World Read Aloud Day motivates children, teens, and adults to celebrate the power of words. This global literacy movement is about taking action to show the world that the right to read and write belongs to all people. World Read Aloud Day asks everyone to celebrate the day by grabbing a book, finding an audience, and reading out loud.
Celebrate World Read Aloud Day by grabbing a favorite text and reading out loud. Have students bring in their favorite book, magazine, script, newspaper, etc. Ask each student to choose an excerpt to read to the class. Additionally, hold a classroom discussion about the power of literacy. Spread the power of reading by doing one of the following activities in the classroom:
- EDUCATE – Have several read alouds in the classroom throughout the day and talk together about the importance of global literacy, marking this as a special day of reading!
- ADVOCATE - Spread the word about World Read Aloud Day and the Global Literacy Movement within the school by hosting a school-wide read aloud event. Make posters in the classroom advertising and informing the school and community about the event. Construct bookmarks with information about the day and tips for reading aloud to their peers.
- INNOVATE - Share World Read Aloud Day by creating Public Service Announcements and share their projects using video chat, blogs, Glogster, and websites.
This website is for an organization that works to cultivate literacy leaders worldwide with teachers, parents, community members, and children to support the development of sustainable literacy practices across the world. This website provides information about World Read Aloud Day and an opportunity to share any activities using a blog or website.
This website is for a network of individuals and institutions committed to worldwide literacy. This site can be used for more information about literacy instruction and Global Literacy.
This website contains resources, information, and strategies for improving family literacy.
Meet your favorite authors, play games, enjoy read alouds, hear from educational experts and more!
Election Day is held on the Tuesday after the first Monday in November. The first uniform Election Day was observed on November 4, 1845.
Have your students get involved with Election Day by creating posters to advertise Election Day and encourage registered voters to exercise their right to vote. Have small groups of students brainstorm lists of reasons why people should vote. Then, have them work in their groups to create posters using poster paper and paint or felt-tipped markers. Alternatively, they can use the ReadWriteThink Printing Press to create flyers. Students can also write persuasive essays that underscore the importance of getting out to vote or create a public service announcement or other multimedia persuasive piece. The ReadWriteThink lessons MyTube: Changing the World with Video Public Service Announcements and Students as Creators: Exploring Multimedia can be adapted for use with this activity.
This website, from the National Museum of American History, looks at the history of voting methods in the United States. The resource explores how ballots and voting systems have evolved over the years as a response to political, social, and technological change, transforming the ways in which Americans vote.
This resource, from PBS, introduces elementary-aged children to the importance of voting in a fun, interactive way.
This website, from the Library of Congress, focuses on some of the memorable elections since the first uniform Election Day on November 4, 1845.
This site includes a timeline of media coverage of important presidential races and presidencies.
The Summer Olympic Games, held every four years, are the largest sporting celebration in terms of the number of sports, the number of athletes present and the number of people from different nations gathered together at the same time in the same place. According to The Olympic Museum, the purpose of the Games is to create a “better world through sport practiced in a spirit of peace, excellence, friendship and respect.” In celebration of the world event students participate in a variety of activities centered on the 2024 Paris Games.
Write about the Olympic Games!
- Be a reporter and write about the result of an Olympic event or the Opening or Closing Ceremonies.
- Create onomatopoeic sports poems about the Summer Olympic events, draw illustrations, and compile their work in a flip book.
- Write and perform a speech after winning a gold medal.
- Create original poems about the Opening Ceremonies. Have students write down adjectives to describe what they see, hear, and feel during the Opening Ceremonies of the 2024 Summer Olympics. As a class compile the adjectives and create original poems about the ceremonies.
- Do some procedure writing; write about the rules of a specific event or create a new Olympic event.
Get creative with the Olympic Games!
- Design a stamp to commemorate the Paris 2024 Olympics.
- The Olympics are a great time to study the world. Use a variety of maps and flags to learn about the location and symbols of different countries. Imagine a new country has been formed – where would it be located? What would the flag look like?
Think critically about the Olympic Games!
- Use a Venn diagram to compare the ancient Olympic Games to the modern Olympic Games.
