Our school's reading program is called, "Rooted in Reading," and it calls for a reading of a mentor text each week to be featured. Throughout the week, the students are able to engage in activities involving the book. The students love hearing the books and later, they ask to read the books again themselves. However, we are in a low-income, poverty school and do not have any of the mentor text books. I have been having to borrow other teachers' books and sometimes they don't have the books that our class needs. When I borrow the books, I have to return them so the books are not able to be in our classroom library for the students to have further access to.
The students loved Saturdays and Teacakes, but the book has already been returned to the owner. We even baked teacakes and had a teacake party in our classroom. The class also loved the book Finding Winnie. They enjoyed seeing the original pictures of Winnie the bear, but again, the book is no longer in our classroom and they still ask about it. We compared and contrasted Pinduli and Crow Boy, but it was difficult because Pinduli was already returned so we did it from memory.
If we had our own classroom library full of these wonderful mentor texts, we could refer to, reread, and use them throughout the year. I really strive to find books in their interests and that are meaningful to them, but it would be so much more beneficial to have them in our classroom library as our own! Then, every week we would be guaranteed to have the featured book that we need and thoroughly enjoy it without it having to be returned.
About my class
Our school's reading program is called, "Rooted in Reading," and it calls for a reading of a mentor text each week to be featured. Throughout the week, the students are able to engage in activities involving the book. The students love hearing the books and later, they ask to read the books again themselves. However, we are in a low-income, poverty school and do not have any of the mentor text books. I have been having to borrow other teachers' books and sometimes they don't have the books that our class needs. When I borrow the books, I have to return them so the books are not able to be in our classroom library for the students to have further access to.
The students loved Saturdays and Teacakes, but the book has already been returned to the owner. We even baked teacakes and had a teacake party in our classroom. The class also loved the book Finding Winnie. They enjoyed seeing the original pictures of Winnie the bear, but again, the book is no longer in our classroom and they still ask about it. We compared and contrasted Pinduli and Crow Boy, but it was difficult because Pinduli was already returned so we did it from memory.
If we had our own classroom library full of these wonderful mentor texts, we could refer to, reread, and use them throughout the year. I really strive to find books in their interests and that are meaningful to them, but it would be so much more beneficial to have them in our classroom library as our own! Then, every week we would be guaranteed to have the featured book that we need and thoroughly enjoy it without it having to be returned.
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