Chomp

Carl Hiaasen's book Chomp is a hit!

Mickey Cray's life is turned upside down all because of a dead Iguana. It falls on his head. All of a sudden Wahoo, Mickey's son is put into the fact that he has to find a job or else he won't survive. Mickey's wife is a foreign language teacher in China, so she is little use to the family. Derek Badger, a phony TV survivalist shows up to the two lonesome's door. Derek DEMANDS use of the Cray's "property". Mickey had always had a love for animals ever since he was little. Because of this hobby Mickey adopted to his family, wait for it.... A zoo. This what Mickey even loves more than his son sometimes. But when Derek hands up some cash to the two boys, they accept the offer. Wait did I mention that Derek is cuckoo! Derek starts acting weird around the animals... Like they are his own property. Derek's phony TV relationship with Mickey might break up a lot of fans and their likes and dislikes when they hit the swamp.

This book is great for people with a great sense of humor and who can piece together connections throughout the story.

The Genius Files

Coke and Pepsi McDonald never wanted to be a spy or top secret undercover twins. They wanted to live the free life like any other kid.
Their dream failed when the twin's school was burnt down. The psycho health teacher Mrs. Higgins was in charge of detention that day and failed to cover up her secret. Bones the quiet/deaf janitor was forced to unleash his secret-TGF. TGF, also known as The Genius Files is a top-secret society for the smartest kids in America. Kids from all over America were recruited to solve America's problems.
Coke and Pepsi met Bones during the fire. The real Bones. Bones was actually a skinny talkative grown-up.
The Twins had been recruited to be in TGF which led to falling off a cliff, getting attacked by "bowler dudes", and saving a giant ball of twine.
Will the McDonald twins ever get their dream or will they die along with the "others".

This book is great for people who can connect to Coke and Pepsi in someway. It is a great cliffhanger that makes you want to read the rest of the stories!

Guided Reading With First Graders

1st day of guided reading.
I have started a book called "Teach Us, Amelia Bedelia!" with a high level reading group in my Mom's classroom. This book has a lot of homophones in it, I taught them about homophones and what they are. After we read together I told them to respond about what we had read. I think that they are amazing kids and they're all very powerful readers.

2nd day of guided reading
I went over to meet with that group again and we were getting ready to go into the hallway when all of a sudden one of the kids threw up right in front of me onto the floor. By the way, did you know I have a phobia of vomit!

When we finally got to work we started to talk about what we had read last and then we started reading the next section I had marked off in the book. This time we were focusing on idioms. I told them some examples to write in their readers notebook, then after they wrote an example on their own.


3rd day of guided reading
We finished reading the book, so it was time for the final activity! The kids really enjoyed doing this part, they got to make a poster which was like a big response that included a picture and there opinion. I recommend this to everyone who wants to be a teacher some day. They got to present this poster to the class!

Vocabulary-
Idioms- a phrase that has a different meaning than the literal meaning.
Homophones- two words that are spelled differently but sound the same and have a different meaning.

My Creative Writing Piece

Here are 2 stories I wrote for Gifted U. I hope you like them!
Crazy Taxi Driver & Wishing Star