- The Olympic Phryge is the mascot for the 2024 Summer Olympics. Create your own mascot for the Olympic Games and write about why you created your mascot and what it represents.
Celebrate the peace surrounding the Olympic Games!
- The Olympic Truce is a valuable part of the Olympic Games that supports peace and sportsmanship. Learn more about the Olympic Truce and create a “Truce Wall” display. Have students post their meanings of peace, friendship, sportsmanship, as well as, pictures that the students have created that symbolize these themes.
- Nominate a Torchbearer. Being asked to be an Olympic Torchbearer is a high honor. Ask the students to work in groups and to each think of someone they know who they believe could be a worthy candidate to carry the Flame, and to write a short paragraph in which they give their reasons. Once this is completed, they fold over their paper and pass it on to the next person in the group. Repeat the process multiple times to create a list of worthy candidates to carry the Flame. Ask them to share their writing with the group and to identify any similar personal qualities and values shown by the nominees.
Have fun with the Olympic Games!
- Make and decorate cookies representing the Olympic Rings. Decorate each cookie with a different color frosting. Lay out the cookies on a plate in the pattern of the Olympic rings. Discuss why each ring is a different color and interlocked. Enjoy and Eat!
- Plan some games in your neighborhood that are like the Olympic Games. Create and hand out medals to those who win or participate.
This document gives and brief description, history, and meaning of the Olympic symbols.
This official website for the 2024 Summer Olympics contains information, schedules, news, photos, and video for the Summer Games.
This website provides a rich history of the Olympic games.
This document written by the Olympic Museum gives and brief description, history, and evolution of the Modern Olympic Games.
National Library Week is a time to celebrate the contributions of our nation's libraries and librarians and to promote library use and support. All types of libraries - school, public, academic and special - participate.
National Library Week will be observed April 7-13, 2024 with the theme, "Ready, Set, Library!"
Most students think of the library as a place to check out books or use technology, but do you know what else your library has to offer? To find out:
Check out your library:
- Head to your school and public library during National Library Week to see what's new and participate in all they have to offer.
Visit your library online:
- If you can’t make it to your libraries, visit their website or social media pages to learn about programs and services offered.
Invite in your librarian:
- Librarians are a wealth of knowledge, about the library itself and all they have to offer. Talk with your librarians to learn more!
Ilovelibraries.org is an initiative of the American Library Association (ALA), designed to keep America informed about what’s happening in today’s libraries.
Learn more about the National Library Week 2023 celebration.
Learn more about the many decades of National Library Week.
As a child growing up in Holland, Leo Lionni taught himself how to draw. He earned a doctorate in economics from the University of Genoa, but began his career as an author and illustrator of children's books in 1959. His first book Little Blue and Little Yellow came from a story written for his grandchildren during a boring train ride. He is the winner of four Caldecott awards.
After reading several of Lionni's stories, play the game Guess the Story. Invite a student to pull a sentence strip that describes one of Lionni's messages from a box. (Older students can create the sentence strips in collaborative groups.) Students should explain what the message means and the book it is from. Some suggested messages include the following:
- Let's work together.
- Take time to smell the roses.
- You are never alone when you have a friend.
- Don't take your family for granted.
- Everybody is special.
- Be happy with who you are.
As a follow-up, have your students write and illustrate their messages with the ReadWriteThink Stapleless Book.
This site gives an excellent introduction to children in grades K through 5 about Leo Lionni’s life, his art work, and his children’s books. The site includes excellent printable activities and videos of Lionni’s art making process.
This packet contains a variety of useful activities made by teachers, for teachers to accompany the Leo Lionni books, as well as original artwork on display at the Castellani Art Museum.
This page provides information about Leo Lionni's life and learns how experiences and events in his life influenced on his work.
Nine contestants participated in the first National Spelling Bee, sponsored by the Louisville, Kentucky, Courier-Journal in 1925. Now, over 250 student champions, ranging from 9- to 15-years-old, travel to Washington, D.C., to compete in the National Spelling Bee. The competition takes place during May each year. The National Champion receives $28,000 in cash and savings bonds as well as reference resources for his or her home library.
