Children's Choice Book Awards for 2012

        The 2102 Children's Choices and 2012 Teachers' Choices book lists have been announced from the International Reading Association and the Children's Book Council! These lists contain book suggestions which serve as valuable resources for teachers, parents, and librarians. 

 

       Click on the links below to go directly to the PDF files. You can easily bookmark and save the documents electronically  to refer to them again. It's a great reference for you to use during your next visit to the public library or book store. You are sure to find some new titles that you will fold into your instruction or classroom libraries. Finding new favorite books will invigorate both your book selections for lessons and simply sharing with children for enjoyment!

2012 Children's Choices from IRA/CBC

2012 Teachers' Choices from IRA/CBC 

     

     The list for the Children's Choices is also the starting ground for the finalists for the annual Children's Choice Book Awards with the Children's Book Council.  You can click on this link to see who the finalists and winners were for 2012.  Here is a clip of author Jarrett J. Krosoczka introducing the awards gala in May 2012.

     You can also find out more about the Children's Book Council's Children's Choices Book Awards through their Facebook page which is dedicated just to the awards. The Children's Book Council can also be found on Pinterest, Twitter and Facebook as well. The International Reading Association can be accessed here through these links for Facebook and Twitter, too. 

    Here are a few of the first place winners which are relevant to the elementary levels:

Illustrator of the Year: Brian Selznick for Wonderstruck (Scholastic Press, 2011)

K-2 Winner:  Three Hens and a Peacock Written by Lester Laminack and Illustrated by Henry Cole (Peachtree, 2011)

Grades 3-4 Winner: Bad Kitty Meets the Baby Written and Illustrated by Nick Bruel (Square Fish, 2012)

Grades 5-6 Winner: Okay for Now Written by Gary D. Schmidt (Clarion, 2011)

                                                        

Writing Fix - Mentor Texts of the Year 2012-13

     Northern Nevada Writing Project has a fantastic writing resource website called Writing Fix. I highly recommend that you bookmark and explore this site. It is an extensive collection of information on Six Traits concepts, mentor texts, journaling, writing prompts, and so much more.

     The mentor texts for the 2012-13 school year have been announced by the staff at Writing Fix. This year, the two books are The Boy Who Loved Words by Roni Schotter and illustrated by Giselle Potter (Schwartz & Wade, 2006) and Vocabulary Unplugged by Alana Morris (Discover Writing Press, 2005).

      

      The Boy Who Loved Words is a picture book about a boy named Selig who relishes in collecting words. It is a good text to support the trait of word choice during a mentor text lesson as part of a writing workshop session. Schotter's book can also show how to spice up your writing pieces during the revision stage of the writing process. In addition, the text can be used to exemplify how to use context clues to figure out large vocabulary words within a story.

      You can download a PDF Teacher's Guide from Random House for The Boy Who Loved Words.  There is more information available about the book through the Parents' Choice Award Website as well.

        
      Sign up here for the Writing Lesson of the Month email from the Northern Nevada Writing Project/Writing Fix. Interesting lesson ideas for teaching elements and traits of writing. (Some of the lessons deal with music, which would apply better to an older student demographic, but many lessons deal with mentor texts.) 

    You can also read an older post about a previous fall's WritingFix's Mentor Text of the Year by clicking here.