New Agriculture and Farming Books at DC Elementary

Earlier in the school year, the Dallas Center Elementary library was awarded a $200 grant from the Iowa Agriculture Literacy Foundation. This grant allowed for the purchase of several new farming and agriculture books to add to the collection and to use with units of study.

Recently, second graders completed a mini-unit that reinforced the main idea/detail note-taking work they had been doing in their classrooms throughout the year. Students could work individually, with a partner, or as a trio to read all or part of a new book, then complete the handout, identifying one main idea and two supporting details.

Access the handout HERE

Below are some of the things students learned in their work:

Once students had read and completed the handout, it was time to return to one of their favorite web tools, Flipgrid. This group of students has used Flipgrid several times and with very few reminders were able to record their learning. 

Talking' about Traits

As part of our Iowa Goldfinch Award work, students spent some time talking about character traits. To help us understand the difference between a character trait and other traits (like appearance), we used everyone's favorite orange cat as an example.

We decided that a character trait had to do with a person's (or cat's!) personality. So, while we could all say that Garfield was a big, orange cat, we couldn't say those traits referred to his personality. Instead, we decided that he was lazy.

Then, it was on to more Goldfinch read-aloud books to practice talking about character traits in books. We used This a Moose and Meet the Dullards for this activity.

Students talked about two groups of characters from each book: Moose and Duck from This is a Moose and the parents and the kids from Meet the Dullards. Here are some of the descriptors they arrived at when talking about character traits:

Moose: determined, brave

Duck: angry, hypocritical

Parents: boring, surprised

Kids: bored, sneaky

Students then used Flipgrid to record their thinking. Using our lists of traits, students chose a character and trait, then said why they believed that character showed that trait. Click on the link in the caption to access the students' responses.

CLICK HERE to access the grid.

Stay tuned--we're not done yet with our Iowa Goldfinch Award nominees!

Using Flipgrid to Recommend Books

We're excited to share how we're using Flipgrid in our elementary libraries. Over time we've used it to share our newly created tall tale characters, to promote student-written and illustrated ABC books, and to plead the cases of books with zero checkouts. (You can read about these activities HERE.) Now, we've used it with our Grades 3 - 5 students to recommend our favorite books.

Taking advantage of access to both iPads and Chromebooks, students were able to share some of their favorite books with others. South Prairie Elementary students shared books in a Read This Book grid:

YOU CAN ACCESS THE GRID HERE.

Heritage Elementary and Dallas Center Elementary students added more than 200 recommendations and has had more than 1350 views after their initial postings!

YOU CAN ACCESS THE GRID HERE.

Flipgrid has been a tremendous tool to help us build our community of readers, and our students would love to have you take a look at their work. Enjoy!

Creating Our Own Tall Tale Characters

Second grade students are finishing the school year reading and watching tall tales, comparing and contrasting character traits and plot points. Students talked about Paul Bunyan, John Henry, and Pecos Bill, noting things like:

     •  the men were stronger, bigger, or faster than others

     •  they often had "sidekicks"

     •  they were in contests 

     •  they get credit for making things in nature.

With these things in mind, students then created their own tall tale characters using the handout below:

Access the handout HERE.

Once students had made decisions about their characters, they accessed our class FlipGrid to record their information. While students had used FlipGrid before, this was the first time they independently recorded themselves. You can see part of our grid below and click on the link in the caption for the full list of responses:

CLICK HERE to access the full grid.

Enjoy the students' responses--their creativity and voice definitely shines through!

We're Flipping Over Flipgrid!

Dallas Center Elementary K-2 students have been using Flipgrid with recent lessons, and we all love it! This website and app allow us to record students' work and hear their thinking in their own voices. Each of the grade levels focused on different lessons but ultimately recorded their work in Flipgrid. Check it out!

Kindergarten

Students have been reviewing the differences between fiction and nonfiction text. We looked at examples both from our own library collection, as well as pairs of books featured on BookFLIX. As a final assessment, students looked at various books at their tables and determined whether the book was fiction or nonfiction. As groups, then, students recorded their responses using Flipgrid.

CLICK HERE TO ACCESS AT FLIPGRID.COM

1st Grade

After talking about ABC order and the importance of alphabetical order in the library earlier in the year, we circled back to those concepts to write and illustrate our own ABC books. After some read aloud examples, students looked at different kinds of ABC books in their table groups.

Students then wrote and illustrated their own ABC books, taking inspiration from the many examples they saw. It was then time to record them reading from their own books.

You can access their Flipgrid videos by clicking on the caption below:

CLICK HERE TO ACCESS THEIR VIDEOS.

2nd Grade

Thanks to a fellow K-5 teacher librarian, we tried a new lesson looking at books that have had very few or zero checkouts in a year's time. Reading a book together, we talked about the story and the pictures, offering our opinions about why the book is one that we should recommend to students or one that we should maybe remove from the shelf. Students then looked through books at their tables to choose one that they then used to complete the handout below.

After making decisions about the books they'd chosen, students then recorded their responses on Flipgrid.

CLICK HERE TO ACCESS VIDEOS AT FLIPGRID.COM

If you're looking for an engaging and user-friendly way to assess your students--and want your students' voices to be loud and clear!--Flipgrid is a wonderful tool to add to your toolbox!