Well, the April Shelf Challenge is over, phew! Did I get all the way through my assigned section, the S section? No, no I did not. Am I still glad I tried? Yes, yes I am!
It was great fun to read through my section and revisit some old favorites like: The Stinky Cheese Man and other fairly stupid tales by Jon Scieszka & Lane Smith, Where the wild things are by Maurice Sendak, One fish, two fish, red fish, blue fish, by Dr. Seuss and yes, by Dr. Seuss.
I also discovered some new favorites like: Monkey and Elephant by Carole Lexa Schaefer and Shark and Lobster’s Amazing Undersea Adventure by Viviane Schwarz
I must admit one that should have already been an old favorite but I had never actually read was Skippyjon Jones and the big bones by Judy Schachner.
I have recommended Skippyjon Jones books millions of time but they are always flying off the shelves and I never had the chance to read one myself. I read it to my daughter after school one day and we laughed and laughed. Talk about a book you need to practice with first if you really want to use your best read aloud voices and accents! Thank goodness I had a supportive audience in my 5 year old daughter and not a whole class of kindergartners!
Along with some misshelved finds, (Henry and Mudge what are you doing jumping a shelf down into the S’s!) I found some holiday books by Lola M. Schaefer that should be in nonfiction. While they probably circulated fine in the easy section my younger readers LOVE to go the nonfiction section and this way I can steer them to some that I know they can read. A win-win for everyone!
April was busy with testing…poetry… more testing… formal observation… still more testing…and reading! I didn’t get all the way through my section but I have fun almost making it around the corner of my book case. Who knows, maybe I’ll keep going into May. I do know that I will be signing up again next year…maybe a fiction section next time!
Happy Reading!
Okle