Favorite Things and Mentor Text: Jamie O'Rourke

Hope you all had a great weekend! I hosted Easter dinner at my house- it was my first holiday cooking for my family, and I'm pretty proud of myself! So now I'm sitting down to catch up on all the blogs I missed out on while I was prepping in the kitchen all weekend.  (I started on Friday night!)

First up, Latoya's Let's Get Acquainted Linky.  I've seen these around but haven't joined in.  No time like the present.

1. Favorite place to shop: 

Oh boy.  Well, much to my husband's chagrin, that would be Sur la Table, where just last night, we took a cooking class and bought some gadgets for the kitchen.  

2. Favorite TV show: 

Well, you all know how much I love Ina Garten, so Barefoot Contessa is pretty high up there.  But seriously...I will drop anything and everything for...

3. Favorite sweet treat: 

Creme brulee.  I have yet to attempt it myself. 

4. Favorite food: 

Lobster.  Lobster any way, any day, any time.

5. Favorite restaurant: 

This is an Italian restaurant from my college town...so many good memories!

That was fun!

And now on to Amanda and Stacia's Mentor Text linky!

I am linking up to share a mentor text I used recently to teach Cause and Effect.  I used it around St. Patrick's Day, and my students really enjoyed it.  

After we shared our predictions about the book, I read it aloud.  I had previewed the concept of cause and effect with some real-life examples, and after the book was finished, we discussed our predictions and then started a Cause and Effect anchor chart together.  The illustrations in this book really lend themselves well to retelling, main idea and detail work, and cause and effect realizations.  You can add this book to a genre study about folktales as well. 

When the book study was over we did a Reader's Theater, which was a blast and so great to improve fluency and prosody.  As an added benefit, it taught my ELL's a little bit about a different culture and tradition that many of them are unaware of.

  

Thanks, Amanda, Stacia, and Latoya, for hosting these linkies!