Please listen and enjoy as the students read you some plays.Goldilocks

On Friday, November 14th, the students and I had a special treat. We met Canadian mystery writer Eric Wilson, as he and his wife Flo, came to our school for the afternoon. We had read some of his books and were eager to meet him in person. No one was more excited than me, as I had read his books as a student in grade 4 and 5 and I really enjoyed the way his stories developed. At the time, mysteries were my favourite genre. I had every copy of Nancy Drew and I kept them on my bookshelf in a special place.

It was a thrill to meet a real author in person. He was quite tall and easy to speak to. You could tell that his passions included writing and sharing a love of literacy with kids. I had an opportunity to have my picture taken with him and he gave me an autographed photo and poster for one of his new books. The students learned so much from him and you can hear some of their comments in the attached podcast.

eric-wilson-podcast

This week we learned what a book trailer was. Through viewing some examples on the internet that were already created, we determined what the structures and features of these trailers are. Since this week we are expecting the visit of Canadian mystery writer Eric Wilson, and we had just finished reading one of his mysteries, The Kootenay Kidnapper, I decided that we would use that story as our starting point.

As a class we brainstormed elements, created a storyboard, shared responsibilities and edited the film. We were all very proud of the final product. I am curious to know though what the students thought about the process and what they learned.

kootenay-trailer

Well I have read a lot of different blogs by teachers around the world. I am going to jump in and start my own for my new crop of students. I still have a lot of learning to do but I think it will be worth it.

I am thinking I will use this as a class blog and then add other pages that represent the different major projects we are involved with.