Join Us On August 4 For The NEW Webinar, Going Back To School With Capstone Connect!

As we get ready to go back to school this fall, I am excited to be using Capstone Connect to help me in the library, as I collaborate and co-teach with our teachers, and in dreaming up all kinds of new ways to use it with our students. 

Next week, on Wednesday, August 4, 2021 at 3:00pm CST, you can join Bryan Schmidt and I for a NEW Capstone Connect webinar to share these ideas and more. 

As shared on the Going Back To School With Capstone Connect webinar invite, 

You're invited to join us on Wednesday, August 4 from 3:00 – 3:45 p.m. CDT for "Going Back to School with Capstone Connect". During this webinar, you'll get an inside look at Capstone Connect including the newest enhancements to the intuitive, easy-to-use search tool that helps teachers find the exact content they need from a comprehensive collection of PebbleGo modules, thematic Capstone Interactive eBook bundles, and compilations of Capstone instructional materials, all aligned to state and national standards. 

Capstone's EdTech Marketing Manager, Bryan Schmidt, and future-ready teacher-librarian, Shannon McClintock Miller, will all also give you tips, tricks, and ready-to-use examples that will equip you with the tools you'll need to create fun, engaging lessons and activities for your students. 

Can't make the webinar? No problem! Everyone who registers will receive a link to the recording.

You can register for the webinar, Going Back To School With Capstone Connect, here.  We hope to see you there, friends. 

Let's Celebrate Zoo Tales For Week 9 Of Our Virtual Camp Adventure!

It's time for Week 9 of Our Virtual Camp Adventure!  And we will be celebrating Zoo Tales. 

All students and families can visit capstonepub.com/camp to access this 12-week long fun summer learning and reading adventure with our friends at Buncee and Capstone. 

This week, just click on Week 9 & 10 Zoo Tales and it will take you to the choice board filled with reading, making, moving, coding, stem, technology and fun virtual field trips around the world.  

The choice board also includes a Buncee Weekly Challenge that will be so much fun for everyone to create and share.  If they do not have Buncee, there is a place to click New To Buncee for their free summer trial.  

You will find that link for Buncee here too. 

In the left hand corner, they will find a place to click to Read and Listen To Zoo Tale Capstone eBooks. 

All they have to do to read and listen to the eBooks is click on the eBook covers.  They are directly linked so a username and password is not required. 

And if they need help, there is a Family Help button on each choice board slide and...

...on the bottom of the capstonepub.com/camp page. 

This document includes How To Use The Virtual Camp Adventure With Your Children This Summer and...

...Directions For Using The Virtual Camp Adventure Choice Boards. 

I hope all of the children and families have a special summer visiting Our Virtual Camp Adventure.  I can't wait to see and hear all of the different ways it is used and what is learned, read, and created from this amazing summer experience. 

And don't forget, friends....There will be prizes for librarians and teachers throughout the summer.  I will be sharing the second one in a couple of weeks.  You can read all about the Virtual Summer Camp Giveaway here. 

Oh, and if you need to make a copy of the choice board, please visit this post for the link and directions. 

Our Back-to-School You've Been Book'd Poster & Book List Are Here, Friends!

During the summer months, I love working on little projects to get ready for the new school year in the fall. 

One of the first things I put together was our first Back-to-School You've Been Book'd list and posters. There are several new ones I ordered from Follett's Titlewave, so this will give me plenty of time to get them all ready when we start school in August. 

There are so many new books I am super excited about.  A few of these include...

Mindful Mr. Sloth's, one of Capstone's upcoming August 2021 titles; 

Our Table, Peter Reynolds newest book coming out this fall; 

Our Class Is A Family, from teacher Shannon Olsen;

First Day of Unicorn School, another new favorite release from our friends at Capstone; 

...and What The Road Said, that came out in the spring from poet, Cleo Wade. 

Our Back-to-School You've Been Book'd includes 24 books and you will find them here in the poster I put together each month.  

Here is how the program works. Each teacher hangs up the poster on their door as the books in our You've Been Book'd bags are passed around and read by all of the classrooms.  You can read all about it here. 

Our students and love all of the You've Been Book'd lists we have throughout the year and we can't wait to celebrate with lots of new ones this upcoming school year too. 

I am also excited that each You've Been Book'd list will be shared on Follett's Titlewave.com. 

You will find the Back-to-School You've Been Book'd Titlewave List here. 

This will connect you to all of the books and the different formats that are available. 

I use our You've Been Book'd program to not only share books with our students and teachers, but as a way to truly enrich and enhance our library collection, while tying into the curriculum, events, social emotional learning, diversity and much more that is important to our community too. 

I hope you enjoy following our You've Been Book'd journey for the 2021-22 school year.  We are excited to share it with all of you and your readers. 

A NEW Yasmin Poster To Help You Kick Off The School Year In The Library!

 

I have been getting our library ready for the new school year.  One place I love visiting is Capstone's NEW Back-To-School Central site.  

This week, I was so excited to find this wonderful poster of Yasmin in the library.  

This is from Saadia Faruqi's much-loved book, Yasmin the Librarian.  You will find it here, along with the entire Yasmin series.  

Our readers LOVE the Yasmin series so I can't wait until they see this new poster. They love talking about the illustrations that Hatem Aly created for the Yasmin series and how he made her come to life in the pages. 

When you visit Capstone's Back-To-School Central site here, you will can download the Find It At Your Library! Poster. 

I printed it off in a poster size for the doors of the library and to hang throughout the school.  I am going to put one in back-to-school library welcome package for each teacher too.  They will love hanging these up in their classrooms. 

