My January Book Picks- A Linky-Party

Learning With Mrs. Parker is hosting a January Book Picks Linky-Party. Head over here to join in!

These are the books I use for Guided Reading book studies in January:

I always begin the New Year with

Chicken Soup With Rice: A Book of Months by Maurice Sendak.

It is my springboard for teaching students the names and order of the months of the year. It also leads to discussion about the different seasons. I incorporate syllable learning into it, by having students sort the month cards by number of syllables. Students also sort month cards in order of the calendar year as well as in ABC order. It also provides an opportunity to highlight the fact that the names of the months begin with uppercase letters.

Two mitten books I introduce are:

The Three Little Kittens by Paul Galdone

and The Mitten by Jan Brett

Mittens! Talking about them provides so many opportunities to introduce/practise concepts like symmetry, sorting {using students' mittens}, graphing by colour, counting by 2's, measuring with mittens, colour words, etc. 

The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats

This book allows for great text-to-self connections. We talk about what activities Peter does in the book, as well as what my students do in winter. The melting snowball in Peter's pocket leads to a mini science experiment of our own, which we try it in our classroom.   

What books do you use? Link up!