Social Studies

Social studies texts provide information about specific history events. These events can be, economics, history, geography, political science, and behavioral science. When I choose social studies textbooks for my classroom I will make sure to select a large variety of books so I have many resources to match whatever I’m teaching. I want to select textbooks that will represent my students’ background in way, or books that will make my students identify themselves with. Social studies is the study of people and the world around us. These books are important in a classroom because they will make foreign students feel like at home. When I select books I will make sure they are very appealing for my students since I want to get them involved in my classroom. One criteria that I will look for in the books that I am selecting is appropriateness. I want to select books which contain vocabulary words that are appropriate for the grade level that I'm teaching. I plan to have multiple social studies texts available for my students to read on their own time and some of the books I will use for a read-aloud. 


McCollum, S. (1999). Kenya. Minneapolis, Minnesota: Carlrhoda Books.

 Grade level in which text is considered complex:

• Second & Third

 Grade level for read-aloud

• First & Second grade 

This book provides information about the different land-forms, cultures, location, and climate in Kenya. I like this book because it contains a pronunciation guide which helps students pronounce difficult words that appear throughout the book. The book has already identified the complex words and has placed them in bold letters. Also, these words can be found at the back of the book under the glossary. This book provides fun and factual information about the country's most important aspects. It provides information about Kenya’s ethnic groups, how they live, where they live, what they eat, etc. It also contains information about the different animals found in Kenya. I like the illustrations in this book because they are very appealing most of them are real life pictures. Also, the text features like the font size and style make the book more suitable for the kids.


Morvan, Jean David. (2015). Omaha beach on d-day. New York, NY: Dupuis.


 Grade level in which text is considered complex:

• Fourth and Fifth 

Grade level for class read-aloud:

• Third and fourth 

The major theme discussed in this book  is
 World War II (WWII). The book talks about a 
photographer of D-day during World War II. His
 book starts out as a comic book, and then it
 explains what happened during Dooms Day 
also known as D-Day. It talks about how the
photographer almost got shot a couple of times.
 As the book goes on, more details about D-day are
 given and towards the end it shows 9 real life photos 
that were taking that day during the battle. This would be an interesting book for a boy to read since it starts out as an action comic book about a war and later on it provides real life pictures and information about what happened that day. Action and adventure books are often preferred by males. These books usually contain an informal type of voice which means that the book uses pronouns as if it was talking to you. These types of books are often organized in a chronological way, descriptive form, or in a cause & effect way. Most history books are either action or adventure, the action part can be found in information about wars, and the adventure part on how America was discovered.

Math

Math texts try to make math more appealing and fun for students as they learn math facts. When I searched for math textbooks I focused on this criterion. I selected books that seem appealing for students, these books are either colorful, they contain many illustrations, the have different font styles and sizes. When texts are appealing it makes it more interesting for students which makes the students want to read the book for fun. Having appealing and interesting math books in my classroom library can help students who struggle with math or the ones who have a negative attitude towards math get more involved and interesting in the subject. Also, as I selected my books, I looked for the ones that are appropriate for the reading and math level my students are at. Since we want our students to have a positive experience towards reading and math it's important to select texts that are at their level otherwise they will find the text too hard to read and will become frustrating for them. In my classroom I plan to use these books for read-aloud and shared readings.

David M. Schwartz. (1985) How Much Is A Million? New York : Lothrop, Lee & Shepard Books

 Grade level in which text is considered complex:

• Third & Fourth

Grade level for class read-aloud:

• First & Second

 The main theme discussed in this book is to get students to build a sense of how much is a thousand, how much is a million, how much is a billion, and how much is a trillion. This book uses real life examples to help students build a sense of how big these numbers are. It contains lots of illustrations which are very colorful and appealing. This book helps students conceptualize and most importantly visualize how much is a million. At the end of the book, all the calculations have been made showing step-by-step and explaining how they were able to calculate how big /much is a thousand, how much is a million, how much is a billion, and how much is a trillion. The book is guided by a wizard named Marvelosissimo which makes it interesting for kids to read about the wizard explain these concepts.

Stephen R Swinburne, (2000). What’s a Pair? What’s a Dozen? Honesdale, Pa. : Boyds Mill Press.

 Grade level in which text is considered complex:

• Second & Third

Grade level for read aloud:

• Kindergarten & First

This is a well-designed picture book, it contains photographs of children jumping over a ball, riding a bicycle, eating ice-cream cones or playing in a group illustrating a specific number or word. This book contains terms such as, single, double, triple, couple, several, few, many, and a dozen.  Also, it contains prefixes such as, uni, bi, and tri. This is a book I will use in my classroom during a read-aloud since it contains questions throughout the book which I can discuss with my students as I read the book to them.