Look below for each week's activities!!

Library time is not only for checking out great books to read.  Our librarians provide lessons that enhance classroom instruction. Mrs. Hobart plays games that focus on sight words, reading comprehension and sentence structure. We tell stories and reinforce the concepts that stories have a beginning, middle and end. The Librarians work closely with the classroom teachers to provide students with continuity across the curriculum. We foster imagination and a sense of fun about reading.

For the older students, we provide skills in how to use a dictionary to look up definitions, the parts of a book, almanacs, encyclopedias and atlases. The students learn about each literary genre like historical fiction, biography, realistic fiction, poetry and more.  Extra help is given to older students when they need to research or find that "just right" book for a report or special project.

May 25 - 29, 2009

MONDAY, NO SCHOOL Memorial Day Holiday

PreK--

Kindergarten, 1st, 2nd and 4th grade -- NO CLASS 

3rd grade -- Language Arts Jeopardy style Game Show

5th grade-- Free Time

May 18 - 22, 2009

PreK and Kindergarten--Picture Bingo

1st and 2nd grade--Sight Word Bingo

3rd grade-- Free Day

4th and 5th grade--Language Arts Jeopardy style game show

May 11 - 15, 2009

NO LIBRARY---BOOK FAIR 

NOTE:  THE BUY-ONE-GET-ONE FREE BOOK FAIR WILL BE HELD IN THE LIBRARY FROM MONDAY, MAY 11 THROUGH FRIDAY, MAY 15.  HOURS OF OPERATION:  WILL BE 8:30AM - 4:30 PM DAILY.

May 4 - 8, 2009

PRE-K -- NO CLASS -School closed

Kindergarten-- NO CLASS-- School closed

1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th & 5th grades-- NO CLASS--School closed

Note:  Every attempt will be made to reschedule classes for book exchange.

April 27 - May 1, 2009

No formal classes held.  Students will be given an opportunity to visit the library the exchange books only as the Gala fundraising items will be on display in the Library for the entire week.

Thursday, April 30th --OPEN HOUSE Please stop by the Library to say HI! and see the auction items.

Saturday, May 2nd--COME TO THE GALA FUNDRAISER.  IT IS REALLY A LOT OF FUN!!!

April 20 - 24, 2009

Pre-K-- Reinforcing the alphabet and combining religion too.  Read "A is for Ark: Noah's Journey" and use our felt board to tell the story. Then played a new card game to reinforce shapes and colors.

April 6 - 10, 2009 

Prek--  Storytelling Time "The Grouchy Ladybug" by Eric Carle.  Then the students made their own "clocks" to take home and enjoy. Skills learned--practice writing their numbers 1 - 12 and reading a clock face.

Kindergarten, 1st and 2nd grade--Continuation of rotations between grade level appropriate centers.  The centers focus on word beginnings, word endings, rhyming words, blends/digraphs and sentence structure.

3rd & 4th grade-- Finish Easter pop-up cards.

5th grade-- FREE TIME; pick out good books for the spring break.

Note: Wednesday, April 8th Easter Break begins 12:30 dismissal         NO AFTERCARE

March 30 - April 3, 2009

PreK-- To wrap up our discussions on family and culture we read "What is a Family?" by Craig Hammersmith.  Then we did movement by singing the "Hokey,Pokey" song.  Thirdly, we played puzzle games by matching a letter of the alphabet with it's picture.

Kindergarten, 1st & 2nd grade-- Centers (differentiated instruction)--Students were paired up and participated in activities like Blends/digraphs, rhyming word puzzles, sentence structure games, word ending charts and beginning word sounds.

3rd & 4th grade-- Begin pop-up cards. Our students will become paper engineers; using cut outs, folding and gluing to make a cool Easter card.

5th grade-- Poetry monthly book report.  Discussed the poetry genre by reading different examples of poetry (Ex: limericks, quatrains, shape poems, acrostics, etc.)Teacher then modeled how to read poetic verse, how to read with expression and how to use punctuation to help express the meaning of a poem.  

