On Tuesday, March 7th, World Read Aloud Day, I visited schools in South Carolina, Michigan, Wisconsin, two schools in Texas, and back to my home state of California–without leaving my office!
First stop: the 5th graders at Langford Elementary in South Carolina. With each of the upper grade classes I visited, I read aloud from first pages of selected middle grade novels: Charlotte’s Web (E.B.White) , Percy Jackson/The Lightening Thief (Rick Riordan), Bud, Not Buddy (Christopher Paul Curtis) , Project Mulberry (Linda Sue Park), my favorite read aloud Locomotion (Jacqueline Woodson), and my own middle grade Work-in-Progress. After each, we talked about how authors hook the reader. Some of the classes watched my Writer’s Rap afterwards. : ) One Langford student, Kareem, has been selected to attend a state-wide writing event, and I’m hoping he will be my guest blogger when he returns. Good luck, Kareem!
Lambertville, Michigan was my second stop. I read one of my picture books, LITTLE BO PEEP CAN’T GET TO SLEEP, to sixty K-2 students at New Bedford Academy and we sang my reading song. I promised I’d put it on my web site so here it is:
Erin’s Reading Song (with guitar chords; lyrics by Erin Dealey, written to the tune of The More We Get Together)
C G7 C
The more we read together, together, together
C G7 C
The more we read together, the SMARTER we’ll be.
G7 C
‘Cuz books make you smarter
G7 C
And smart kids go farther!
C G7 C
The more we read together, the SMARTER we’ll be.
And guess what? The New Bedford K-2 kids were one book smarter after we read Bo Peep. : )
Then it was on to meet some fabulous 1st and 6th grade reading buddies in Franklin, Wisconsin. The 1st graders surprised me with the fabulous Goldie Locks masks they had made. (Thank you!) They read aloud to me first–from the Goldie Locks reviews they had written. Then I read aloud from Bo Peep and, for the 6th graders, the first page of my middle grades WIP. We also talked a bit about the writing process. It’s so cool teachers still make time to let cross-age buddies learn from each other. Keep reading together, Ben Franklin!
San Antonio, Texas was my next stop, with two school visits! First I met the entire 1st grade at Cibolo Green Elementary ,and then I zipped (well, skyped) across town to the El Dorado Elementary 1st graders. After a Bo Peep read-aloud, they asked me questions.
I honestly don’t remember which student (or what school!) asked about my dog Max, the star of my video Rough (ruff!) Drafts, but Max was off doing his own school visits. (He thinks he’s an author…) One question was How did you get the dog to talk? My answer: I’ve always suspected Max is a little old man in a dog suit.
As for me, at the end of the day, it was back to California and a visit to San Gabriel 4th graders who made this very cool video: http://animoto.com/play/UqlQyVuB92xW0C18rNSRFA . I met over 400 students on WRAD and what a fun adventure– no boarding passes (or field trip permission slips) needed!
Special thanks to all of my new skype teacher pals (Please keep in touch!), and especially author Kate Messner (Check out her books!) who posted this WRAD skype opportunity on her web site and connected schools with authors all over the US.
Read on, everyone!
Hi Erin,
Thank you so much for taking the time to Skype with our students at New Bedford Academy in Lambertville, MI. The students absolutely loved it.
You’re so welcome! If you want, we can skype next fall and set some reading goals, and if they reach their goals, I’ll pop back in to congratulate them. : )
That sounds wonderful. I will email you at the beginning of September so that we can set something up. Thank you so much.
Hello Mrs. Dealey. This is Kareem the boy from Langford Elementary. I am so sorry my comment is over due. The symposium was a wonderful experience! When we signed in to the LONG,LONG line, we went to our designated classes. We all had a welcoming conversation and got to know each other. After that, we got to the good part. Wait for it, here it comes!!! WE MET 3 AWESOME AUTHORS!!!! Colin Bootman who is a famous illustrator and an author of many young children books, Deborah Wiles who is the author of Love, Ruby Lavender. And last, but CERTAINLY not least, Jerry Pallotta. I think I’m speaking for all the young authors at the conference that he was the most interesting. He told us about the pros, and cons of being an author and all the experiences he had. But the special thing about him is that he had his bugs and creepy crawlers on the projector (from his bugs alphabet books) and put them above our heads so it looked like it was going to come down and eat us!!! But of course we all had a good time learning the important skills of writing and having fun at the same time!!! All they missed was the greatest writer of all time. YOU!!!! But anyways, we all had a fun time. So that’s it from me. Hope to see you again soon.
Hi Kareem,
It sounds like you had a wonderful experience! I’m so thrilled that you and other young writers had this opportunity. I hope you realize it takes a special person to be selected for this honor in the first place! Are you able to keep in contact with new writer friends you met there? You will find these contacts are the best when you want feedback on your writing or just a friendly “You can do it!” I am happy to provide that also, if you’d like. In the mean time, please give my best to your class and Ms. Wood. Happy Writing and Reading to all!
Your Friend,
Erin