Forest of Reading - An Update!!!

There's so much going on at school right now. The library has been booked solid for the last three weeks.  The Forest of Reading has been incredibly successful. I ordered a total of 80 books for just the Red Maple category of the Forest of Reading and right now all 80 books are checked out. In total I purchased 170 titles for the Forest of Reading. I have kids requesting copies left right and centre. I've included a link to the Forest of Reading brochure. People can access and see all the categories and all the titles in Forest of Reading. If anyone were to donate some of these titles particularly the Red Maple category, that would be fantastic:))

The Forest of Reading has been very popular this year. I currently have 176 students signed up to participate in the voting, for the winning books. This is a huge number. I certainly didn't anticipate having this many students interested in the program and am feeling a little overwhelmed by their enthusiasm.

Students can participate in the Forest of Reading in a number of ways. My goal was to make the program accessible to everyone and make it easy and fun to participate. I would like to see every student in the school pick up a Forest of Reading book sometime during this year and enjoy reading it. If students do this then I will consider the program to have been a success. Of course this isn't the only thing going on students have the following options for participation.

1. Read any of the books for enjoyment.
2. Read any of the books for enjoyment then speak to one of the participating teachers about what they have read.
3. Read any of the books and come to book club on Tuesdays or Thursdays. 
4. Write a message on the Graffiti board. 
5. Rehearse and discuss their book while I film them for our Forest of Reading video.
6. Read 5 books from one of the categories and document their reading on a passport, then participate in the voting at the end of April. 

I want students enthusiastic about reading and enjoying what they read. I believe that literacy is best promoted through positive encouragement.Students all read at different levels so it is important to make the books and success accessible to all. Hopefully, the variety of options that I have presented to students will encourage them to keep reading and above all enjoy it.  

Bitstrips for Schools and Learning French!

Part of my job here at Lagerquist is to work as a resource person for other teachers. Part of my job is to have a fairly wide base of knowledge about technology, curriculum, and teaching strategies. Hopefully, I have fulfilled this role by helping Mrs. Albrecht to plan and learn how to use Bitstrips for Schools. Bitstrips for Schools is a fantastic little resource which allows teachers to create virtual classrooms and structure assignments for students in which students create comic strips to display their learning. Mrs. Albrecht has chosen to have students create a comic strip for her grade 7 french class.

Here's a link to a video about Bitstrips. Bitstrips on Vimeo


Mrs. Albrecht came to see me in December to discuss the project. She wanted to try and add a technology component to her french program. She admits to not having a strong knowledge of technology but very much wanted to try a new activity and to learn some more about technology. I took her to the Bitstrips website and showed her all the features available on the site. We talked about setting up an account for each students. This is a fairly daunting task as Mrs. Albrecht has 6 french classes and it was a going to take a fair amount of time to set up individual accounts for approximately 150 students. She was committed to the project however and seemed very eager to start setting up the virtual classroom. Mrs. Albrecht was fantastic she was open to suggestions and really wanted to learn. We discussed the length of time it would take to introduce the program to the kids, get them set up and then an appropriate amount of class time for the project. We booked the students into the library computer lab for 3 periods for each class. It was refreshing to discuss a french project with her as most activities I work on are science, history or language based.

The assignment required students to use their reading comprehension skills to read a collection of sentences and choose 15 sentences to order into a cohesive story. Students were then brought to the library and I instructed students on how to use Bitstrips. Students were given the option to create an electronic comic or a hand drawn version. Most students chose the electronic option. Bitstrips is fantastic because students can also access their virtual classroom from home. This means that most students can complete their work here at school or at home. For those with limited Internet access Study Hall provides that extra time to work on computers.

It's been a lot of fun working with Mrs. Albrecht and her 6 classes of french. I look forward to another partnership in the near future and will certainly post some of the students comics as they complete them.