Last km Club Run

I had to run out right after school yesterday and didn't manage to post on the blog.  Here is a photo of our guest reader yesterday.  He did a great job.  

I've had some parents asking about the reading.  the goal of these book sharing times to encourage the kids to see themselves as readers.  Many of the stories are memorized and that is perfectly fine!  I really want the kids to feel confident and excited about reading.  Sometimes, I have to whisper the words to the reader.  That's ok too.  We are celebrating the stories and our willingness to share them.  There is no pressure placed on the kids at all....just encouragement and celebration.  

We found this book on our classroom bookshelf and had a look at it as a group today (a great one for beginning readers to look at with someone who can coach them along).  We talked about strategies we could use to figure out the words.  We looked at the pictures and made some predictions.  We discovered that there were LOTS of rhyming words, and we were able to look at the beginning sounds to figure out unknown rhyming words.  Maybe you have this book on your shelf at home.  Take a look at it and share it with your child.

This was a book that this guy was looking at, really trying to figure out the print.  He worked so hard!  It seems like the reading "lightbulb" has just turned on for many in the class.  If your child is showing interest, now is the time!  If your child is not yet showing interest, that's ok too....continue to share books together and talk about the stories.  

Today was our last km Club run.  I cannot say enough about how well this group did this year.  We had final km tallies ranging from 36kms to 120kms!!!  Most kids reached around the 60km mark, which is impressive.  For many, this was a chance to set and achieve personal goals.  We will have our last ribbon ceremony on Thursday this week.  (Sorry for the blurred out faces, I'm not sure if the kids in the other classes are allowed to have their images posted on a blog).

Here are our two guest readers from today.  They both brought books that I have never seen before.  Both of these books were simple, followed a pattern and had repetitive language throughout.  The pictures gave the reader important information about the story....perfect for beginning readers.