Books on my mind

To meet my challenge this summer of reading a book each day I am going to have to read A LOT of books! YEA! 🙂 There are some that I have been wanting to read since this past year, but just never.found.the.time.

So, I went to the classroom and grabbed some + I bought a few. Here’s a visual:

Of course, I have a whole bunch more that I want to read-I bought about 10 or 12 on my way back from Mobile this past Friday! In fact, do you see the book on the top of the stack-“The Face on the Milk Carton“? Well, it was listed in one of my professional reads this summer so I went out and found it-then I realized it had 2 companion books to it (I think sort of like sequels) so I actually found them Friday-I know, you don’t have to say it-I’M GOOD!!!!! 🙂

Happy Reading! Drop a comment if you have already read any of these and let me know what you think!

Book-a-day Challenge for Summer

I obviously didn’t too well with the 48 hour book challenge the other weekend hosted by http://www.motherreader.com/ since I didn’t read at all!! GASP!! Can you believe it? I LOVE to read, but that weekend ended up being so busy with family and since I sometimes IGNORE my family to read books I thought it was best NOT to do that! 🙂

So…..Donalyn Miller-author of The Book Whisperer-is setting forth a challenge to read a book each day during the summer. The rules are VERY flexible-check out her post about it:

http://blogs.edweek.org/teachers/book_whisperer/2011/06/the_3rd_annual_book-a-day_chal.html

I think I have about 61 days left until the beginning of school in our district here in Alabama, but I might cheat (gasp again) a little and just aim for 50 TOTAL books this summer! I am going to post about each one-even the little, teensy, tiny picture books that will make their way into this challenge! I actually started this 2 days ago and have read 3 books so far-1 picture non-fiction and 2 chapter-and let me tell you the chapter books were amazing! I’ll be posting about them soon!

I went to my classroom yesterday (even though it is completely packed up for the summer awaiting the cleaning of the floors) and hauled a stack of books back to my house!!! To go with the stack of books in my junky wannabe organized home office! To go with the stack of books near my bed! To go with my Amazon kindle that I hope has a stack of books soon!! 🙂

Are you ready all you bookaholics???? Join the fun!!! What can it hurt? The worst thing that can happen is you don’t meet your challenge and you still get some great reads in for the summer!!

 

Related articles

• June Book Challenge – Day 9 (bluecloverbelle.wordpress.com)
• Read to Me Picture Book Challenge (onlymuttix.wordpress.com)

Loving to read and reading what I love!!!

I am a book addict! Bookaholic!! Obsessed with books! This includes professional teaching books! I taught Kindergarten for 6 years and read books about Kindergarten. Now I teach 6th grade and read books about intermediate students! I decided to create a list of my Top 10 (or more) professional teaching books that I have read or started reading  in the past year that I think are the BOMB!!! I plan on going back through each book this summer and taking notes for the upcoming year. I will use all of these books to plan by for this year! Ready……….Set………….Go!

They are not in any particular order!

1. The Book Whisperer-Donalyn Miller

2. The Daily 5-The Sisters

3. The Cafe-The Sisters

4. Readicide-Kelly Gallagher

5. The Reading Zone-Nancie Atwell

6. 7 Keys to Comprehension

7. Guiding Readers and Writers

8. Strategies That Work

9. Comprehension Shouldn’t Be Silent

10. R5 in the Classroom

11. Reading Essentials

12. Mosiac of Thought

13. Notebook Connections

14. Notebook Know-How

If only I could visit the classrooms of some of these magnificent authors!! 🙂 What’s on your list of best reads?

READ-READ-READ 48 hour book challenge

Get ready for reading!! An entire weekend! Hop on over to www.motherreader.com to sign up for the 48 hour book challenge coming up the 1st weekend in June. It sounds like a lot of fun-AND a good excuse to do nothing much except read! I am already gathering up a whole bunch of young adult books that I want to read so that I can have a running list of recommendations for my 6th graders!

I can’t wait for this unique and exciting experience!!! 🙂