March 23 - 27, 2009

Pre-K, Kindergarten & 1st grade--  It's almost Easter!!  A time filled not only with the sadness of Jesus' death but the joy of this glorious resurrection.  To the little ones, it is also time for the Easter Bunny to visit.  This week we read about Easter celebrations and finished our Easter Bunny POP-UP! cards.  

2nd grade-- This week we had centers at the library.  There were 5 stations and each center had 2 or 3 students working on an activity like: sentence puzzles, word ending cards, blends and digraph sounds, rhyming word puzzles and beginning/middle/ending sound puzzles.

3rd & 5th grade-- NO CLASS.  Assembly in church hall for multi-cultural week.

4th grade-- A demonstration of more intricate POP-UP books!!  Then we began making our own "fan type" pop-up cards. (to be continued next week)

Note: each POP-UP card is designed to be appropriate for each grade level

March 16 - 20, 2009

Pre-K,  Kindergarten & 1st grade-- Everyone loves POP-UP! books.  We read some pop-up books and showed the students how the paper is folded and glued to make amazing pictures.  Then we began making our own pop-up cards for Easter!

2nd grade-- Every story has a beginning, middle and end.  We read the Eric Carle book, "Pancakes!Pancakes!" then used our Tell A Story game to reinforce these concepts.

3rd & 4th grade-- Parts of Book.  Mini lesson on the parts of the book; where to find the spine, title page, index, table of contents etc.

5th grade-- Students will explore the library on their own.  Mrs. Hobart out for substitute teaching duty.

March 9 - 13, 2009

PreK-- The whole school is talking about world cultures.  We read "My First American Friend" a story about a Chinese girl, who moves to America and can't speak a word of English.  Then we sang "The More We Get Together" by Raffi.  And with our people felt pieces and felt board, the students discussed who are the people in our family.

Kindergarten-- Picture Bingo.  The very popular and fun Bingo game that combines pictures and common words for easier learning.

1st grade-- Sight Word Bingo.  Reinforces our sight word capabilities with a fun game.

2nd grade-- Silly word sentence game.  First discussed parts of speech (noun, verb, adjective) then used puzzle pieces to make our own silly sentences.

3rd & 5th grade--  Free session; students explored the library on their own.

4th grade-- Free session; Students did research on the country that they chose for their reports.

March 2 - 6, 2009

MONDAY--NO SCHOOL SNOW DAY (No class for Kindergarten, 1st, 2nd, and 4th grades)

TUESDAY-- 2 HOUR DELAY  (No class for PreK and 3rd grade)

5th Grade-- Researched and checked out books for their monthly book reports.  Discussed characteristics of "Fantasy" genre books.

Week of February 23 - 27, 2009

Pre-K-- Story about sequencing; "Growing Vegetable Soup" by Lois Elhert. Reinforced last week's lesson with a fun Snoopy and Woodstock picture and a practice on writing our numbers "1, 2 & 3".

Kindergarten-- Read the story, "Mouse Makes Words" to introduce word patterns and rhyming words. Then we wrote word ending worksheets for the sound "AT"; students used different beginning letter sounds to make new words (i.e.: CAT, RAT, MAT, etc.)

1st & 2nd grade -- Fiction vs. Non-Fiction-- Explained the difference between each of these genre and read an example of each kind of book.  Then the students were given a pair of books (one fiction/one non-fiction) to explore.  We then listed all the characteristics of each genre.  Example: Non-fiction books have real facts and usually have photographs.  Fiction stories often include animals wearing clothing or acting like humans.) 

3rd, 4th & 5th Grade - Genre relay game-- Learned about the different book genres (Ex: historical, fiction, poetry, mystery, fairytales, folktales, biography etc.), then played a relay game.  Each game is adjusted to make it grade level appropriate.

WEEK OF FEBRUARY 16 - 20, 2009

Kindergarten, 1st grade, 2nd grade & 4th grade-- NO SCHOOL PRESIDENT'S DAY HOLIDAY

Pre-K--Counting books--Read aloud "Snoopy's 1,2,3" and "The Noisy Counting Book". Students practiced counting 1 through 10 in both ascending and descending order. Sang songs-"If Your Happy and You Know It".

