I am looking for a polysemic childrens text to study and need some help any ideas?
407292
I would go with "The Wizard of Oz".  Frank L. Baum, the author of the book, wrote it as an allegory of the gold standard.  However, it became an instant children's classic.  Baum for a long time resisted writing more books in the series as he wished to be considered a serious adult author but dire financial staights forced him to reconsider and he ended up writing several more books in the series.\n\nSo on the one level you have the tale of Dorthy that was imortalized in the classic movie.  On the other hand you have the political symbolism of the characters including how \n"the wicked Witch of the East represented eastern industrialists and bankers who controlled the people (the Munchkins); the Scarecrow was the wise but naive western farmer; the Tin Woodman stood for the dehumanized industrial worker; the Cowardly Lion was William Jennings Bryan, Populist presidential candidate in 1896; the Yellow Brick Road, with all its dangers, was the gold standard; Dorothy's silver slippers (Judy Garland's were ruby red, but Baum originally made them silver) represented the Populists' solution to the nation's economic woes ("the free and unlimited coinage of silver"); Emerald City was Washington, D.C.; the Wizard, "a little bumbling old man, hiding behind a facade of paper mache and noise, . . . able to be everything to everybody," was any of the Gilded Age presidents" (Parker)\n\nNow if you want something that has multiple levels without the political allegory, the symbolism of "The Little Prince" is also well established and would be worth a look.\n\nSo depending on the needs of your paper I would start with one of those two.
653431
Also try pinkmonkey and spark notes.  Often if you just do a search for each specific title you will find a great deal of information.\n\nGood luck with it.
641646
Try having students do double-entry journals as they read. They pick a quotation that they like, that illustrates a theme, or that they can talk about and then write their reaction to it. Have the students pair up and have a book dicussion by sharing their quote with another person. Grade the discussion by giving participation credit, then have the opposite partner present the entry and explain it. \n\nAlternately, you could assign parts of a text for small groups to present and teach through a presentation including a small project like a poster, comic strip, timeline, etc...that way, all kids will get the benefit of the story through each other and not have to slog through all of the text. Groups could also write and give a follow up quiz to their peers for credit. \n\nYou could also do a similar activity in which students focus on Spanish vocabulary development specfically. This would also work well as a vocabulary journal.\n\nGood luck!
292295
Try these:\n\nhttp://www.carolhurst.com/\nThis provides a collection of reviews of books for children, ideas of ways to use them in a classroom, and collections of books and activities about particular subjects, curriculum areas, themes, and professional topics.\n\nhttp://www.reachforreading.com/\nThis site offers educators intervention strategies for below grade readers.\n\nhttp://www.reading.org\nThe International Reading Association is an organization devoted to further reading and literacy.  It has information and links to current issues.\n\nhttp://www.teacher.scholastic.com/\nOn this web page, you can find free tools and resources for the classroom such as: Lesson plans, teaching strategies, and many other tools.
818639
MLA Formating can be found here:\nhttp://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/557/01/\n\nBeowulf can be found here:\nhttp://www.library.unr.edu/subjects/guides/beowulf.html\nhttp://www.gradesaver.com/classicnotes/titles/beowulf
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children's literature is a combination of books, stories, songs, fingerplays, and other items mixed with information for adults who read and other wise choose, buy, and pass out the items to children, their families, and teacher.\n\nit also includes research materials for teachers, librarians, other caregivers, and parent or families so they can choose approiate materials for reading, sharing, and choosing/buying for the children they work with and love.\n\nit may also include the study of how children's literature began and has evolved, and assist persons who want to write, illustrate or publish childrens materials.\n\nanother part of the study of children's literature may include how to formulate varying sizes of libraries and actually the writing of a simple book for children( in my class we had to illustrate an old childrens poem and then bind the book for use)\n\nbasically it includes everything to do with the aquisisition of language and the encouragement of children to use these tools
200476
Hey, I learned that book when i was in eleventh grade. When I get home I'll check my notes and try to get back to you. Good Luck!!
421371
A really good one is by Mem Fox, it is called "Wherever you are".  \n\nGo to the library and find a copy of "A to Zoo".  It is a reference book to find children's books about particular subjects.  Look under diversity and you should be able to find a lot of examples of excellent children's books about diversity.  Also try searching in search engines for children's diversity book lists.  Good luck!
