ABCs of DCGMS Library: K is for Kahoot!

Making our way through the ABCs of the DCGMS Library has us at letter K today--K is for Kahoot!

Access Kahoot! HERE

Our DCGMS students are familiar with Kahoot! as it's used in a variety of classes and in advisory, so it was a natural fit to use Kahoot! in the Literacy Studies class, too. After a quick search on Kahoot!, we came across the public Kahoot! called Fun With Reading, which was a great way to wrap up recent activities related book series, book recommendations, and book review writing.

Access the Kahoot! HERE

A good time was had by all as we worked through the Kahoot!, and with so many of the books already on our library shelves, it was a great way to book talk titles that may have been new to students.

2nd Quarter Library Projects

Each quarter in literacy studies, students work on a project related to their reading classes. Last quarter, sixth graders created Slides presentations showing their understanding of genre by choosing an independent reading book they'd read, identifying the genre, and providing supporting examples. Seventh graders also created a Slides presentation to show their understanding of different literary terms, including protagonist & antagonist, point of view, conflict and theme.

In the new quarter, students are again working on different projects. Sixth graders are developing better book talks based on a poster from www.middleschoolmind.com.

LINK to access full blog post

Students chose a book they could enthusiastically recommend, developed their book talks, then used the Unsplash add-on in Google Slides to add an image to also grab the listeners' attention. Finally, students recorded their work using Screencastify. This will allow students to take part in a gallery walk, of sorts, after the holiday break and listen to multiple book talks.

While sixth graders worked on book talk presentations, seventh graders again this year completed an author study project. Over time the project has undergone several revisions; this year, those revisions included using Thinglink as the basis of the project and adjusting the written requirements to include both required and personal choice items.

LINK to site

Students used Google Drive to write and present information about an author of their choice--they wrote about the author's publishing life and included an analysis piece of a passage of their choosing, and they also included one of the following: a personal narrative about their interest in the author, a creative interview, or a scene rewrite.

Featured New Books

With the close of our recent Scholastic Book Fair, you may notice quite a few new titles in the library. Want to try one of them? Here's some information--and book trailers--for some of our new books.

Patina, by Jason Reynolds, is the second book in his Track series that includes the book Ghost. This book follows Patty, one of the teammates on the track team. An African American middle schooler who lives with her aunt and uncle, Patty's life has the life skills to bring her relay team together, to make it in her all-white girls' school, and make the best of her unusual family arrangement. 

Legend series author Marie Lu has a new series in the works with Warcross. Main character Emika is a teenage girl who not only plays the international sensation video game, but also hunts down the people who illegally bet on the game. Check out the trailer:

Want to try historical fiction? Dean Hughes' book Four-Four-Two features the 442nd Combat Regiment from World War II--a unit made up entirely of Japanese Americans.

Main character Yuki and his family are forced to live in a Japanese internment camp in Utah, but Yuki chooses to enlist in the army to serve the country that holds him. He and his friend ship out to Europe, where their friendship only grows stronger amid all the prejudices and battles.

Other titles are read-alikes for books you may have already read. Any of these look familiar?

So why not stop by the library soon to look at our book fair purchases and maybe check out something new? Hope to see you soon!

1-Thing Wednesday: Historical Fiction Focus

With so many great books released in the last year, how about a look at a few that are historical fiction, like the Newbury Honor book Wolf Hollow? Readers will find themselves pulled into the story of Annabelle, Betty, and Toby; can we trust what we believe we've seen, and do we really know the people in our lives?

Other great historical fiction promoted throughout the year in the library include some newer titles along with some old favorites:

If you haven't read many historical fiction titles--or if you're eager to read some more--we're happy to help you with that next book to read!

Last Round of Book Talks

Seventh graders were in the library again today to listen to the last round of book talks for the year. Serendipity prevailed, and many of the new books that were ordered in April arrived just yesterday, and in the nick of time made it into today's book talk presentation.



The final slide in the presentation specifically promoted 4 of the new titles added just today:

With just a week and a half left to check out books, stop by today to pick up one of the new titles. Or, make a note to pick them up at your public library over the summer! They'll all make for some great summer reading!

Book Talks with a Twist

In this latest round of book talks, our titles reflect a popular expression as we move into springtime and summer: Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue.



"Something old" refers to titles we've had in the collection for a bit--like Sanderson's The Rithmatist and Brow's The Wild Robot.

Some of our new spring book fair purchases are included in the "something new" category--books like Ghost by Jason Reynolds and Boy X by Dan Smith.

With classic retellings like Heartless popular now, our book talks also include "something borrowed" with Redwine's The Shadow Queen.

And our "something blue?" Cheating just a little, Carve the Mark by Veronica Roth--its beautiful dark blue cover meeting the need. 

Take a look at the Slides presentation--maybe you'll find something to interest you in this last quarter!

Another Round of Booktalks

Seventh graders visited the library today to listen to book talks and to visit the Scholastic Book Fair. Some of the highlights from the Book Fair were Exo, The Shadow Queen, and Zero Day.

Below is the book talk presentation--including mention of this year's Newbery Medal winner The Girl Who Drank the Moon. Also featured is a new-to-us sports series by John Coy called the 4 for 4 Series. 

Book Talks

Both sixth and seventh graders have been into the library recently to listen to book talks and to make book selections. Both presentations--along with a few of the highlighted titles--appear below:

Stop by the library to check out or put on hold any of these books, plus any others, including some recent new titles like John Feinstein's The DH in The Triple Threat series, or the Red Queen companion Cruel Crown by Victoria Aveyard.