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Hi All, Thanks for all your information so far! This is my second attempt at posting a hit. I didn't see the first one post, so please forgive me if this is a second posting. I received several requests for a hit so here is what I have received so far..... (I didn't include names b/c I wasn't sure if I was supposed to or not. I would like to credit the people who responded so if someone would let me know what the protocol is on that, I would appreciate it!) Mrs. Harrow Strickland Media Specialist Cary Woods Elementary Auburn, AL work- hstrickland@auburnschools.org home- w-hstrickland@mindspring.com 1. I use author studies with second and third grade classes, and I tend to use those authors who have videos available in my own collection or elsewhere in the district and who have written books which are used in the pertinent classroom. Some of them are Eric Carle, Cynthia Rylant, Tomi de Paola, Dr. Seuss, Laura Ingalls Wilder, ... I use the same format for most lessons: US or world map to locate the birthplace and current place of residence; tell a few biographical facts which I think will be meaningful for the age group; show and booktalk the available books by that author; show a video of the author (or of one of the books if no author video is available); invite the children to check out one of the author's books. This program usually takes 30 minutes, depending on the length of the video. 2. Last year I started author studies and the kids and I loved it! I chose a different author each month ( one elementary K-3 and one 4-8). I set up a small area for each in different parts of the library. In the "author's corner" I displayed their books, put up posters about the authors (available from Demco), and also typed a list of their books. During their library visits (fixed schedule, daily, 30 min.) I would talk about the author and booktalk a few of the books. If I had a video about the author or one of their books, we would watch some or all of it. Also, I would choose one of their books to read aloud during that month. I would try to write to each author and let them know they were our author of the month. Some wrote back! Louis Sachar wrote a really nice letter and Marc Brown sent an email from Arthur! We really enjoyed our author studies! Some of the authors we studied are listed below. Good luck and have fun! Grades K-3: Marc Brown Eric Carle Donald Crews Dr. Seuss (in March!) Maurice Sendak Steven Kellogg Bill Peet Grades 4-8: Louis Sachar Beverly Cleary Roald Dahl Theodore Taylor Judy Blume Natalie Babbitt Virginia Hamilton 3. In my seventh grade lit classes, the poets seem to be the best received by the students. We were able to do very successful internet biographical searches of the most famous poets. It seemed that the newer authors and popular current names were more difficult to search, so we will try again this year. 4. I don't know if this what you have in mind, but at my previous school, the fifth graders did a unit on Betsy Byars. The whole fifth grade was divided into small groups and each group read a different Betsy Byars novel. At the end, we had a "celebration" in which each group created a unique presentation to tell about the book they read. Some make posters, some do skits, dioramas, quilts, stuff like that. In order for the groups to be manageable size, other professional in the building join the teachers in taking groups. Last year we had 3 sections of fifth grade. One section is an inclusion class, so there were 2 teachers in that class, for a total of 4 classroom teachers. In addition, the LMS, school psychologist, a reading teacher, the nurse, and I took groups, for a total of 9 groups. I was a employed as a paraprofessional, but was able to take a group because I am also a certified teacher. In most situations you probably would not be able to use your parapro. This arrangement works very nicely because it allows for small groups and draws other building professionals into the class. The number of groups allows the students to be exposed to more novels than they might ordinarily be. We also use this arrangement when doing historical fiction and biographies. We call these units Literature Clubs. 5. Hi - I don't know what grade level you are addressing, but I do author studies with K-2. I usually tell them something about the author and then read as many of the books by the author as possible. We compare and contrast, if possible. I would also look them up on the Internet, if I had access to it in my library. I have printed out pages and brought them in for the kids to see. I use videos about the author and tapes by the author. I have done Cynthia Rylant for years. I also do Daniel Pinkwater - he'd really be better with older kids as his humor often goes over the heads of the younger ones. I have never used "canned' studies with the children, although I will look in those for information about the author. I have also done David McPhail, Mark Teague, Chris Van Allsburg. That's all I can think of at the time. 6. Hello Last year I did an author study unit with my 7th graders. With a partner or two, they had to read different books by the same author. Next they had to research the author online. The unit was called Connections because they had to lok for connections between the books and the author's life. They were each responsible for a book talk, a written summary, and a group presentation using Venn Diagrams. 7. My second year in the library I did my first author study with the First Grade. Our grading periods are broken into six weeks, so I panned that as my time frame. I chose Tomie dePaolo as the author and randomly chose 6 of his books (fiction and nonfiction). I started with a little biographical info about Tomie dePaolo and then each week I read 1 of his books and asked the students what they would like to ask Mr. dePaolo about his writing of this book. At the end of the study, we put their questions into letter form and mailed it to the author. We actually got a response (picture, letter, and bookmarks). The kids were hooked on Tomie dePaolo books! I've since added Second Grade and author Patricia Reilly Gif. The other authors and grades weren't as successful so I'll try new ones this year. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-==-= All postings to LM_NET are protected under copyright law. 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