Literature Activities

Click the posting title for literature activities for the books, "One Odd Day," "My Even Day," or "My Half Day" or cut and paste the following link into your browser.

http://www.sylvandellpublishing.com/documents/OddEvenHalfTeachingActivities.pdf

Fancy Writing

Get your writers to use fancy talk using "Fancy Nancy," by Jane O'Connor

Book Synopsis (taken from inside sleeve)
Meet Nancy, who believes that more is ALWAYS better when it comes to being fancy. From the top of her tiara down to her sparkly studded shoes, Nancy is determined to teach her family a thing or two about being fancy.

How Nancy transforms her parents and little sister for one enchanted evening makes for a story that is funny and warm -- with or without the frills.

Pre-Reading Activity - make a list of fancy words and come up with the synonyms for them.

Post Reading Activity - Encourage students to use "fancy" words in their writing. Post on a display with fancy decorations. Have a "fancy" dress up day and encourage students to wear fancy clothing and use fancy words when talking.

Blog Makeover

Don't you love it? I want to thank Danielle from
www.blogsbydanielle.blogspot.com for my makeover. I could just stare at it all day - it's too darn cute! It makes me miss teaching even more! Thank you Danielle for your gift of design and eye for detail.

Field Trips Grant Program

This year, Target will award 5,000 grants of up to $800 for for field trips. Applications will be available online from September 2 - November 1, 2008. Previous winners are welcome to apply.

Visit Target.com/teachers for more information and to apply for a field trip grant.

Small Favor, Big Impact

I have a small favor to ask of every one that visits my site that could make a big impact for Adopt-A-Classroom and America’s teachers. For the second year, American Express Members Project is giving away $1.5 million to the project that receives the most nominations on the Members Project website at http://www.membersproject.com. Last year, Adopt-A-Classroom made it into the Top 25. This year the focus is on national attention to the importance of teachers in our communities and the issues they face. I greatly appreciate your taking a few minutes to go to memberssproject.com and nominate “Adopt a Classroom - Support America’s Teachers.” You do NOT need to be an American Express cardholder to nominate a project. (This is a big difference from last year’s campaign.) Help Adopt-A-Classroom win $1.5 million to support America’s teachers. As an FYI, this is the first of 3 rounds of voting. The next round narrows it from Top 25 to Top 5 and the final round narrows it to a winner. Thanks so much for doing this. Please forward this email to your friends and family.

Visit Adopt-A-Classroom's website at