Mem Fox & Global Read Aloud? ~ True Excitement!

I  💕 LOVE 💕  Mem Fox and was especially excited when I saw that she was chosen as the K-1 author for this year's Global Read Aloud project! 

After seeing so many wonderful resources for the upper level books, I decided I wanted to find a way to create a resource for our youngers to interact with the books as well (#K2CanToo). After a lot of thought, I decided to create a Book Creator template with a hyperdoc feel. What you will see below are screenshots and explanations of each of the pages in the template. The best part is, once you download the template, you can change whatever you'd like before sharing it out with your students.

The first two pages of the book offer resources and directions for you, the teacher. You'll simply delete those pages prior to sharing the template with your students. Erin Kramer has put together some wonderful lessons to go along with the books and those are linked on this main page. They are also available in her Teachers Pay Teachers store.  On the second page there is information about a special edition of the #EpicPals project that Bobbi Hopkins and I put together each month. This special edition is specifically for the Global Read Aloud and is in addition to our normal monthly #EpicPals project.

This will be the cover of your students' book. The only edit needed on this page is for your students to add their name to the bottom.

Page 1 offers your students a little information about Mem Fox. There is also a map of Australia where they can use the pen tool to find and circle where Australia is located. They will also use the Add Sound button to record something they know about Australia.

Week 1- Koala Lou
Students will see a picture of what the Australian Bush looks like. They will be asked to create a PicCollage of animals they would find in the bush. Use the animals from the story to guide you. You may consider writing these on chart paper to help your students as they look for their pictures in PicCollage (You may use any app that will help you accomplish this goal).

Week 2- Possum Magic
Students will draw a picture of their favorite food and also use the included menu to find the cities that Hush and Grandma Poss traveled to in Australia. If this is difficult for your stuents, consider mirroring your iPad on the smartboard to guide your students around the map if needed.

Week 3- Whoever You Are
Students will take a selfie of themselves and then compare and contrast themselves to the pictures of children around the world. Students use the Add Text tool to write their ideas.(consider having them also use the Add Sound button to read their ideas).
If your students are not able to write their ideas, simply use the Add Sound button and have them record their likes and differences.

Week 4- Hattie and the Fox
Students will drag the animals to the sentence that they said in the story. (Remember, if your students press the play button in the top right corner, it will read the page to them to help remember what each sentence says) After placing the animals, have students practice reading the sentences with fluency and expression. Then use the Add Sound button and have them record themselves reading the sentences.

Week 5- Tough Boris
After reading the story, talk about Tough Boris' character traits. Then, have your students take a picture of themselves to create their own character traits. PicCollage or Seesaw would be great apps to use. Have your students share their creations to the coordinating Padlet board. (A QR code is embedded onto the student page not seen here. I've also added the QR code to the Padlet board so if you project it onto your smartboard, students can easily scan the QR from your board) This board will give your students another opportunity to compare themselves to others and how we are the same based on the lesson we learned from Whoever You Are

Week 6- Your choice
Whatever book you choose for this last week, have your students take a picture and add it to the top left corner (you could also do this prior to sharing the template out if you know which book you're going to use) After reading your selection, have students take a picture of a page that shows the main characters to add to their Book Creator. They will then use the Add Sound button to tell something about the characters.

Have you heard of Flipgrid? Here's an opportunity for you and your students to try out this great new resource. Have your students scan the QR code in the Book Creator template or go to this link. Students will be able to easily add a one and half minute video to the grid telling others what their favorite Mem Fox book has been and why. They will also be able to watch others' videos as well!! There is also a small video embedded of Mem Fox introducing herself which will be fun for kiddos to see and hear with her wonderful Australian accent!

Here are the directions to download the template. It is saved as an ePub so that you (and your students) will be able to edit it. This will take a few minutes like it says in Step 2, so be patient. Here's the direct link to the Book Creator file.

Click here or on the image to access the directions to 
download the Mem Fox Book Creator Template

When you are ready to send it to your students, remember to share it with them as an ePub as well so they can still edit and add their content. I would highly recommend using AirDrop to share it to your students as it's super EZ and super fast-in fact, almost instant! 

One last thing, if you are a Seesaw user, when your kiddos are completely done with this project, have them share it to Seesaw. At this point you'll share it as a video which will keep their voices as part of the file and also flip the pages automatically. 

that I've included everything here that you need to know to make this successful for you and your class! If you have any questions or issues, hopefully your technology integration specialist can help you out, but if not, feel free to get in touch with me and I'll do my best to help. You can find me on Twitter, @smalchow or via email sjmalchow@pulaskischools.org