Author Visit & Free Books!

The coolest thing happened at my school this week; we had 2 different authors come and visit us!  My awesome reading specialist found out about this great organization called, An Open Book.  They are an organization committed to bringing books to disadvantaged children and teens in the Washington, DC area.  Through the organization our school was able to have 2 authors visit with 3 different grades.

Uma Krishnaswami is one of authors who came to our school, and she was great!  She read her book, Out of the Way! Out of the Way!, to the whole 1st grade.  The story is a sweet tale about a tree growing up amidst a very busy and growing village.  I can see using this as a mentor text for a few different topics like change over time or natural made vs. man made features.  

After she read to us, she worked with them to create a whole group list poem.  The kids loved the book and had so much fun creating the poem with her!

The best part for my students was finding out that they were going receive a free copy of the book, and that the author was going to sign it for them!  They were so excited and just couldn't believe that they were getting their own book to take home and keep!  It was so cute!

After one of my cutie pies got her book signed, she went right over and put it safely in her desk.   Then she went back to sit on the carpet to listen to another one of Umi Krishnaswami's books being read aloud.  After a few minutes she quietly got up and went back to her desk to retrieve the book, as she walked pasted me she leaned over and whispered, "I just want to hold onto my book, is that ok?"

What a wonderful experience for my students!  I think this organization is just great and would encourage you to go and check them out!

I wasn't involved in coordinating the event, but I was told that it was pretty easy to set up and the whole experience was just so meaningful!