Chills and Thrills guest reviewer Beth Hibbard

My friend Beth is back with another read aloud recommendation. Beth loves read a louds and she chooses titles that will engage and delight students. This time of the year. Beth  reads The Ghost of Sifty Sifty Sam 

Sam is a little bit scary, with a funny ending. The text is repetitious and it rhymes !  Author Angela Shelf Medaris is a great story teller living in Texas.  The 100th Day of School is her best know book. Make a note for a January/February lesson.
 Beth also recommends

https://www.cfclassroom.com/2011/10/haunted-house-creative-writing-project.html

for writing prompts and other project activities.

Other spooky titles:

traditional song and story

Georgie the Ghost series.  This title form from Audible now under a dollar.

How brave are you ?

Make a sequencing activity for Kindergarten.

Autsim Makes Waves

Yesterday I presented at MASL (Maryland Association of School Librarians) on my favorite topic Students with Autism in the Elementary Library Classroom.  I choose pecha kucha, a chit chat slide show presentation.  I used the 20 x 20 format, though the time frame was about 15 minutes longer .
Below are many of the slides and a little explanation.

I asked the group to share what experiences they had with students with autism

Quick pass at the AALA standards, for this presentation I focused on Collaboration, Inclusion and Engagement.

Description of the autism spectrum disorder in students; social skills, repetitive behaviors, non verbal communication, individuals have unique strengths. Causes are genetics and environmental. 

The rate of autism in general population 1/60, for boys 1/42 and 1/189 for girls.

 The above data comes from AutismSpeaks

 Collaboration with teachers, teaching assistants and administration essential.

While cruising the internet I found this photo of a paraeducator form Maryland. Your expectations for paraeducators should be specific, discussed and approved by administrators, special education teachers and introduced to the para before instruction begins.

When working with students with autism in a library media center  make it VISUAL

and

introduce VOCABULARY

Special Education Teachers use Boardmaker software or the online app to create social stories.

Instead of paying for software or an app I use MS Power Point, which has copyright free clip art. Using a template, choose 12 vocabulary words from a book, picture book or non fiction. Include the cover, read the story or use a recorded version lots on You Tube, Pebble GO , Discovery Ed or Mackin Library.  Students may follow along with the reading identify the vocabulary with finger, or with manipulative, cut up velcro-ed pictures or a cut and paste activity, as below.

Alternate activities to introduce could be CODE.org or other on line coding sites and MakerSpace activities, puzzles, Legos, STEM boxes.  Students with Autism need engagement and inclusion as do all students.

Thank you to all who attended my presentation.I hope you enjoyed the back and forth discussion. I know I did!

Why Genre fy Dewey ?

I find this article interesting.  If I was in a school library today I would give the gentrification of Dewey serious consideration; mostly to increase circulation, but also to recognize that there is sexism and racism and cultural ignorance in the DDS.

https://www.slj.com/?detailStory=ditching-dewey-libraries-These-Ideas-Can-Get-You-Started-on-Genrefication