I Can't Resist Sharing One More...

I just have to share one of my favorite classroom blogs (it wasn't on the list of blogs to review for our assignment). Actually, it is a school library blog and I think that it is clever. I just love it!
The site is called Children's Choice Chats. This librarian has taken the books that are nominated for their state's (Washington) award this year and creates a post about each of the nominees. As students or classes read the books, they can leave a comment about the book. It is a great example of using a blog to encourage the children to read and reflect. The format she uses makes very little work for the librarian. I would like to try this next year as I loop back down to 3rd grade. I could follow Mrs. Berthelson's model and set up a blog for the Mark Twain Award nominees and as my students read those books, they could then comment on the blog. I could also invite our Kindergarten buddy class to comment as a class on books that were read to them in their classroom. Mrs. Berthelson actually has another blog for older students' and their books called the Young Reader's Choice Reviews. It works pretty much the same way as the Children's Choice Chats. It's just for older readers. She also has a blog called Blogging with Mrs. Berthelson that I thought was also clever. Here the students comments were actually recommendations for books they read in different genres. Again, the format of the page was very simple. Unfortunately, this blog seems to be no longer active (the posts are old). I do a lot with genres in my class. I bet I could create something similar to this. Hmmm.....

Check out Mrs. Berthelson's blogs:
http://schools.shorelineschools.org/briarcrest/blogs/berthelson_cc/
http://schools.shorelineschools.org/briarcrest/blogs/berthelson_yrc/
http://schools.shorelineschools.org/briarcrest/blogs/berthelson/
http://schools.shorelineschools.org/briarcrest/blogs/berthelson_ss/ (Another inactive blog similar to the Young Reader's Choice Reviews.)