Social Issue Book Clubs (by Freya)

Social issues in our books aren't just naming the social issues. They teach us different ideas about the social issues. Like "Sammy and the Time of the Troubles." Sammy still knows war is horrible, but he starts to get used to it. Other books show war as something that scars your body because your family and the people you live die. Another example is the social issue death in "Esperanza Rising." Her father's death scars her life forever because after he dies, Esperanza and her mom are at the mercy of their mean and horrible relative. In other books like "The Bridge to Terabithia" it is a big pressure to Jess when his only and best friend dies.

Social issues teach you something important, but some ideas conflict. Which ideas do you agree with?

Arrowheads

Today we had a special presentation by Will. He brought in Iroquois arrowheads for us to study, and he taught us everything he could about them. We were filled with questions, and we got several great ideas for our historical fiction pieces.

A Columbus Comic (by Louise)

I know so much about Christopher Columbus, and I wanted to show some of it in a child-fun way. So I decided that I would Write and draw a comic on Columbus. I hope after reading it, you will say to yourself, "Wow, I just learned a ton!!" Then please help your self to reading and learning as much as you can about Christopher Columbus. Click on any picture to view it larger!

Why Some People Think Christopher Columbus "Discovered" America (by Zora))

Some people think Christopher Columbus “discovered” America but he really didn’t.  One reason he didn’t is that native people were there for hundreds of years.  Another reason is people like Leif Eriksson sailed to America but just didn’t stop to make settlements.  I guess the reason of that is because the Europeans [the or Spanish] didn’t know about the New World [North America] and accepted Christopher Columbus as the “discoverer” who brought them aware that a continent was there.  Though it’s funny because the Europeans [or the Spanish] thought Christopher Columbus had just come across a much faster and safer way to sail to China.

Thanksgiving!

This Thanksgiving, Class 4-324 is thankful for all the new books we just got from the Scholastic Book Fair! Thanks to your generous donations, we were able to get a variety of fiction and nonfiction books to add to our classroom library. Many of us already took these books home to read over Thanksgiving weekend!

Which books are you most excited about reading? Why? 

Sharing Our Personal Essays!

Edison came up with the COOLEST idea during Writing Workshop today. He's writing his personal essay about how Legend of Zelda Spirit Tracks is the best Legend of Zelda game. And he thought to himself, "When I'm done publishing this, I can take it down to Game Stop! They sell Legend of Zelda Spirit Tracks. I bet other people there would want to read my essay to find out if they would like the game."

As a class, we got pretty excited about his idea, and we started thinking about potential audiences for our personal essays.  

Who do you plan to share your personal essay with you when you are finished with it? 

826nyc and Lots and Lots of Bacon

On Tuesday, we journeyed down to 826nyc for a Storytelling and Bookmaking Program. Volunteers at the center helped us develop our own story titled "Bacon the Hamster vs. Squeaky the Squirrel." After we wrote the first few pages together, we went off to craft our own endings to the story. An illustrator created drawings to match our story. These drawings were bound with the original story and our own endings, so we left with our own original books (complete with our photograph on the back!).

The only downside to the whole trip was Ms. Mildew, the 826nyc publisher who lives deep down in the 14th basement of the building. She was the toughest publisher we've ever encountered. For a while we were concerned that she wouldn't accept our books (she normally doesn't take anything written by children), but after reading our stories she reluctantly agreed they could be approved.

Here are some pictures from our visit. Click on a picture to enlarge it!

What was your favorite part of our trip to 826nyc? How did your story end?