20 FREE Pet Tales Capstone eBooks For Weeks 7 and 8 Of Our Virtual Camp Adventure For All Readers!

 

Happy Tuesday! 

I can't believe it is already Week 8 of our Virtual Camp Adventure. One of the best parts of our Virtual Camp Adventure this summer are the eBooks that our friends at Capstone have given all readers access to throughout these twelve weeks.  

On each of the bi-weekly choice boards, users will see a place where they can Click to Read and Listen to Capstone eBooks. For Weeks 7 and 8, there are 20 awesome pet tale Capstone eBooks that our readers will love.  

They include eBooks like...

...and others. 

As I hear from my readers at Van Meter on the eBooks they are loving this summer, I am starting to make a little list of books I would like for our library this fall.  Our kids will love finding these familiar books on the shelves to read and check out.  

You will find the Pet Tales on on the Capstone site here too.  

And you can find the links and information for our Virtual Camp Adventure capstonepub.com/camp here.  

Let me know if you have any trouble accessing the eBooks or the lists. I am happy to help you, friends. 

Let's Celebrate Pet Tales For Week 8 Of Our Virtual Camp Adventure!

                  

It's time for Week 8 of Our Virtual Camp Adventure!  And we will are celebrating Pet Tales. 

All students and families can visit capstonepub.com/camp to access this 12-week long fun summer learning and reading adventure with our friends at Buncee and Capstone. 

This week, just click on Week 7 & 8 Pet Tales and it will take you to the choice board filled with reading, making, moving, coding, stem, technology and fun virtual field trips around the world.  

The choice board also includes a Buncee Weekly Challenge that will be so much fun for everyone to create and share.  If they do not have Buncee, there is a place to click New To Buncee for their free summer trial.  

You will find that link for Buncee here too. 

In the left hand corner, they will find a place to click to Read and Listen To Pet Tale Capstone eBooks. 

All they have to do to read and listen to the eBooks is click on the eBook covers.  They are directly linked so a username and password is not required. 

And if they need help, there is a Family Help button on each choice board slide and...

...on the bottom of the capstonepub.com/camp page. 

This document includes How To Use The Virtual Camp Adventure With Your Children This Summer and...

...Directions For Using The Virtual Camp Adventure Choice Boards. 

I hope all of the children and families have a special summer visiting Our Virtual Camp Adventure.  I can't wait to see and hear all of the different ways it is used and what is learned, read, and created from this amazing summer experience. 

And don't forget, friends....There will be prizes for librarians and teachers throughout the summer.  I will be sharing the second one in a couple of weeks.  You can read all about the Virtual Summer Camp Giveaway here. 

Oh, and if you need to make a copy of the choice board, please visit this post for the link and directions. 

Dot Dot! A NEW Special StickTogether Poster For Our Dot Day Celebrations!

 

I love planning for our Dot Day celebration on September 15'ish every year.  This is the day that everyone can celebrate our uniqueness, creativity and voice by making a mark on the world. 

This summer, I am putting together resources, ideas, projects and plans for our library and classrooms for Dot Day, and connecting to authors, illustrators and other classrooms and libraries around the world. 

I even created our NEW August/September S.T.E.A.M. Choice Board around Dot Day with science, technology, engineering, art, math and other special S.T.E.A.M. resources. 

You will find the link to the choice board and resources here in this blog post. 

One of the projects I am super excited about came in the mail today.  

It is a NEW sticker poster from our friends at StickTogether called Dot Dot! 

This special sticker poster was created from these beautiful paper coaster dots our students created last year at Van Meter. 

After all of our elementary student created their own unique dot, I took several photographs of their dots. 

StickTogether took these photographs and turned them into virtual StickTogether stickerboards. 

They were found in the virtual stickerboard gallery, along with other schools art work. 

One of my favorites from our students was Dots Dots Dots 1 in the virtual stickerboard gallery and guess what? 

StickTogether took this and turned it into the coolest sticker poster, Dot Dot!  

I can't wait to hang this up in the library for the kids to collaborate on and create together for our Dot Day celebrations and start of the school year. 

You can order it for your students, library and school too.  You will find Dot Dot! sticker poster here on the StickTogether site.  

Let's get ready to celebrate Dot Day in special new and wonderful ways, friends. 

Our Daily Book Box Pick Up For The Van Meter Readers and Teachers!

We always want to offer our readers at Van Meter to have a lot of opportunities to check books in and out of our library.  We want our readers to feel confident, welcome and excited about this process. And over the years we have created ways to make this possible for all readers and teachers every single day.  

One of the ways is our Book Box program.  Every classroom and related arts teacher has a colorful plastic crate outside of their classroom door.  When our students and teachers want to check a book back into the library, they can place their book in the crate outside of the classroom doors. 

In the morning and afternoon, my library assistant, Diana, goes around with her cart and picks up the books.  She brings them back to the library to check them in and get ready for another round of readers.

Even though every class comes to the library for a special checkout time with Diana and can come to the library if they need something throughout the day, this is a quick and easy way to keep our collection moving and for the students to check out what they want to read throughout the school year. 

This summer I made new signs for every box and had them printed at our local Area Education Agency. 

I used clips to attach them to the crates as shown in this picture. 

I made the sign and just changed out the name of each classroom teacher and...

...related arts teacher like the S.T.E.A.M. Room with Ms. Algreen and myself, 

SEL and Mrs. Cook and...

...Spanish and Ms. Newell. 

This is also a wonderful way to get books rotation throughout every classroom and space with our teachers and associates too. 

Our signs and book boxes can't wait for the new school year and for lots of books to go in and our of the hands of our readers.  

It's going to be a great year, friends.