Celebrating World Read Aloud Day all week long - Day 2

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Tuesday... Day 2

Mrs. Thayer's 2nd grade class connected with Andy Plemmons 2nd grade kids. We took turns reading to each other from Peter Brown's Mr. Tiger Goes Wild. Each group formed a line in their own library, and read alternate pages to their cyber guests.

photo from Andy Plemmons, David C. Barrow Elementary

 

We learned that their school day is longer than ours by about 30 minutes. We joked that they should be smarter than us.

Mrs. Snedeker's 1st grade skyped simultaneously with two other classes: Angie Dickerson's 6th graders from Hillcrest School in Lebanon, Missouri, and Sherell Stepp's 1st grade class of Gilbert Primary School in Gilbert, South Carolina. The 6th graders read Mo Willems' Don't Let the Pigeon Stay Up Late! to our two first grade classes. It's so cool to hear the older kids read to the younger ones! Go Readers!

It was the first time any of us had ever connected as a threesome on skype, and we had no problems, fortunately.

Flower Hill is an elementary school in Gaithersburg, Maryland. That's where Mrs. Meehan's 2nd grade class met Melissa McDonald's 1st graders. We took turns reading together Mo Willems' Watch Me Throw the Ball. We also compared a few state symbols, and our weather.













Next, Mrs. Synnott's kindergarten class connected with another kindergarten class with Shannon Hyman at Kaechele Elementary School in Glen Allen, Virginia. Shannon did a fantastic reading of Oh No! by Candace Fleming and had both groups of kindergartners chiming in on the "oh no" part.

Librarian Alice Harwood skyped for her first World Read Aloud Day with Mrs. McNeish's kindergartners. Union Street Elementary is in the southern part of our state in Springfield, Vermont. Three 4th grade students treated us to a read-aloud of Mo Willems' There's a Bird on Your Head!  We loved it!

We looked at a map to see how far apart we are. It would take us about 2.5 hours to drive to their school. 

For Mrs. Seligman's 1st grade class we traveled very far from Essex Elementary to connect with Meghan Nels 2nd and 3rd graders at Turtle River Montessori School in Jupiter, Florida. We read Bob Shea's Unicorn Thinks He's Pretty Great!

Their school is a PreK through 8th grade and is located just north of West Palm Beach. They were very impressed with our snow (I brought the webcam to the doorway looking outside.).

The week goes on. Read more about Day 1.

Celebrating Read Across America and World Read Aloud Day all week long - Day 1

March started off with two special celebrations. The first one was Dr. Seuss's birthday on Monday, March 2nd, our first day back from the February vacation. This prolific author now has a national event in his honor, which is called Read Across America Day.

March 2, 1904 - September 24, 1991

March 3rd is World Read Aloud Day. What better way to celebrate reading than by sharing our love of stories with other classrooms around the country!?! So began Day 1 of a full week of reading and connecting.

Mrs. Rotach's 1st grade class connected with Mary Hundt's 5th graders at West Salem Elementary in West Salem, Wisconsin. The 5th graders read aloud Drew Daywalt's The Day the Crayons Quit. We noticed how well the older children read, with lots of expression.

Our next connection was with Mrs. Tracy's 1st graders and Sherell Stepp's kindergartners at Gilbert Primary School in Gilbert, South Carolina. Together we read to each other Mo Willems' story That is Not a Good Idea! The children loved chanting the part, "that is not a good idea!"

We learned that their school has exactly the same grade levels as we do, and that is why their school is called a primary school.

Mrs. Yandell's 2nd grade paired up with Crystal Hendrix's kindergartners of Isaac Dickson Elementary in Asheville, North Carolina. Peter Brown's Mr. Tiger Goes Wild! was our read-aloud choice.

In the afternoon Mrs. Rowley's kindergarten class skyped with Misti Sikes's kindergarten children in her school library at K.B. Sutton Elementary School in Forsyth, Georgia. Together we enjoyed Unicorn Thinks He's Pretty Great! by Bob Shea. We shared information about our schools and our weather.Their school has about the same number of students (511) as ours (475ish), but their grade level range is from PreK-5. Our webcam had an extra long cord, so we were able to bring the camera over to the open door and show the children all our snow. They liked that! Their mascot is the knight.

Fifth graders from our sister school, Founders Memorial, took turns reading aloud from Mo Willems' A Big Guy Took My Ball to Mrs. Day's kindergartners. That was a lot of fun, especially since many of these children used to be students here at EES. Thanks to librarian Sara Jablonski for setting it up at short notice. Our original contact had to cancel because of weather issues, but Sara's 5th graders rose to the occasion and created a fun read-aloud for our kindergarten class.