What We're Reading in December

Five days, everyone, five days. We can do this, right? Right??

With the in-and-out of November and December, my fifth graders are still working their way through what we began in November. (Curious? Check that post out here.)

Which is OK, because I'll share with you what I'm doing with my fourthies! Hopefully, you'll still find something new and cool to try with your big kids.

We're about halfway through:

I'm working with the themes of individuality, inner and outer beauty, and unconditional love, so I've paired these close reads with it:
"Remembering", a poem in my Jacob's Ladder comprehension set,
"Beauty and the Beast",  as in the real one, and quite different from the Disney version. It's in my Junior Great Books (set 4A), but you can find the text here.
"Harrison Bergeron", another bit of science fiction, in which people with talents or gifts are purposely handicapped to make everyone equal. More scary for grown-ups (because you can see this happening one day) than for kids. They just get mad. Find it here.
"Tesseract" a webpage describing what a tesseract really is. Find it here.

My fourth grade reading is tiny, so we only have two book clubs:

 

By the way, at least in my town, it's time for the Scholastic Book Clubs Warehouse Sale! Most of the books in the warehouse (and it's an actual warehouse) are half off, so this is when I go and shore up my book club choices. When will your city have one? Find out here. 

Five days, y'all, we got this. 

I hope you and yours have a peaceful, restful, awesome-amazing couple of weeks off! Enjoy it now...winter is coming, my friends. Unless you teach in New Zealand, like our Learning to be Awesome's Erin. She's ready for summer. 

Check out what the other Focused of Fifth collaborators are reading in their classrooms! Just click on the icon below or right here.