3rd grade-- Genre relay game-- Learned about the different book genres (Ex: historical, fiction, poetry, mystery, fairytales, folktales, biography etc.), then played a relay game.

5th grade-- Encyclopedia skills-- To enhance the student's classroom learning, Mrs. Butler asked the library to introduce the characteristics of encyclopedias and compile bibliographic information.

WEEK OF FEBRUARY 9 - 13, 2009

Pre-K-- Read book "Let's Pretend" by Jean Marzollo and "Head to Toe" by Eric Carle.  Pretended to be different animals.

Kindergarten--  Read "The Berenstain Bear's "A" book".  Played games with blends and digraphs; "GL",  "WH", & "TR".

1st grade-- Wrote a cinquain poem together as a class about "Frogs".

2nd grade-- Reinforced the book "The Doorbell Rang" and the math concept of dividing something equally.  Completed an activity sheet with paper cookie cutouts on fractions.

3rd grade & 5th grade-- Dictionary skills -phonetic spelling of words.

4th grade--FREE CLASS Students explored the library on their own.

WEEK OF FEBRUARY 2 - 6, 2009

PRE-K-- 5 Senses--(touch)  Some books have felt, glitter or some other tactile feature on the pictures.   So the librarian read, "Snow Friends" (a specila glitter book) then students played a guessing game with paperbags that had different items like an apple, coins, a pencil, a spoon etc. and the students had to try and guess just by feeling the object.

Kindergarten--Read "Go to Sleep Little Groundhog".  Played games to help reinforce blends and digraphs, "SH", "CR", and "PL".

1st grade-- Read "Go to Sleep Little Groundhog" and discussed the holiday. Then read "Valentine's Day" book of poetry by Jack Pretluzsky; Discussed the characteristics of poetry.  We will be writing some poetry together as a class next week.

2nd grade-- Read "The Doorbell Rang" by Pat Hutchins.  This is a storybook about kids sharing a plate of fresh baked cookies but it actually explains the math concept of "division".

3rd grade-- FREE CLASS.  Students used this time to explore the library.

4th grade-- Dictionary skills--phonetic spelling.

5th grade-- Monthly book report; discussion about characteristics of biography and autobiography.

WEEK OF JANUARY 26 - 30, 2009

Pre-K-- Read "Go to Sleep Little Groundhog" in preparation for Feb 2nd, Groundhog's Day.  Then played Picture Bingo game and sang "Bingo" song.

Kindergarten-- Sang "Bingo" song and then played Picture Bingo game to help students make connections between pictures and the spelling of some common everyday words like "dog", "cat", "socks", "balloon", etc.

1st grade and 2nd grade-- Discussed the definition of "sight words", then played Sight Word Bingo game to reinforce the most commonly used words found on the Dolche lists.

3rd grade-- Dictionary skills.  Continued out lessons on the dictionary by exploring the phonetic spelling of words.

4th grade-- Dictionary skills.  Began lesson on the dictionary by using "guide words" to help us find words in the dictionary.

5th grade-- NO Class.  School closed early due to inclement weather.

Week of January 19 - 23, 2009

NO CLASSES--NO SCHOOL MONDAY 1/19 OR TUESDAY 1/20

Week of January 12 - 16, 2009

Pre-K -- Read the book "How Big is It?'  Discussed the ideas of big and small, same and different.  Used felt shapes (circle, square, rectangle and triangle) of different colors to sort the shapes according to either their size or color.

Kindergarten-- In keeping with their Apples cross-curricular theme we read the book, "The Ecosystem of the Apple Tree". Then played a game using the beginning word sounds called blends, "BR", "ST", and "FL".

1st grade-- In keeping with their cross-curricular theme of building communities, we read the book "Firefighters".   Then played puzzle games to reinforce our prior lessons on word beginnings, and rhyming words.

