Books in the Classroom with Yvonne Mullen!

I want to start by welcoming our NEWEST book reviewer Yvonne Mullen to Mrs Mommy Booknerd's Book Reviews!  She is an awesome 2nd grade teacher and book nerd/guru!  I am so excited to have her on the team blogging about books in the classroom.  She will be taking the books that we review and applying them into the class!  She also shares the books she loves with the district and helps other teacher's use the books in new and fun ways!  

So here are Yvonne's first book reviews.  I am so looking forward to seeing how she uses them in class!

If You Give a Mouse an iPhone: A Cautionary Tail

by Ann Droyd

If you give in to temptation and give a bored little mouse your iPhone,even for ten minutes, he’s probably going to beam to some faraway place beyond time, space, and the sound of your pleading voice. And if he’s that far gone, he won’t have any idea what’s going on around him, and he might end up missing out on all the real fun.

From the New York Times-bestselling author of Goodnight iPad comes a delightful new commentary on the perils of our tech-obsessed lives and a fully charged romp for readers of all ages. 

If You Give a Mouse an iPhone

What a fun twist on a very familiar book. I like the repetition of language for beginning to transitional readers. The story could easily be read to beginning readers and then they would be able to "read" the story back.  That is how many students begin reading. 

The story could easily be used for:

• teaching predictions
• using technology purposefully
• adding dialogue through speech bubbles (great way to teach k-2 student about dialogue and then transition into using quotation marks)
• using different types of punctuation (?, !, ...) how to use in writing and how we "read" the punctuation to increase student fluency
• partner reading (1. narrator 2. boy)
• contractions
• text to self connections
• comparing/contrasting two stories
• the dedication is perfect for any age to read... 45 drafts! All students need to be taught and retaught that good writing rarely if ever happens the first time. 

It is great to have one text that can be used in so many ways.  That is when it can truly becomes a mentor text. I will be adding this to my wishlist and to my next staff development session. 5 stars

Things That Float and Things That Don't

by David A. Adler, Anna Raff 

Things That Float and Things That Don't

As a science geek I love this book.  It definitely is a book that upper elementary - freshman science teachers should incorporate into their unit on density. It does an amazing job of explaining many concepts (density, cubic foot, water displacement, and solutions). It actually walks readers though the scientific method in a fun and easy to understand way. I appreciate the data table and the accuracy of how data tables should be constructed (title, labels, straight lines, hypotheses). Finally the book sets readers up for many mini experiments to try on their own.

This would be a great book to have for sharing because there are not many picture books that explain such a large science concept. I think it is important for upper elementary teachers and beyond to realize the role picture books can play in their teaching. 5 stars