and the picture books to go along with them!
I get asked this question all the time. How do you incorporate picture books into an upper grade classroom? The easiest way is to incorporate books with national days.
Let me tell you how I do it in Room 35.
Every morning one student reads the national days for the current day. For example, on Tuesday, October 1st Homemade Cookies Day. We will celebrate with a question about cookies and a picture book read aloud. The kids LOVE IT! If for some reason, we have to have a shortened morning meeting, it can never be this section. I tried once and it didn’t end well for me. (hehehe)
Here is a list of my fav NATIONAL DAYS for October!
October 1st: Homemade Cookies Day : The Cookie Maker of Mavin Road
October 4th: National Taco Day : Dragons Love Tacos
October 5th: Do Something Nice Day : Something Beautiful
October 10th: National Mental Health Day : The Snurtch
October 14th: National Stop Bullying Day : Lila and the Crow
October 16th: National Sports Day : Chip and Curly
October 17th: National Pasta Day : Pasta Pasta Lotsa Pasta
October 20th: National Confidence Day : Saturday is Swimming Day
October 22nd: National Color Day : Isabel and her Colores go to School
October 26th: National Pumpkin Day : How Big Could Your Pumpkin Grow?
October 27th: National Black Cat Day : Cat Problems
October 31st: Girl Scouts Founders Day : Here Come the Girl Scouts!
Want to send home a pdf of the recommended National Day books for October? Grab it HERE or click on the picture above.
This month we are going to focus on CONFIDENCE in my classroom. Each Wednesday, my students and I embark on a 40 minute journey of picture book bliss before Science Lab. In October, I will be using Saturday is Swimming Day which is the perfect choice to tackle a confidence boost, practice story element and written text responses. You can check out the resource here.
TEACHER TIP: Announce the day, ask a related question, and read a picture book celebrating the topic! The kids love it and it brings you back to the days of thematic teaching. Oh the good ole’ days.
Here is a list of all the books I use to celebrate October National Days. If you want more lists, you can visit my amazon store and search October National Days and the book list will pop up!
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