2nd grade-- Talked briefly about pop-up books as a special genre. Showed some examples of super cool pop-up books and then we made our own pop-up cards using the cross-curricular theme of FROGS.

3rd grade-- Dictionary skills.  Brief lesson on using guide words in the dictionary to help us narrow our search for a particular word.

4th grade-- Group reading from our cross-curricular outer space themed books.

5th grade-- Map and almanac skills.  Drew maps of states for cross-curricular on which information about the states population, square miles and other important facts will be included.

Week of January 3 - 9, 2009

WELCOME BACK TO SCHOOL!!

PreK-- Felt Board story of "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" by Eric Carle. This is a wonderful story that reinforces counting and helps children learn the days of the week.

Kindergarten-- Beginning sounds of words. Played puzzle games to reinforce the concepts that some words have the same "beginning" sound.

1st Grade-- We've been doing lots of work on word endings and changing the first letter to make new words. Example: LOG, FROG, HOG, FOG. Read Dr. Seuss's "Hop on Pop" and talked about word beginning sounds and ending sounds, then played puzzle games to demonstrate and reinforce the concepts.

2nd Grade-- Read Dr. Seuss's "A Great Day for Up" and a portion of "Hop on Pop", then discussed beginning, middle and ending sounds of words. Students worked with a partner and puzzles to reinforce these concepts.

3rd grade-- Our wonderful 3rd graders helped Mrs. Hobart un-decorate the Library from Christmas.  The students were a terrific help and they all earned themselves a ticket for the service dog drawing for their efforts. Then they had an opportunity to explore the library for new books.

4th grade-- Students were given a "free" period to explore the library and find that "just right" book.

5th grade-- This month's classroom book report is historical fiction genre. We discussed the characteristics of historical fiction.  A display of historical fiction books was put together by the librarian and students spent the remainder of class choosing a book for their report.

December 8 - 12, 2008

3rd, 4th and 5th grade-- Alphabetical order.  Using computer games, posterboard, games, worksheets, etc. to reinforce alphabetical order concepts.  Each grade is given assignments based upon their grade level (Ex: first letter, second letter, third letter alphabetizing)

December 15 - 19, 2008

PreK-- Read "Let's Pretend" by Jean Marzollo, a story about pretending to be animals and then we acted out some of the animals.

K, 1st grade & 2nd grade-- Read Dr. Seuss's "Hop on Pop" and discussed words that end with the same sound (rhyming words).  To reinforce this concept students

3rd, 4th and 5th grade-- Alphabetical order.  Using computer games, posterboard, games, worksheets, etc. to reinforce alphabetical order concepts.  Each grade is given assignments based upon their grade level (Ex: first letter, second letter, third letter alphabetizing)

Week of Dec 1 - 5, 2008

No library scheduled.  Santa's Secret Shop is being held in the Library.

Week of Nov. 24 - 28, 2008

(Thanksgiving Holiday- 1/2 day Wednesday, No School Thursday and Friday)

Pre-K-- Book exchange only. Visit to their classroom from the Reading Fairy.

1st grade -- Read"My Brown Bear Barney".  This story shares the concept of "lists" of items. It shows how we write a list of items and separate each word with a comma.  Then with a partner the students were given a sheet with pictures of the items from the story and sent on a scavenger hunt throughout the Library!!  This story has repetitive text, which helps younger students predict what will happen next in the story.

2nd, 3rd & 4th grade-- (Free day)No formal instruction, students had extra time to explore the library.

5th grade--  Genre, realistic fiction. A  lesson on the characteristics of realistic fiction was presented. A selection of appropriate books was compiled for the students to help them choose a book for their December monthly book report.

Week of November 17 - 21, 2008

Pre-K-- Read "My Brown Bear Barney".  This story shares the concept of "lists" of items. It shows how we write a list of items and separate each word with a comma.  Then with a partner the students were given a sheet with pictures of the items from the story and sent on a scavenger hunt throughout the Library!!  This story has repetitive text, which helps younger students predict what will happen next in the story.

