Five for Friday

Happy Friday everyone! We made it through another week. I had a pretty good week, but I'm exhausted. After doing so little last week during spring break, it was tough getting back on schedule. But this week seemed to fly by.

Well, since it's Friday, it's time to link up withDoodle Bugs Teaching for her weekly Five for Friday linky party.

1. Free Student Book Publishing Project

We are currently working on a book publishing project. Using the company Student Treasures my school is currently working on a writing where our students have the opportunity to become published authors. The best part of the project is that it is completely free. Although I'm excited that we have this opportunity, this project can be a bit labor intensive but the final product will be worth the work. I wrote a post about it earlier this week. Clickhere for more information.

2. Kidblog
I read about Kidblog from Fourth Grade Flipper last week. I looked it up and loved it so I created an account and introduced it to my students this week. They are already obsessed. I can't wait to explore this writing opportunity with my students throughout the rest of the school year.

3. Substitutes
I hate missing school, but I was given the opportunity to attend an amazing workshop that would mean that I would be missing 4 1/2 days. I couldn't pass up this opportunity, but unfortunately that means that I would have a substitute for several days. Wednesday was the second day of the training. Even though I had one of the best subs at my school, I feel like Wednesday was a wasted day for my scholars and I had to play catch up the rest of the week.

4. Skeeball
I've mentioned before that I played in a skeeball league. Well, we were on tv yesterday. Click here to see the broadcast.

5. Wiffleball
I can't think about anything else so I'll talk about what I'm doing this weekend. My friends and I are getting together to play wiffleball tomorrow. There's no special reason, but someone mentioned it earlier this week and several of us jumped on the offer. Looking forward to playing. I haven't played since I was a kid.

I hope everyone has a great weekend. I'm looking forward to mine.

Tried it Tuesday - Student Treasures Book Publishing

Have you ever wanted to allow you students actually publish real books?

Well there is a company that will publish hardbound books for your students and it is absolutely FREE!!

The company is Student Treasures.

I'm linking up with Fourth Grade Flipper for Tuesday Tried It.




This how the Student Treasures Book Publishing project works:

1. One representative from you school contacts the company to schedule a publishing date.

2. Teachers sign up for the type of book they want.
- Grades K-3 create 1 class book: You will receive 1 free copy of the book
- Students in grades 4-5 each create their own book: Each student will receive the free original copy of their book
- Teachers may choose to order books that are portrait or landscape
- Teachers may choose to order lined pages for students to write the text or blank pages for students to type the text

3. School representative order the number of necessary packets.

4. Envelopes arrive with all necessary materials.

5. Students work on books: writing, editing, and then publishing their books by either writing or typing and printing on the provided pages. Students also illustrate their stories.

6. Prior to completing the project, send home the parent letter. This letter invites parents to purchase extra copies of the book for about $20. Parents must check whether or not they want to buy extra copies, sign it, then return it to school. In order to receive free books ALL parents must sign and return this letter. But don't worry, they provide enough copies of the letters to send home a second form if necessary.

7. About a week prior to the publishing date, all envelopes are collected by the school representative.

8. The school representative boxes up all the envelopes and ships them back to Student Treasures using the provided mailing labels.

9. About 2 weeks after the publishing date, the published books arrive at the school.

Your students are now published authors.

I first tried Student Treasures about nine years ago. At that time students in 3rd grade could each make their own individual books, so my third graders made individual books. I completely fell in love with the company because my students had an amazing experience, their books turned out great, and of course, they were free.

Since then my school has used the company 2 more times. The books pictured above are from the year I taught second grade and made a class book. We decided to do a second grade ABC book. Most of the kids had two letters to contibuted to the book. They typed the text and then did the illustrations. I received the original copy and I had a few parents purchase extra copies.

This year my school has decided to use Student Treasures again. I introduced the project to my students yesterday and they are super excited about it. The idea of becoming published writers has them super engaged in the process. They have come up with some very interesting ideas for books. I'm excited to see their final products.

I am also going to print out all of their research projects which included an essay and PowerPoints. I will create a class book of those. We also wrote essays about Martin Luther King Jr. that I am going to create another class book of. I will be able to use these for examples in future years.

I'm glad that I could share this amazing project with you. I hope you can take advantage of Student Treasures at some point. Check out the website for more information.

Stop by Fourth Grade Flipper and link up.