- Sidney Public Schools
- Beyond Reading: Book-related activities to spark imagination
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Jan Brett's personal webpage
Jan Brett, the beloved children's author and illustrator, provides plenty of resources on her webpage. Not only does she have a complete list of all her books, she also has coloring pages, printable activities, and craft ideas to go with her books. I also enjoy watching her how to draw videos.
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Free printable Mad Libs - Woo Jr.
This webpage is an archive of free printable mad libs sorted by a variety of categories. Mad libs are a great way to practice language skills adn refresh the parts of speech. They are also pretty hilarious to complete as a family. These pages are a great activity especially for upper elementary students.
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Mo Willem's Lunch Doodles
Mo Willems, beloved children's author of the Piggie and Elephant series as well as the Pigeon books, has begun a series of videos in which people can join him as he doodles ideas, answers questions about himself and his work, and inspires people to stay positive and creative during this time.
The link leads to a playlist of all his videos so far.
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Kid's Bookshelf - YouTube channel
This YouTube channel provides animated versions of classic children's books. These videos require no reading, making them perfect for a child still learning to read. They are also just fun to listen to and watch for anyone who loves a good story.
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Author Interviews - Reading Rocket
This webpage holds all of the author interviews conducted by Reding Rocket. Some authors interviewed include Jeff Kinney, the author of The Diary of the Wimpy Kid series and Lois Lowry, author of the Giver series. These interviews often involve discovering why an author decided to write or even the struggles that the author's face when writing. The connection between a face and a story we love to read is a great way to increase interest in reading.
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Planet Storytime
This podcast is fairly new. It produces a mix of original and classic stories for children to listen to. The podcast is still releasing new content every Thursday. While the podcast is suitable for kids of all ages, the stories might appeal more to younger children.
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But Why: a podcast for curious kids
This NPR-produced podcast provides answers to questions kids ask such as "why do baby teeth fall out?" and "how do we taste food?" Because the podcast takes questions submitted from regular listeners, the episodes can often link to current events.
Some episodes may not appeal to younger children, but there are definitely episodes that will be interesting to a listener no matter their age.
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Story Seed
This podcast focuses on stories, but not just listening to stories. Instead, this podcast shows the process of creating a story, beginning with a child age 6-12 and their story idea. The child is joined by a well-known author who helps grow the "story seed" into a full-grown story.
This podcast is a great way to encourage imagination and show how what we think can be transformed into something we can share with others.