How does a child choose?

We've been trying to draw out a flowchart that shows how children make decisions while choosing a book. One of the benefits of our system is that many books on a topic can be shelved together, even if they are fiction and non-fiction. A child can search for an interesting topic (trucks! dogs! machines!) and then find facts and stories all there on the shelf to choose from. I think it makes for a richer reading experience, more choices, and supports teachers who are looking for literature connections.

(Please click below for a larger view.)

Our young students are taking a different path to choosing a book. 

What are your pathways through the library? Are there too many hurdles? Share on our discussion board at metisinnovations.com.

And the next holiday coming up is...

A parent just came in looking for picture books on the lunar new year. "We're sorry, they're all out," Tali told her.

"Do you mean that other parents got here ahead of me?" puzzled the parent. 

"Oh, no, the teachers have everything checked out about it. In fact, they found everything so easily, there weren't any stories left even when I went to the shelf for the library lesson, either."

"Oh, no," she replied shaking her head, "you know how much I love this new system; this is the first time it has worked against me!"

So Metis makes things easy to find; it may mean you need to get there sooner. 

Awards season!

ALA announces the Youth Media Awards and our fifth-graders are set to celebrate.

The mock Newbery club had a very close contest; we did the voting last week, just in time to watch for the real winners. Wonder was the favorite of our 21 students.

All told, our students read six or seven books from this year's crop and discussed them in a private online forum. Next year, we hope to start a faculty mock Newbery. Has anyone reading here tried that?---we'd love to hear how that worked.

Congratulations to the committee members and the honorees!

And the winner is...

The surveys have been surveyed, the totals tallied. We have a winner folks! This year's 2013 Mock Caldecott winner is.... Unspoken by Henry Cole.

Our short list included: Extra Yarn, Nighttime Ninja, Red Knit Cap Girl and Step Gently Out, and Unspoken.

I must say I am pretty darn happy that a group of second-graders chose this book over some of the competition. It would be pretty easy to assume that Nighttime Ninja would sneak away with the prize but it wasn't to be so.

About Unspoken my students said, "I loved how he used just pencil and made it old-fashioned" and "It was very creepy" and "it's so real, & so calm, & peaceful, & I can't believe the illastrater(sic) just uses pencil to make that texture."

Pretty impressive stuff!

You can see how other Mock Caldecott contests played out here at Horn Book Magazine
and of course see what wins the actual Caldecott Medal this year!