Kindergarten, 1st Grade & 2nd Grade-- The students heard a brief story about Louis Braille then they were given the opportunity to touch and "read" a real Braille book.  Students in 1st and 2nd grade used the Braille alphabet chart and a worksheet to write their initials in braille.

3rd Grade & 5th Grade-- Wrap Up Almanac--Finish up worksheet.

4th Grade-- Short lesson on the genre: Biography and Autobiography.  Used examples from our library collection to compare and contrast them.

5th Grade-- Continuation of lesson on the Almanac.  Fifth graders explore the almanac and construct there own questions about statistics found there.

Week of November 10 - 14, 2008

Pre-K-- Our very own Reading Fairy (volunteer Mrs. Walls) read to PreK today.

Kindergarten- Catholic Identity theme "Parables".  We read the book "Berenstain Bears Helping Others" and then talked about how God's light shines from us when we do good things for others.  The students colored a candle that is being used to decorate our monthly bulletin board.

1st grade-- Catholic Identity theme "Parable - Christian Light".  We read the book "Berenstain Bears Helping Others".  Students colored a candle and finished a sentence strip that began, "God's light shines through me when I . . ."  These sentences and candles are being used to decorate our monthly library bulletin board.

2nd grade-- Sight word bingo game--Discussed what a sight word is and then played a fun game to reinforce the student's ability to recognize these most commonly used words in English.

3rd grade-- Book exchange only-- Reading Fairy went to their class to visit and have story time with them.

4th grade-- Almanac wrap-up -- Discussed briefly again the purpose of using an almanac and what types of information the students were able to find in this resource book.

5th grade-- Book exchange only (school assembly)--November monthly book report is on the non-fiction genre. 

Week of November 3 - 7, 2008

Pre - K--No class; Day at the Pumpkin Patch

Kindergarten -- Picture Bingo-- Uses words combined with pictures to improve word recognition of common items such as: car, doll, cat, dog, toothbrush, soap, coat, pajamas, flower etc.

1st Grade--  Read two stories about phonics and changing a word ending just by removing the first letter of the word and replacing it with a new letter.  Then we worked with a partner and special dry erase boards to create our own rhyming words like:  net, bet, set, -- pot, not, cot -- hat, cat, rat -- pan, ran, can -- etc.

2nd grade-- Finished up our unit on Alphabetical Order.  Worked with a partner in centers to improve our skills with 1st, 2nd and 3rd letter alphabetizing.  We used poster activities, a puzzle, word cut-outs and various online games.

3rd grade-- No class; Day at the Pumpkin Patch

4th grade-- Almanacs- Continued working on find out about the different types of information contained in the Almanac and how that might help them in the future for researching and gathering information for a report.

5th grade -- Discussed the difference between fiction (a made up story) and non-fiction (a book with real facts).  We also talked about the different characteristics of a non-fiction book such as, using photos (instead of drawn/cartoon pictures). Also the animals in the photos look real, as opposed to fictional animals which may be drawn wearing clothes or demonstrating human characteristics.  Non-fiction books are written to inform and many times contain a glossary at the back of the book.  A glossary is the same as a dictionary in that it gives word pronunciations and meanings but it contains words that pertain only to  the subject matter in that particular book.

Week of October 27 - 31, 2008

Pre-K,Kindergarten, 1st & 2nd grade -- Halloween story "The Little OldLady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything".  Students used a variety of props(like hats, gloves, boots etc.) to make all the sound effects for the story telling. Ask your child to tell you the surprise ending to the story.

3rd, 4th & 5th grade - Began lesson on the Almanac. Each class had a lesson plan tailored to their ages and abilities.

Week of October 20 - 24, 2008

NO CLASSES!  THE BOOK FAIR WAS HERE!!

Thanks to everyone who made the book fair a success.

Week of October 13 - 17, 2008

Prek-K, Kindergarten, 1st & 2nd grade - Halloween story time.

3rd, 4th & 5th grade - Free time to explore the library and practice using the online card catalog.

