RES Library Media Center News

RES second graders love to share books and recommend them to their friends. Over the next few weeks, the second graders will have a chance to teach their classmates more about their own favorite books during student-led, hands-on "Book Centers." They will be planning their centers around interesting topics, authors or series they like, formats they enjoy, and other themes they may come up with. I can't wait to hear the conversations these scholars will be having with each other about what books they should read next! Stay tuned to this blog and the RES Library Twitter feed  https://twitter.com/RESVTlibrary  for updates on second grade Book Centers. - Mrs. Redford

  RES Red Clover Winning Book: The Day the Crayons Quit by Drew Daywalt All school year, RES scholars have been sharing the 10 excellent picture books on the 2014-2015 Red Clover Award reading list. Every year the Vermont Center for the Book puts together a new reading list of 10 fiction and nonfiction picture books for this award, which is named after our state flower. Vermont students in kindergarten through fourth grade read, listen to, discuss, and write about the books on the list. Then each student votes for his or her favorite. Discussing Red Clover books in Grade One library class   Another popular title: Unicorn Thinks He's Pretty Great   by Bob Shea Discussing Red Clover books in Grade One library class This year's Red Clover winner at RES, by a large margin, was  The Day the Crayons Quit  by Drew Daywalt. Scholars couldn't wait to reread their favorite parts of this story about a rebellious box of crayons who compla...

using a book to answer the question, "What is the history of firefighting and how is it different today?" Capstone projects are an opportunity for our fourth graders to practice their research and critical thinking skills as well as to learn more about topics they are passionate about. This morning Ms. Erickson's class was using a variety of research sources as they gathered information to help answer their research questions. In the year 2015, information doesn't just come from books...or the internet! One scholar was recording information on the history of firefighting from books, and also from the New York City Fire Museum website . She has also interviewed a firefighter for information about firefighting today. Another scholar was learning more about marine animal rehabilitation from the Clearwater Marine Aquarium website ... using a website to answer the question, "How do marine animals get injured and how do they get rehabbed by peopl...

We are SO PROUD of our third grade scholars for their hard work and perseverance on their book trailers! A book trailer is like a movie trailer: it's a short video advertisement that tells an audience a little about a book. In order to create these trailers, the scholars did the following: wrote voiceovers as persuasive texts during Writing Workshop learned to use Google Advanced Image Search to find reusable (not copyrighted) images found and saved images for their their trailers learned to use either WeVideo or Screencastify Google Apps to create their trailers added images and recorded voiceovers. Some scholars even added music! Along the way they encountered some technical problems with the Google Apps they were using, but they showed great determination to finish their trailers and make them excellent. We think they succeeded! We hope you enjoy these first few trailers. We will be sharing more soon. Book trailer made with WeVideo Book trailer made...

As part of their current unit on persuasive writing, third graders are writing and producing book trailers to convince their classmates to read the books they recommend. A book trailer is like a movie trailer: it's a short video advertisement that tells an audience a little about a book. The scholars have finished writing the words for their scripts, and now they are finding images to put into their videos. As they do this, they are learning and reinforcing important digital citizenship skills such as citing their sources and only using images for which the photographers have given permission for reuse. The scholars also put together a great list of tips for using images to make their book trailers even more persuasive. They made these suggestions after watching several professional and student made book trailers and deciding what made them less or more effective. Tips for Making a Persuasive Book Trailer by RES grade 3 scholars Images Your first image should be...