970235
I taught 5th grade a few yrs ago. I liked using their literature stories and have the students pick a character and write the story from a different perspective. You can also allow them to write about their hobby,how would someone describe you if they came into your room and didn't know you?What will you be involved in in high school? What is your goal for 30 yrs of age? Write about fav sportsman. Who is their hero? What is a hero? Feelings about America? I once did a story on a bag of marshmallows and they wrote from the marshmallows veiw. It was a good topic. You can use everyday objects and lay one on each desk. Recently I had my grandkids write a story about 3 items that I picked for them. The items had nothing in common but they wrote great stories. They also made a story plan by filling out a form with the characters,problem,2 paragraphs about how to solve the problem,how it was solved, and wraping up in the last paragragh. The next time I let them pick the items but it took them forever to get them. I think they were trying to think up a story while looking for the items. I was actually working with one grandson who was behind in reading due to ADHD( Delux!). He learned some from the new ideas I found for him and it was nice that the others of about the same age wrote with him.PBS.com is where I got some of my ideas(games,worksheets,books) to help him this summer so he got caught up. "Mrs.McGowen Lots About Reading" in the PBS site is a great source and has many ideas on all subjects. Best wishes! I miss teaching but have my hands full with grandkids!
264248
First, try to find a topic the interests you.  Some of my faves:\nGrapes of Wrath, Jonathan Livingston Seagull, The Giver, Number the Stars, Call of the Wild, The Outsiders, Holes, Ironman, StarGirl, Of Mice and Men, When Zachary Beaver Came to Town, I Robot, The Pigman, From the Mixed-Up Files of Basil E. Frankwieler, The Chocolate War, I Am the Cheese.\nSome are real classics, some are Young Adult literature, but there are plenty of web resources for you to choose the right one for you
1007157
www.abcteach.com is a very good site. I've seen many of their worksheets - all engaging, exciting, and informative.
1138500
Check out:  First Day of School by Harry Wong\nFred Jones' material (I forgot the name)\nTeaching with Love and Logic\nThey all have websites.
751954
get the children to read read read read read make sure what they read is interesting, and of a high quality, \n pick interesting fantasy or fictional stories and read them with vigour\n\ncreative writing is 99% inspiration and 1% convention\n the conventions are important but when the children are involved and passionate then they will be most interested in going through the editing and self-correction process which is how they will best learn convention\n\ntalk them through the process of beggining a story, give them perhaps a few beggings, some could be time oriented- long ago... once upon a time... three years ago...  etc.\n\nfind inspiring ideas for them to base their stories on\nuse materials, photographs, objects, guided visualisation, fantasy settings, interesting science fiction ideas, whatever you can dream up to help inspire them\n\nperhaps you could tie it in with the sport they are doing, or the social studies area they are learning about\n\n\n an interesting beggining would be for the children to watch a little bit of the surfing movie- biggest wednesday, (50ft plus face waves) where the surfers towed in by jet-ski and the helicopters watching were dwarfed by the waves -\nand to get them to write from there\n\n as soon as the children have the idea of making stories up-(which most will) they will be able to have far more freedom\n\n a great exercise is to ask the children to give you a list of the ten top words they would use in a story, and then tell them they have to write a story without using these words\n some will struggle, others will relish the challenge, with support all will learn and develop\n\n(if the children struggle with handwriting you may need to set minumum legth requirement and convention guidlines before- hand, as they may write a few sentences and tell you they have finished, these will be useless if the children are not inspired and they will come up with all sorts of strategies to avoid them, however if you can really inspire them these will be easy to help them to achieve.)\n\nonce they have dived in, then it is time to start talking about grammer and paragraphing and sentencing or whatever level they are at\n\nif you can build passion with the entire class about this activity\nthey are already successful and your job will be easy
1067544
For exercises, I would try Harvey's Revised English Grammar - it's on old grammar book they used to use, like in the one-room schoolhouses.  I bought it for homeschooling my kids, and the exercises are wonderful.  For a reference text, I would try Elements of Style by Strunk & White.  You should be able to find it at amazon, but it's also available in full text online.
267404
go to LEARN TO READ@STARFALL.COM. my kids love it
238434
try cliff notes or spark notes
489253
go to yahoo- and type in Search engine- popular children poems! adn looko for a long one.