Kindergarten is "Wild About Books"

Making and selling books during choice time

       

A new kindergarten favorite

     










Kindergarten is "wild about books." Since the start of school we have noticed that our kindergarten students are enthralled with books and have been exploring the world of books in multiple ways. The children have been making books in class during choice time, sometimes "selling" them to adults who enter our room! We extended this interest by creating spider number books in math as well as making books to explore the five senses, our first study of the year.

Book sharing with the class

Noting this growing interest in books and book making, we knew that each child would love another kindergarten experience- book sharing. Each child looks forward to sharing a favorite book from home every week as they share three pages and ask for questions and comments during daily book sharing times. The class also clamors for "one more chapter" as we have been reading the chapter books Gooseberry Park and the sequel, Gooseberry Park and the Master Plan. Other read alouds in class and in the library are carefully listened to and thoughtful discussions follow. Morning choice and afternoon quiet times are often filled with friends reading together or moments to read alone.

Reading during quiet time

Designing a mask 

This deep and continued interest in books naturally led to the students creating favorite storybook costumes for our annual AFS Halloween Parade. With the help of classroom and resource teachers, the children used community time to create costumes to transform into characters such as Pete the Cat, the Gruffalo, Pinkilicious and Eagle Man!

  

Eagle Man to the rescue from the book, ABC Super Heroes

Sketching illustrations for a new book

To provide a clearer focus to this interest in books, the students began asking many questions about what they would like to learn more about:
How do you make books?
What are the parts of a book?
How do you know what to write?
How long does it take to make a book?
How many books are there in the world?
Why do you like books?
Why do we read books?
What kind of books do you like?
Why do we have books?
Can we sell our books?


We were fortunate to have Eric Luper, an author visiting the Lower School this week, to help us to answer some of our questions about books and bookmaking. Other questions will require further exploration and investigation. If you know of any resources about books and book making (an author, illustrator, publisher, book binder, etc), please let us know. Our kindergarten class would love any additional resources to support this emergent study. Be on the look out as our dedicated kindergarten authors and illustrators continue making class books and individual books for all to enjoy.