Invite your students to write and illustrate their own children's stories, using the text from a Walt Whitman poem. First, have students read Whitman's poem "Miracles," from Leaves of Grass. Next, share the picture book Nothing But Miracles, which features the text of the poem. Have a volunteer read the story to the class, and then as a group, discuss the book's illustrations.

• How do the illustrations enhance the telling of this story?
• How did the experience of reading this poem with illustrations differ from reading it without illustration?

After discussing the book, have students select Whitman poems that would make good children's picture books. Have students create illustrations for the poems they select and then publish their books. Share the books with a primary classroom in your school or district. You might also have your students create digital storybooks to share on the Web.

Have your students write their own "Junie B." stories after brainstorming issues they've experienced during the school year.

• First have the group make a list of the Junie B. adventures in the books they've read (e.g., cheating, school play, losing a tooth).
  
  
• Then ask students to brainstorm a second list of ideas that would make interesting stories.
  
  
• Students can work alone or in pairs to write their stories, using one of the ideas from the class list. Have students use the interactive story map to plan their writing.
  
  
• After all stories have been completed, have each student or pair share their story with the class.
  

Have students turn their stories into books, with illustrations, and then work with your school or community librarian to create a library display of all the new stories.

Create a students' copyright guide as a handy reference for classroom work or the library.

• First, form small groups to conduct web research on copyright issues. Assign groups topics, such as the types of copyright protected works, fair use, court cases, public domain works, and so on. Students can use the interactive Notetaker to help them organize their research findings.
  
• After students have finished their research, have each group compile their information into a page for the class booklet, by visiting the Printing Press tool and selecting the "flyer" option.
  
  
• Collect each group's work and create a booklet. Be sure to create a table of contents and index for the guide, as well as a cover page. Keep a copy of the guide in the library and near photocopying machines.
  
  
• You might also want to reproduce the guide and distribute a copy to each student.

Project for students an excerpt of an interview with Amy Tan  (Q8: Chinese Characters, 1:09:45 to 1:11:00). Discuss their impressions of her stance toward writing from her personal experience as an extension of her identity. Then invite students to tell a story of their own, either a fictionalized account of a memory or family experience or a more straightforward true story that is important to them and who they are.

Share the Story Map or the Story Cube interactives to help students generate and organize their ideas. Then give students the opportunity to share their stories by holding a classroom reading or creating an online or print collection.

Have students adapt a Roald Dahl story to picture book format. Read a Roald Dahl story that has been adapted to film (Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, James and the Giant Peach, Matilda) Then show students the film. Have students use the Interactive Venn Diagram or Mobile App to compare and contrast the two versions, focusing on the images in the movie:

• How were the two experiences different? Similar?
• How did the images in the movie affect the story? Your enjoyment of the story?
• What are the benefits of reading a story? Of watching a film?
• How is the story in the movie different? Why do you think this is so?

Then have students create original picture book versions of the story. Afterwards, have students share their books and then add them to the classroom library.

Today is the birthday of author Beverly Cleary, who brought to life the characters of Ramona and older sister Beezus. On this day, D.E.A.R Day, families are encouraged to take at least 30 minutes to put aside all distractions and enjoy books together. Get together with other readers, find someone to read to, or even just read alone. Here are some additional ideas:

Family Read Aloud

With this tip, learn a few simple read-aloud strategies that can sharpen a child's emerging reading skills and help you have fun together with a good book.

Journaling

This lesson encourages children to explore authentic reasons for writing by writing messages to their family in a family message journal.

Retell Stories

Tell me about it in your own words! If students can paraphrase the information they have read, then you—and they—can be confident that they understand it.

Drop Everything!

Don’t think that means that the celebration is only allowed during this month, though. It’s encouraged all year long!

Project or share copies of Dunbar’s poem Sympathy. Read it aloud and ask students to discuss words, lines, and images that stand out to them as particularly meaningful.

Then share with students the critical excerpts on the poem from Modern American Poetry (including earlier and later versions of part of the poem). Ask small groups to read the excerpts and then discuss how the ideas from the three critics change or deepen their understanding of the poem.

Preview and share with students all or parts of Baldwin's 1963 essay A Talk to Teachers. Ask students to identify Baldwin's main contentions about race relations in America and think critically about connections they see to other texts (such as poems, books, or films) and to contemporary social issues.

Then invite students to use the Letter Generator to write a letter to Baldwin responding to his ideas and how they see them resonating with the present.

Project for students the short video Louise Erdrich, author of LaRose, talks about her love of books. Briefly discuss Erdrich’s attitudes toward and associations with books before inviting students to write their own short memory piece about a pleasurable experience with a book, at a bookstore, or in a library.

Encourage students to include sensory details about the book, such as how it looked, felt, smelled, and so on. Then ask students to share their memories to join in Erdrich’s love of books.

Read aloud or project this quote from Sandra Cisneros:

The older I get, the more I'm conscious of ways very small things can make a change in the world. Tiny little things, but the world is made up of tiny matters, isn't it?

Invite students to select a "tiny little thing" from their lives—an encounter with a stranger, a small object, a physical feature of a loved one, a fragment of remembered dialogue—and freewrite about its significance to their lives. Then read aloud a vignette such as "Hairs"/"Pelitos" (also available as a standalone picture book) and discuss how Cisneros takes something small and finds significance in it. Give students time to write, share, and revise to take up what they learned from hearing Cisneros' writing. Let students choose a form for their writing: narrative prose, poetry, or essay.