Best+Lessons

Post here your best lesson ideas in any format!

Excel Projects from Laura MacArthur I'm attaching these projects in the order we taught them - the "CA" just stands for the class name, Computer Applications. I've also included an example for the Wish List project. Some of these files started out life as .docx, but I thought I'd aim for maximum accessibility and saved them as .doc files. Hopefully the transition hasn't mucked too much with formatting! If you have any questions, please feel free to email me, lmacarthur@ahacademy.com.




 * [|Biography Stew Lesson]** also called **[|Biography Hash]** (great photos here)


 * Substitute Lessons** on the Elementary Library Routines Wiki

Here are some documents that I have in my Substitute Folder. Most of these documents will need to be modified to fit your library but I thought they may be helpful and giving a "starting place" so other people don't have to start from scratch. Most of the lessons refer to books, DVDs, and worksheets that you may not have but I'm sure you can find similiar things to replace them. Please feel free to modify any of these documents to meet your needs. Virginia Crutchfield 9-12-08
 * Substitute Emergency Lesson Plans (Elementary)**

The class had to have time to check out books AND for 3 periods, I had another class in the library at the same time checking out books and then I did the lesson with them in the same period so that is why it is really a MINI lesson. Of course, the teachers are going more in depth but I like to help introduce or review when I can. I talked to the students about inferring tone and mood. I gave an example of my mother yelling out the back door, "Sandra Kay get in here right now!" with the appropriate tone and of course, they all could infer that I was in trouble! I explained tone was how you could tell the author's attitude toward the subject by the words used to describe it.... We talked about how music helps set the mood in movies, examples given by the students. Again, I said, in text, we must rely on the words used to infer the mood. I read a few stanzas of The Raven ( I actually enjoyed that) and they easily identified the mood. I shared a tip from Toni Buzzeo, look at the verbs and adjectives and see if they express the same mood. I read the poem below and the students shared what mood they felt. We then looked at the verbs and adjectives and confirmed their answers.
 * Tone and Mood Mini-Lesson using Poetry**

//The sky is low// THE sky is low, the clouds are mean, A traveling flake of snow Across a barn or through a rut Debates if it will go. A narrow wind complains all day How some one treated him; Nature, like us, is sometimes caught Without her diadem. **Emily Dickinson** __April Rain Song__Let the rain kiss you Let the rain beat upon your head with silver liquid drops Let the rain sing you a lullaby The rain makes still pools on the sidewalk The rain makes running pools in the gutter The rain plays a little sleep song on our roof at night And I love the rain. by Langston Hughes I concluded the lesson by passing out a couple of poems to each table. They read them aloud and decided on the tone or mood in their group. We passed the poems to the next table and repeated the process. I was pleased to see many of the students checking out poetry books after the lesson.

Maybe in a future lesson. I want to incorporate music selection with booktalk podcasting so that may be a good way to re-visit tone and mood again. Sandra Carswell, Librarian S. C. Lee Junior High, Copperas Cove, TX

Best lesson or idea from 2007-2008 I started this discussion last year and really enjoyed it. Please share the best thing you did in your library this year. I got so many great ideas from this last year.

My best thing was to spend the majority of my book money on new YA fiction. Three years ago our fiction collection had an average copyright of 1976. I've got it up to the year 2000 now, and fiction circulation is 26 times higher than it was 3 years ago! Students are finding a new love for reading and I hear them discussing their favorite books among each other. This is the thing I am most proud of.

Graphic Novels: Selection and Teaching:
Barbara Braxton, a regular contributor to the LM-NET listserv from Australia, has put together which gives in one compact document contributions from LM-NET members. It includes definitions of terms in the design of graphic novels, the critical elements of graphic novels, as well as a bibliography of professional resources on GN. Hope this comes in handy in planning lessons, and just to help defend the inclusion of graphic novels in the library collection. See the .pdf at