Week of October 6 - 10, 2008

Pre-K-- A is for apple.  Read story about "Johnny Appleseed". Played sorting shapes game.

Kindergarten--Read"ChickaChicka BoomBoom", sang songs and played an alphabet puzzle game.

1st grade--Reinforced the classroom lesson on sentence structure (i.e., begins with a capital letter, has a subject, a verb and ending with a period).  Played a sentence structure puzzle game.

2nd grade-- Continued alphabetical order skills with poster displays, and online computer alphabetizing games.

3rd grade-- Alphabetical order and sorting skills.  We'll be playing games and alphabetizing through the second and third letters of the words.

4th grade-- The whole class came to the library and had the opportunity to look for their favorite book and practice their skills with the library's online card catalog system.

5th grade-- A lesson on time management skills that teaches students how to budget their time for completing the monthly book report.  This month's book report theme is "Mystery".

Week of September 29 - October 3, 2008

Pre-Kindergarten & Kindergarten-- Felt Board story about baby Moses.  This lesson is part of our catholic identity theme, "Foundations of our Faith". Students use the felt board to help tell the story of Moses as a baby and God's plan for him. This month's classroom bulletin board theme is "The Ten Commandments".

First grade-- Sight word Bingo (uses Dolch List words).  There are 220 common words that were identified by Edward William Dolch, PhD in 1948.  These words are found with frequency in all texts and are sometimes words that cannot be sounded out easily, like "said", "who", "knew" etc. Learning sight words will increase a students reading fluency.

Second grade-- Using differentiated instruction to address "Alphabetical order".  Students used special board games and computer games to alphabetize words beginning with the first and second letters.  Third letter alphabetizing was done by students who needed a challenge.

Third, Fourth and Fifth grade---  Free class to explore the new library selections, try out the online computerized card catalog system and get one-on-one help from the Librarian.

Note: Fifth grade monthly book report for October is "Mystery" genre. We are blessed to have a large and varied library collection.There will be a large display of books so that parents won't have to make a special trip to the public library.

Week of September 22 - 26, 2008

Pre-Kindergarten--Sang songs "From My Head Down to my Toes, God Made Me" and "The ABC song". Librarian read "ChickaChicka Boom Boom" (an excellent alphabet book) and students played an alphabet puzzle game.

Kindergarten and 1st grade-  Picture Bingo !!  Traditional bingo game that uses pictures and common words.

2nd grade-- Silly Sentences game.  Used parts of speech puzzle pieces to create simple and silly sentences.  Reinforces the concept that sentences follow a predictable pattern (i.e. begins with a capital letter, contains a noun as the subject, a verb and ends with punctuation)

3rd grade--Began lesson on dictionary skills

4th grade--Tutorial on how to use the online card catalog system in the St. John's library.  Creating independent learners by allowing students to search for books by keyword, title or author on our computerized system.

5th grade-- Jeopardy style "Quiz Show"  featuring the categories: Definitions, root words, synonyms, prefixes/suffixes and using the word in a sentence. 

Week of September 15 - 19th

Pre-K, Kindergarten and First Grade--Felt Board Story "Polar Bear, Polar Bear What Do You Hear?"  (Interactive story telling)  Students are given the felt board pieces and they help tell the story. Keeps children engaged and paying attention to the story. Shows story sequence (beginning, middle and end)

Second Grade-- Played sentence structure game. Students learned that sentences begin with a subject and include a verb and ending punctuation. This activity was a supplement for the classroom Lanugauge Arts lessons.

Third Grade and Fifth Grade-- Tutorial on how to use the online Library card catalog. Creates independent learners by allowing students to search for books by title, author or keyword in our computerized system.

Fourth Grade-- Language Arts quiz game. Students played in teams and answered questions about word definitions, synonyms, antonyms and root words.

Basic Library rules (For all ages):

1.  No shouting! Using your indoor voice.

2.  No running! Walk, please.

3.  Please respect the teacher and others by not talking when others are talking.

4.  No horseplay or you will be asked to leave the library.