Simone Toy-ECL310 posts!

I was amazed at the amount of picture books and the range of different styles that I came across when searching ‘picture books’. The range of colors that appeared display many emotions and eye catching visuals. There are some pictures that can be explored and read into such detail due to the amount of small visuals and creations within the image, however some single visuals display so much information at a glance. Expression, emotion, personalities and situations can be represented through a single image without words, therefore there is so much within a book before it even being opened, which states the importance of frontloading. I found many picture books that every day people sketch to represent their feelings, day or situation, which shows the importance it places for students to be able to express themselves through creativity.

-If you were currently in the story cover, what do you think you would be able to feel? -What emotion is the author trying to covey? -Can you relate the cover to any prior experiences you have had? -If the book could make noise, what do you think it would sound LIKE? -What do you think the choice of colors represent?

I joined a grade four class for my recent placement at Park Ridge. The students were reading the Big Friendly Giant by Roald Dahl, and writting a narrative story based on their own conception of the Giants. I was able to read to the students throughout my placement and conference their narratives with them which was a great experiences to go through the planning, drafting, editing, conferencing and publishing stages with the students. I focused my literacy lessons on comprehension, direct speech, simile/metaphors, summarizing and editing to develop their skills and apply this knowledge to their narratives. In the second week, we focused a lot on areas of compare and contrast, as we finished reading the book and were going to watch the movie then they were to complete an assessment comparing and contrasting the book to movie. I loved my time on placement as I developed a really positive relationships with the class and I learnt so much every day in the classroom, attending meetings and through lesson planning. My confidence developed a huge amount which made it much more comfortable and enjoyable and allowed me to focus on developing my teaching skills.

Making the poster was an excellent ‘tune in’ for the lesson whilst it allowed to students to revise, share ideas, learn from one another and have a poster to refer back to.

Paul Jennings stories were so popular around our school, that the author himself came to visit us.Suddenly all the books became real. This was a fantastic opportunity for the importance of reading and writing to be discussed and classroom tips to be shared, as all students were engaged and could relate to the lesson.