The National Spelling Bee competition has been broadcast nationally on ESPN and during primetime on ABC. In his article "All I Need to Know about Teaching I Learned from TV and Movies," Kenneth Lindbloom compares the competition to shows like Jeopardy. Lindbloom explains, "One might speculate that these events garner interest because they are contests with one winner and many losers. But more difficult contests-Westinghouse science winners, for example, or creative-writing contest winners-don't get the kind of publicity memorizers of trivia get." Ask your students to consider this with the following questions:
- Why do some contests get more publicity than others? What makes the National Spelling Bee interesting to the general public?
- Is the National Spelling Bee a sports event? Why has it been broadcast on ESPN?
- What counts as knowledge on television? What knowledge is seen, and what kinds of knowledge are not seen?
The official homepage for the competition includes details on the student spellers, their sponsors, the rules for the competition, and statistics. During the competition, photos of the events will be added to the site.
By Margaret Y. Phinney, this page from the Natural Child website explains invented spelling and emergent writing and includes suggestions designed to encourage children's writing and use of invented spellings.
This Scholastic website features essays that contain strategies aimed at integrating spelling into the reading and writing curriculum and helping students to improve their spelling skills.
ReadWriteThink's Word Wizard interactive allows students to spell words based on four favorite children's books. Students can read and listen to clues and click the hint button if they're stuck.
Summer reading is an important component of an overall reading program. Research shows that summer vacation often has a significant negative effect on student learning. Providing opportunities for students to read regularly during the summer can prevent documented reading achievement losses. The bottom line is that students who read during the summer do better in the fall.
A June literacy fair for students and their families is the perfect way to end the school year and get students off on the right track for the summer. In addition to standard carnival fare (face painting, games of chance, etc.), offer a variety of fun literacy-based activities.
- The cost of entrance? Ask students to bring a lightly used book as an entrance pass, to be collected on a table or display. As students leave, each person can select a book to keep from the donations.
- Hold a literary trivia contest, with new, donated books for prizes.
- Invite an author to your school for a book reading/signing event.
- Don't forget to invite families to your event and to include informational material.
This collection of NCTE blog posts is the perfect place to begin looking for summer reading resources. They are full of text suggestions!
Reading Rockets provides ideas to keep kids reading during vacation. There are activities and tips on encouraging children to love reading.
Whether for summer reading or during the school year, these selections will reinvigorate the curriculum and inspire students to forge rich connections to literature and media.
According to the Wampanoag and the ancestors of the Plimoth settlers, no oral or written account confirms that the first Thanksgiving took place between them in 1621. The Wampanoag, and other Native Americans, did participate in daily and seasonal thanksgivings for thousands of years prior to the Pilgrims’ arrival. This process of thanksgiving continues today.
Provide students with a selection of texts about Thanksgiving. Invite students to partner-read their selected books, considering these questions:
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From whose perspective is the story told?
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Whose voices are active and passive?
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What words are used to describe the groups?
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Whose story has the most detail?
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What details were offered or implied in the text or illustrations about Thanksgiving and each group’s lifestyle (e.g., food, clothing, beliefs, and traditions)?
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Are the illustrations accurate? How do you know?
Next, share with students texts that are #OwnVoices. Oyate and American Indians in Children's Literature (AICL) both provide critical analysis of Indigenous peoples in children's and young adult books.
Select one of the #OwnVoice texts to read, like Giving Thanks: A Native American Good Morning Message, a children's picture book, by Chief Jake Swamp. This version of the Iroquois Thanksgiving Address, or Ganohonyohk, is written especially for children who want to know more about Six Nations Iroquois spirituality. The Thanksgiving Address is one of the key speeches of the Six Nations Iroquois.
End the session by allowing students to share "What are some things you are thankful for and where do they come from?"
Oyate is a Native organization working to see that our lives and histories are portrayed with honesty and integrity, and that all people know that our stories belong to us.
American Indians in Children's Literature (AICL) provides critical analysis of Indigenous peoples in children's and young adult books.
The words in this book are based on the Thanksgiving Address, an ancient message of peace and appreciation of Mother Earth and all her inhabitants, that are still spoken at ceremonial and governmental gatherings held by the Six Nations.