a gardening activity of our own, having the classroom work on a small garden together.

While I'm still unsure about the book, I will admit that it makes you stop and think, and not just about yourself. It makes you think about others. It makes you think about how well we know the people that we see, but don't necessarily interact with daily.

Tar Beach

Tar Beach (1991) by Faith Ringgold is about a young girl who dreams she can fly. She likes to fly above her Harlem home, where she claims all she sees for herself and her family. The story, in fact, is based on a family quilt that the author made. The story quilt is also called Tar Beach and has the story sewn into the quilt itself.

The story itself is a mixture of autobiography, fictional narrative, painting and  quilt making. The title, Tar Beach, refers to the rooftop of the building, where the author and her family would get together on hot summer nights. They would go up there to spend time together and eat, both parents and children alike.

The young girl in the story (the author) called the George Washington Bridge "hers" due to the fact that it had been part of her view for her entire life. In fact, the author claimed that anything she flew over, she claimed as being "hers."

Tar Beach, however, also speaks of the social injustices of the time period. In the story, the young girl's father, a construction worker, isn't able to join the union due to the fact that he's "colored or a half-breed Indian." However, the author wants to right this injustice by flying over the building, claiming it as her own, and giving it to her father.

I found this story unique because the author used her own paintings to illustrate the story. Also, the author uses images of the actual quilt to frame the bottom edges of the pages. Additionally, the text is printed on a seeming textured material -- the same visual texture as it's printed on upon the quilt. Each of the images seems to look down on all the characters, as the reader is in the sky flying along with the author.

While my kindergartners would not be able to understand the social injustices of the story, they would be able to understand what is happening. I think this would be a wonderful opportunity for them to make their own "story quilts." They would be able to draw their own pictures for the center, then create a "quilt" of scrap pieces of paper to surround the story picture. Then the students would tell the story so someone could help them by writing it on the back of each individual quilt.

An award winning book, Tar Beach is a must have title for any teacher's personal classroom library!