April 17 to 23 on ReadWriteThink

April is both National Poetry Month and National Humor Month. Celebrate by having students write funny poems and perform them for their classmates. Try using interactive poetry tools, or challenge your students to create a video about their written work to share with others. For more ideas, check out how others bring humor and giggles into their classrooms on the Thinkfinity Community.

This week on ReadWriteThink, you can find more resources for timely classroom activities. Have a great week!

New Resources

• Prepare to celebrate El Día de Los Niños/El Día de Los Libros (Children’s Day/Book Day) next week with resources from the ReadWriteThink calendar.
   
• April is National Poetry Month. Find links to 30 different poetry-writing resources in the Thinkfinity Community. (For grades K–12)
   
• Share our new collection of tips and activities translated into Spanish with families to help children develop as skilled readers and writers at home.
   
• Explore Thinkfinity’s classroom resources on baseball & spring fitness. There is something for every classroom!

From the Calendar

• April 18: Paul Revere began his famous midnight ride in 1775.
  Through the study of Paul Revere, students learn about primary source documents while researching their family histories, with which they create and compare their family trees.(For grades 4–8)
   
• April 20: Celebrate author Mary Hoffman’s birthday. Students write original picture books based on their own aspirations and dreams and share with the class or with younger students. (For grades 1–9)
   
• April 21: Barbara Park, author of the Junie B. Jones series, was born. Students write their own “Junie B.” stories, based on the Junie B. Jones series, after brainstorming issues they’ve experienced during the school year. (For grades 1—6)
   
• April 22: Celebrate Earth Day! Students research famous environmentalists and write letters to them asking for their opinions on current issues and turn their letters into a poem. (For grades 3–12)
   
• April 23: William Shakespeare was born in 1564. Based on grade level, students learn about rhyming structure, experiment with the Shakespearean Insult Kit, or study scenes from Othello and watch an adaptation of that scene from the movie O.(For grades 1–12)
   
• Look ahead to next week for literacy activities on the Library of Congress, the bombing of Guernica, and the birthdays of Coretta Scott King, August Wilson, Lois Duncan, and Yusef Komunyakaa.

Connecting with Other Teachers

• Connect with teachers across the country and around the world in our Reading & Language Arts group in the Thinkfinity Community.
   
• How do you motivate the unmotivated? Share your ideas in the Thinkfinity Community forums.
   
• Keep students at the center of learning by registering today for the Supporting Students in a Time of Core Standards Virtual Conference Series.
   
• Gather family stories, oral histories, and timelines for Preservation Week April 24–30, 2011. Find details in the Reading & Language Arts group.

If you have feedback or questions about ReadWriteThink, all you have to do is contact us. Have a great week!

 
[Photo: First grade reading – small group breakout by woodleywonderworks, on Flickr]