That Which Shall Not Be Named...

Things change in First Grade.  Six year olds start noticing things that they didn't notice in kindergarten, such as what the children around them are doing, reading, writing, and learning.

In Kindergarten, children often parallel play.  They play next to children and do their own thing, rather than engaging in partner or group play.  

And as they approach the mid-year of First Grade the inevitable occurs.  And here's what it is.  

That which shall not be mentioned.  The experience that every First Grader longs for...

Chapter Books. 

                                                    

At first I begin reading them out loud to the whole crew,  as I am doing with Anna Hibiscus.

But now, some of the children are ready to read books like Frog and Toad,  Henry and Mudge, 

and Poppleton during Independent reading time.

Not all of us are ready for these books.  But some of us are.  I am SO SENSITIVE to all of my crew children's hearts.  So for now, I've asked the children who will be reading these books not to call them "chapter books". 

For now,  we will call them "longer books" until the day that we are all in what a First Grader thinks is a special club to belong to.  Those who are reading "chapter books".