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Truman visits classes of winning Kidsville News! essays
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Jennifer Sitman's class at Guyton Elementary School hangs out with Truman. - photo by Photo by Sandi Van Orden

Jennifer Sitman, a teacher at Guyton Elementary, and Jamie Crunkelton, a teacher at Marlow Elementary, won a visit from Truman, mascot of Kidsville News! for essays they wrote about how they use the monthly publication in their classrooms.

Sitman won the essay contest. Truman visited her class Oct. 5, and brought with him gift bags and cupcakes for the students to have a party.

Brittany McNair, editor of Kidsville News!, asked the class questions about what they read in the newspaper, and how they use it in class. Many students participated in this discussion time.

Crunkelton, the runner-up, had a visit to her classroom from Truman on Oct. 8. However Truman was only able to visit with the students because Crunkelton was out caring for her sick children.

“I loved hearing how the teachers use Kidsville News! in their classrooms,” McNair said. “It helps me when I am deciding exactly what to put in each issue. But the most fun of the entire thing was the visits with the students and letting them see Truman up close.”

Crunkelton’s essay

Students go to school every day hoping and anticipating they will learn something new and interesting. This new learning, however, will be meaningless if they are not able to connect to the world around them. Grammar is one of those subjects that needs to be connected to the real world in order to give students a clear understanding of it. Kidsville News provides a perfect avenue for just that. Not only is it interesting, but it is also kid friendly. My students have often used Kidsville News to find examples of nouns, verbs, adjectives, possessives, compound sentences, and many others. Students read the paper and use highlighters to show the different parts of grammar they've found. So while they are learning how to use the grammar they have learned in the classroom, they also read interesting articles that will help improve their reading skills and give them new information. Students find it very exciting to be able to use what they have learned from their textbook and apply to something in the world around them. Kidsville News has been very helpful and beneficial for my students. I will continue to use it extend and enhance their learning.


Sitman’s essay
Kidsville Newspaper as a Resource in the Classroom
 
The Kidsville Newspaper serves as a great resource in the classroom. The best part about it is that it comes straight to your classroom for every student! I use it for several different supplements.

First of all, the kids get so excited that a paper has been delivered for them, and it draws in their attention. They grab their highlighters, and we begin. We often look through the paper first, and I have them find articles. We then skim them and make predictions/summaries of what the article is about.

An easy use for the paper is grammar. The students can highlight parts of speech, find types of sentences, or punctuation.

Additionally, for my fifth graders, it serves as a platform for many discussions. We may read an article, and then open up for questions. This often leads to topics of discussion that we wouldn’t ordinarily get to.

It’s also an opportunity for any student to think outside of their school or town. They are exposed to global, political, and/ or world events.

In the end, they always love to complete the Puzzleville Page! The Kidsville Newspaper it just a nice break from the ordinary!