Today was our first library adventure. For the last few classes, we have been talking about lions and today we went to the library to search for printed materials and other sources to supplement the learning we had been getting from each other as sources. We all walked over in the rain and began talking about our plan of attack for how we would find our eight sources which we would soon narrow down to three to check out and return to the classroom with. We all decided that we would split into two smaller groups so we could still work together, but we would not just be one cumbersome mass.
When we arrived, we split into a group of three and a group of two. The three person group being myself (Danielle), Megan, and Sarah and the other two were Jess and Caitlin. The five of us first looked around the room we met in to find resources.
There, Caitlin found a puppet of a lion that we knew would be a unique learning tool to better help the students conceptualize fur and texture of a lion. They could also use what they learn from books about lions to bring that personality to life with the puppet. After this discovery, Sarah, Megan, and I went to the computers to make a search through the CAT system. They seemed to have a handle on it, so I went on a search of my own. I browsed the stacks and found four books of different genres that I thought would be useful. I met back up with Megan and Sarah and we started putting the print resources we found into piles after skimming them for content.
"Think about what information the books deliver," Kris told us. We had immediately began thinking as teachers and saying what we could teach with each book, but we learned that the most important thing to think about what what would the children learn or infer from reading this text. Given this new lens, we reevaluated the books and tried to use books that would not only be interesting for children but would also either have informative pictures or facts, or give various views of how a lion can be portrayed.
The book I chose was, "How Loud is a Lion." This book right off the bat is appealing because it has colorful, textured pictures that look like they were created from felt. When immediately thinking through a teaching lens, I pictured recreating this story with children through the use of a felt board. But when I began to look at it from the lens of what I would learn from the book, I enjoyed that it began with a question. Children are naturally inquisitive and may have their own preconceived notions of the sounds a lion makes. It was also educational in the way that it explains other animals that live in the lion's habitat. There is a lot of repetition which can be enjoyable for a child with a lot of onomatopoeias for the children to join in with story telling. Overall, this book is a well rounded, enjoyable story for the portrayal of lions in the classroom.
This is another book that our group found appealing and potentially helpful. It uses a mix of photographs and illustrations to represent different kinds of wild cats. This book is helpful because it helps children compare and contrast the similarities and differences between mountain lions and cheetahs and tigers. It tells a story that could engage the children while using facts to intrigue them as well. The cats in the story go on an adventure to see if wild cats are anything like house cats, something that elementary children can relate to. This book is full of facts about eating, hunting, running, hiding, habitats, and family dynamics. The illustrations can grab a child's attention, but the book's facts are true. Many activities could incorporate the facts pulled from this book or it could just be an educational experience as children sit and listen.
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