New Friends Made on World Read Aloud Day

Happy belated but most sincere World Read Aloud Day wishes to everyone!  This blog entry is written today, Thursday, March 6, 2014, the day after official World Read Aloud Day.

I am bursting with excitement and love for the new friends Harding Elementary students made with teacher-librarians, teachers, and students from...

Mason City, IA to Weatherford, Texas

Mason City, IA to Roswell, Georgia 

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Mason City, IA to Wentzville, Missouri

While I LOVE every connection made this week for World Read Aloud Day, my most FAVORITE and BEST SKYPE experience ever was first thing Wednesday morning at 9:15am (CST)!  Mr. Feight's 4th grade class from Harding Elementary connected with Teacher-librarian Shawna Ford (@ShawnaFord1) and her 2nd grade students from Weatherford, Texas!  I believe this was my most favorite and best Skype session ever thanks to a combination of well-behaved students at both sites, Mr. Feight's support as a classroom teacher, and Shawna's experience with numerous Skype sessions with famous authors, all-stars like Shannon McClintock Miller, and many more.

I follow Shawna on Twitter and consider her to be part of the elite "all-star teacher-librarians" group (just as I consider Shannon McClintock Miller & John Schu elite all star-librarians) that I look up to and admire.  I admit that I was completely "star-struck" when we connected via Skype that I just had to tell her how much I think of her!

Our students enjoyed a read aloud of The Day the Crayons Quit by Drew Dewalt!  By now, after reading World Read Aloud Day 1 and Day 2 blog posts, you probably have figured out that I really, really LOVE this book!  It is so much fun to read aloud, it never gets boring!

Here are some pictures of our amazing Skyping experience with Mr. Feight's class and Shawna Ford and her students!

 Best part of the Skype session with Shawna?!  Mr. Feight "starring" as Superman!  It was pajama day at school to celebrate Dr. Seuss's "I Don't Want to Wake Up Today!"

Next, Ms. Ibis's and Ms. Beatty's 4th grade class from Harding Elementary connected and made new friends with 4th grade teacher Heather Temeske (@htemske) and her students from Roswell, Georgia (1 hour north of Atlanta).  We LOVED reading The Day the Crayons Quit by Drew Dewalt!  Why is it that elementary-age students think any book with "naked" and "underwear" is the best book ever?!  I don't know, but I have to admit that I like all the crayons in the story, but Peach Crayon is my FAVORITE!

I enjoy learning about other states, especially their state's picture book award!  Thanks to previous blog posts I have written, it is obvious that I am passionate about the Iowa Goldfinch Award!  So, it made it even more fun to connect Ms. Ciavarelli's kindergarten class from Harding Elementary with teacher-librarian Jeanne Cook  (@JeanneCook20 ) from Wentzville, Missouri to listen to a read aloud of their Missouri state picture book award winner "It's a Tiger" by David LaRochelle!

Jeanne Cooke read aloud the book and showed the pictures to both my students and her students.  It is quite obvious that Harding Elementary needs a copy of this fun, interactive read aloud!  Jeanne did a fabulous job of engaging all of our students with motions, actions, and audience participation!

Check out some of these pictures of this Skype session with Ms. Ciavarelli's kindergarten class and teacher-librarian Jeanne Cook and her kindergarten students from Wentzville, Missouri!

It was so much fun to connect and make new friends with Shawna Ford, Heather Temske, and Jeanne Cook!  I hope Harding elementary students went home and couldn't stop talking about these amazing opportunities to connect with people their own age, outside the state of Iowa!  I know I couldn't stop talking about it as my family and I sat down for dinner that evening!

I consider the Official World Read Aloud Day (March 5, 2014) to be an EPIC day in the Harding Elementary IC!  I am still bursting with excitement over Wednesday's EPIC Skype experiences!