Book Giveaway & a Free Literacy Center for Youngsters

So a few weeks ago, I was on FB and I saw one of my former sorority sisters at a book signing.  I'm a reading teacher (at heart), so it peeked my interest.  As I did a little exploring, the book intrigued me.  If you don't already know I have a bit of a passion for multiculturalism and finding characters of all ethnicities to introduce my students to.

Turns out, the author, Kat Chimney is from Houston so she's fairly close and my mind started thinking a skype session or even an author visit (maybe in the future).  I jumped on board and asked where to find Keilah West, The World's Greatest Klutz. - to my surprise, Kat sent me a free copy of the book.  How sweet is that???   

Look at this picture, doesn't Kat look like she's your best friend?

The Friday before Spring Break, the book arrived.  I was giddy.  I opened it and showed it to all my teacher friends, who 'ooooh'd and aaaaah'd' all over the book.  Yes, they were jealous.  Immediately, every teacher in the lounge fell in love with the main character, Keilah (key-luh).  The illustrations are OUTSTANDING!  I cannot say enough about the illustrations by Robyn Haley - she's got major talent.

I had the opportunity to read Keilah West, The World's Greatest Klutz to my 1st grade GT pull-out students. I decided to talk about character traits and adjectives.  I knew that they worked on adjectives around Valentine's Day.  None of them knew what the word klutz meant.  But, as we read the book they used context clues to figure it out!  All of them were able to tell me either fall down or clumsy.  I didn't take any pics :(

I made a bubble map and had them put their answers for what they thought klutz meant and to give text evidence to support their answer.  EVERYONE was successful.  I do have some bilingual students who couldn't write their answers but were able to verbalize their answers.  Then, we did a word sort and sorted nouns and adjectives from the book.  It wasn't fancy, just notecards.  

The good news, they all loved Keilah West, The World's Greatest Klutz and immediately asked if there were other books with Keilah as the main character!  I told them that was called a series.  GUESS WHAT?  Kat is working on a series starring Keilah!

When I contacted Kat and told her that my students loved the book and I was writing a review for the book, she offered to do a giveaway for my followers!  She wants to give your class a brand spankin' new book and some goodies (pencils, bookmarks, etc...).

a Rafflecopter giveaway

If your kiddos need some help with adjectives, nouns and verbs, this free literacy center will help them.  If you end up winning or buying the book, the center is aligned to Keilah West, The World's Greatest Klutz.  Click the pic below to get the free literacy center.

I'm linking this forever freebie to a few link-up's.

This Little Piggy loves meeting new characters.