Third Graders Receive Their Dictionaries

COE third graders were presented with student dictionaries today by the Midwest City Rotary Club. This club is very generous to include our school in donating the dictionaries. The students were very excited to learn what other things were included in the dictionaries aside from definitions. Each student was presented with their own dictionary to keep and use for their studies in and out of school.

In addition, the Midwest City Rotary Club donated some much-needed books to our library. We are very grateful for these donations and I'm sure the books will be used by many students and teachers in the years to come.

Thank you for your committment to education and your generosity to our school, Midwest City Rotary Club!

Thunder Up Central Oak!

Our school was privileged this week to welcome two of the Thunder Girls and the Thunder Bus!














The top two readers in each classroom were able to board the bus and choose a free book donated by the Thunder.

Mrs. Cindy Tinney, our Library Assistant and I welcomed the Thunder Girls and were able to view the wonderful books that our students would be receiving.

Thank you Thunder! We are so glad you support schools in the Oklahoma City area!

OTA/Encyclomedia Conference - Oklahoma City, OK

Last week I spent two days at the Oklahoma Technology Association/EncycloMedia Conference held in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. What a wonderful opportunity to share with and learn from many other library and technology experts from our great state! Several people from our school district were representing Crooked Oak Public Schools. The COE Library Assistant, Cindy Tinney, the CO high school librarian, and a couple of others attended.  I was there with a 4th grade teacher (Laura Knight) from our school to give our presentation called "Classroom Bloggery." Here is the presentation link: http://bit.ly/PPP4gJ
 

In addition to presenting, we were able to attend other presentations about technology tools, great books to share with students, and also looked around at vendor booths. At one of those booths, I got to meet Katy Kelly, the author of one of our school's favorite books, Melonhead! Katy signed our school copy and I got to have my picture made with her (picture above).

EncycloMedia is a great way for librarians to re-charge and reconnect. Thank you, Oklahoma Technology Association for the great conference, and thank you COPS for paying for our attendance this year. It will be beneficial to our school district in ways we can't even imagine yet.

Have you attended a workshop or conference in the last year that was awesome? What was something you learned about your craft? Please share in the comment section below.
 

Captain Underpants Interview

Three fourth graders did an interview with Captain Underpants about one of his books this morning. The students posted the interview video on their blog through Kidblog.com. I am hoping to add the video to this blog as soon as it is published.

What a cool idea, Mrs. Knight!

George Washington Portrait

The front of Mount Vernon

Over the summer, I visited Mount Vernon as part of my trip to the Washington, DC area. I had planned on staying for a couple of hours and then heading back into the city for more sight-seeing. Little did I know how profoundly I would be struck by Mount Vernon! I was transported back to the 1700s while strolling the grounds of our first president's home. I was surprised at how small the home actually was, and at how nicely things have been preserved. I was unable to visit all the parts of the site due to time limitations, so I plan to return soon.

The back porch of Mount Vernon

Gardens at Mount Vernon

 As I was wandering through the new museum, a worker recognized me as a teacher (Hmmm... I wonder how he knew?), and sent me to the teacher resource center. The staff gave me a folder of resources from Mount Vernon to share with the teachers at my school. One of the things they did for my school was send a beautiful framed portrait of George Washington to be hung at our school! We finally received it last week, and it is now hung in a very prominent place in our school library. We are just as proud as we can be to have this portrait in our new library.

If you ever get the chance to visit Mount Vernon, I highly recommend it!