Wednesday, September 5, 2012

Book Love

As I called my students over to the carpet today one of my little girls squealed with delight. She'd caught the corner of a Gerald and Piggy book and just KNEW we were going to dive into reading it. I hadn't actually planned on reading the book- I'd planned something much more boring- something that didn't involve me making different voices in front of the other teachers I'm still getting to know- but how do you NOT read Gerald and Piggy after such pure delight?

So we did.

I thought most of them weren't very engaged. Gerald and Piggy have a sense of humor that can be hard to follow for some students. I tried to make it as engaging as I could but I closed the book a bit disappointed. After the friend's original squeal I'd set my Gerald and Piggy expectations way too high.

Later in the day I was frantically getting things ready for the next activity while I had the children sitting on the rug having quiet time. Two little girls cuddled up beside each other.

"Hey," one whispered to the other, "I'll be the pig and you be the elephant!"
"OK!" the friend giggled.

Together they pointed and giggled and "read" the story the best they could. I hung back, amazed and in awe at the unprompted book talk occurring under my nose on the first day of school.

Did I mention it is going to be an awesome year?

1 comment:

Julia said...

Don't you just love it when they surprise you! Here's hoping the year continues to be great!