Rivers... Make it more interesting with a story!

9 Titles to introduce or teach RIVERS
(A 3rd Grade Standard in Georgia)
1.  Where the River Begins
2.  River Story
3.  The Raft
4.  A River Ran Wild
5.  Water Dance
6.  River Friendly River Wild
7.  River Town
8.  River
9.  On the River ABC (an ABC book but with upper level vocabulary and content)

Map it! 5 titles for introducing maps

5 Titles for Introducing Maps and Geography...

Your place in the world

1.  As the Crow Flies

2.  The Scrambled States of America

3.  The Once Upon a Map Book

4.  The Armadillo from Amarillo

5.  Mapping Penny's World

5 more for Cause and Effect

Teaching Cause and Effect
1.  Never Take a Shark to the Dentist
2.  Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs
3.  "Stand Back," Said the Elephant, "I'm Going to to Sneeze!"
4.  The Giant Jam Sandwich
5.  If Everybody Did

8 for Measuring Length

Measurement Titles

1.  Hershey's Chocolate Weights and Measures

2.  How Big is a Foot?

3.  Measuring Penny

4.  Millions to Measure

5.  Twelve Snails to One Lizard: A tale of mischief and measurement

6.  Inchworm and a Half

7.  Inch by Inch

8.  How Long or How Wide?

16 for Cause and Effect

Cause and Effect Titles    

1.  The Day Jimmy's Boa Ate the Wash

The link below will take you to additional resources for using the Jimmy's Boa series to teach cause and effect:

http://www.readwritethink.org/classroom-resources/lesson-plans/jimmy-taught-cause-effect-1029.html?tab=1#tabs

2.  Jimmy's Boa Bounces Back

3.  Jimmy's Boa and the Bungee Jump Slam Dunk 

  4.  Jimmy's Boa and the Big Spash Birthday Bash

5.  Dog Breath

6.  A Bad Case of the Stripes

7.  That's Good!  That's Bad!

8.  That's Good! That's Bad! in the Grand Canyon

9.  That's Good!  That's Bad! in Washington D.C.

10.  That's Good!  That's bad! on Santa's Journey

11.  Double Trouble in Walla Walla

12.  Sylvester and the Magic Pebble

13.  Why the Chicken Crossed the Road

14.  Why Mosquitos Buzz in People's Ears

15.  Someday a Tree

16.  The "If you give a ...."  Laura Numeroff series

Books We've Read Together

A good idea that worked for me...

Years ago, I read the idea to keep a "running" list of read alouds in Guiding Readers and Writers by Fountas and Pinnell. However, this year is the first time I've ever tried it and stuck to it.  Everytime I read a book aloud to the class I record it on an ongoing list along with the book's genre.  Our list has grown to 73 titles as of today. 

The kids love it... they guess how many days it will be until we read our 100th book, they refer to it when we are discussing books, they talk about which book is their favorite, and they use it when they are writing in their journals.  They'll say "This story reminds me of the book we read...." then, they'll look at the chart, and remember.  The possibilities are endless.  They are begging to have a celebration for our 100th book.:)  Just an idea... thought I'd share.  :)

Questioning + Inferring

The Stranger  By: Chris Van Allsburg
A lesson that combines questioning and inferring...

If you research books to use to teach "questioning," you will inevitably come across this title.  When you read it, the kids will naturally begin to generate questions...LOTS and lots of questions.  During the read aloud, I simply recorded their questions.  After the story, we discussed our "questioning" and how it could lead us to make a inference about the identity of the "stranger."  Chris Van Allsburg hinted that the stranger is "Jack Frost" in an interview that I read online.  My students came up with many ideas including the idea that the stranger was "Father Nature."
Our Lesson Chart: