Between the Lines

2nd Grade Faves

I asked the Amigos 2nd graders for the titles of some of their favorite library read alouds this year. After a great deal of excited conversation and laughter about the books’ characters and events, we finally remembered the exact titles. If you have time this summer, check these books out at your local library.

Library Lion by Michelle Knudsen (available in Sp.)

Willy el Timido y Willy el Mago por Anthony Browne (available in Eng.)

El Tapiz de Abuela por Omar Castañeda (available in Eng.)

365 Penguins by Jean-Luc Fromental and Joelle Jolivet (A 2007 Boston Globe-Horn Book Honor Book)

Bartholomew and the Oobleck by Dr. Seuss

The Weaving of a Dream by Marilee Heyer

Klondike Gold by Alice Provensen

The Terrible Hodag and the Animal Catchers by Caroline Arnold

Happy Year of the Pig!

From Library Photos

It was a busy week at the Amigos & King schools, with both sides of the building preparing Valentine’s displays & celebrations of the Chinese New Year. King School students showed great creativity in their Chinese New Year assembly on Wednesday, and the hallways are swinging with paper lanterns. The Amigos Schools students marched through the halls of the school on Friday, carrying a dragon on their backs, banging instruments and carrying signs to wish the school community well in the new year. The library gathered its Chinese New Year books and made a quick display, with one of our favorite puppets basking in the glory of having his own year to anticipate.

From Library Photos

For now, February break gives everyone a chance to rest up from the week’s festivities and prepare to enter the next month with renewed energy & excitement. Have a great vacation!

WOW!

The Amigos first graders came into the library yesterday afternoon. I know how much they love their Chinese lessons with Ms. June, so I showed them the new books we have by Huy Voun Lee. When I held up 1,2,3, Go! they began to count in Chinese without any prompting. It gave all the adults in the room goosebumps. “Wow,” we said, “Can you do that again?” Sure enough, they counted in Chinese all the way through the book. Look for all four of Huy Voun Lee’s books in our library.

Wiki Pioneers Share Their Knowledge

Since late December, two 6th grade classes in the Amigos School have been charting unknown technological terrain. Laurie Ferhani’s science classes visited & documented ecosystems around Boston including Deer Island, the Charles River, and Black’s Nook Pond. While it’s great to have information for ourselves, it’s even better to share the wealth, and that’s just what students have done with their “Boston Ecosystems” wiki.

A wiki is an expandable set of webpages that can be written and edited by anyone. Yes, anyone! Our wiki limits editing privileges to “members” (our students), but anyone can view the pages online. Students got an overview of the world of wikis, but most of the learning happened when they jumped in and started creating.

Students wrote individual articles & experimented with formatting text & saving their pages. Learning to use the (sometimes finicky) Wikispaces template was no easy task, but the pioneers displayed typical courage & determination and pressed onward.

One goal of using wikis is to share knowledge through a collaborative writing & editing process. The students have recently combined their individual pages (me) into group-written & edited articles (we) that synthesize and communicate the information students have gathered.

Take a moment to learn more about Boston’s ecosystems from our 6th grade experts today!