Triangle (and Square) with K

image from goodreads.com

One of my summer projects is clearing out my photos, and I found a batch from October that I never posted! 

In K, we talked about illustration styles and read several books by Jon Klassen (one of my all-time favorites). 

In "Triangle," Triangle decides to play a sneaky trick on Square. The characters are literally a triangle and a square. And the students made their own to act out the story at home. Look at these adorable kids and their shapes! 

Not a Box! (continued) with K

One of the most important roles I have as a library teacher is cultivating my students' imaginations. In K, we read Geisel-honor Not a Box by Antoinette Portis; the main character creates all kinds of play scenarios with a simple cardboard box. 

Then the kids drew their ideas for our own continuation of the book, which is now on the shelf with some additional pages from 1st graders who came in after K and found the templates still on the tables. Here are some sample pages:

K Book Matching

A big part of information literacy is being able to recognize patterns and to categorize facts, sources, etc. We start work on these skills in kindergarten, and it is leading up to them being able to choose books from the shelves on their own, versus from the selection I put out. 

This week, students each got an Everyone or Early Reader book and had to find another student whose book was in the same category in some way.

Mock Caldecott Winner 2025: The Squish!

The American Library Association awards the Caldecott Medal to the artist of "the most distinguished American picture book for children." This year, I read 8 picture books with Caldecott buzz to kindergartners and first-graders, and we narrowed the list down to 2 finalists. 

With nearly 60% of the vote, the Garden City Mock Caldecott winner is The Squish, illustrated and written by Breanna Carzoo. 

Students shared their reasons for their choice, and explanations included: 

• It was cute. 
  
  
• He kept getting squished but getting back up. 
  
  
• Because the sand castle’s arms moved. 
  
  
• It was funny. 
  
  
• The sand castle kept falling down. 
  
  
• He broke and then he built himself again. 
  
  
• I liked the giant castle. It is about bringing yourself up.
  
  

Here are some of their illustration interpretations: