Duplication; Disclaimer | Practitioner's class page was sited at http://lee.boston.k12.ma.us/d4/d4.html | Looney98 "The Looneys Love Regional Literature" | Looney Lobster root page
"Looney Lobsters Love Regional Literature" - 1998
an online travel project
initiated by the 5th graders of Marjorie Duby,
Joseph Lee School, Boston, Massachusetts
Background:
During the past school year, our traveling stuffed crustaceans, Looney Larry and Looney Lester of Boston, Massachusetts accepted the gracious hospitality of elementary school classrooms across the United States for one school week and then were mailed to another classroom eventually returning to Boston.
They received cuddles, pets, and tours of local sites. They learned of local customs and culture. As we kept in touch with them and others through the Internet via electronic mail and our "Looney Lobster on the Loose" website at http://bps.boston.k12.ma.us/rc328sb/looney.html, we learned much virtually.
Our Looneys enjoyed traveling and learning so much that they would like to again travel the USA learning about local regional literature.
Our Project Announcement:
Would you be willing to show hospitality in your elementary school classroom for one school week to our traveling Looney? During Looney's visit, would you be willing to read aloud picture books based on local lore - - a folktale, a custom, a happening, a regionally identifiable daily life story?
What we will send:
A small box which will include:
1. a small pouch with Looney Lobster, a small, cuddly, stuffed crustacean
2. a photo-album showing our class members - - on our travels around Boston and in our classroom
3. Looney Lobster's itinerary
4. a single-use camera
5. a pouch of SASE envelopes
What we will ask that you do:
1. In your message of interest, identify the title and author of a picture book/s based on your local lore - - a folk tale, a custom, a happening, a regionally identifiable daily life story - - which your class will read aloud to Looney during his visit to your school.
2. Immediately after being notified of your acceptance into the project, arrange to send a photo of your class (digitized, photocopy of a photo, or original photo) possibly holding a copy of the regional book they will read aloud during your school week.
3. Once accepted into the project and the "Looney Lobsters Love Regional Literature" booklist is created, begin to locate the booklist entries at your local library for read-aloud use during the scheduled school weeks.
4. Subscribe to our Looney Lobster Listserv (mailing list) which will network participants allowing students to converse about the literature and the daily experiences of Looney.
5. Send electronic mail messages related to Looney's visit to the Looney mailing list
6. If possible, create a school-based webpage of Looney's travels and experiences linked to our "Looney Lobsters Love Regional Literature" webpage.
7. With the single-use camera, take a close-up picture of your state's license plate and two other pictures of your choice.
8. Remove one of the SASE from the box. Inside the envelope, place the front page of your local newspaper.
9. Following Looney Lobster's scheduled visit to your school, immediately send him to his next scheduled site allowing a minimum of 4 days for Priority Mail travel.
What we will be doing:
1. Calculating the accumulated mileage for our Looney Lobsters.
2. Locating the latitude and longitude of each city that our Looneys visit.
3. Becoming aware of the daily time zones for each school that Looney Lobster visits.
4. Observing the daily weather of Looney's host school and comparing it to our weather.
5. Obtaining from our local library the regional literature suggested by participants for each scheduled Looney visit.
6. Reading aloud the weekly booklist suggestion to our lower grade Reading Buddies.
7. Reacting to the read aloud selections with other participant students through the mailing list.
8. Receiving the SASE information that is sent to us as our Looneys move to the next school site.
How we will let you know about Looney's travels:
1. We will have a webpage which will include Looney's itinerary, the regional literature booklist, and the daily adventures of Looney.
2. Our group will telecommunicate using our Looney Lobsters mailing list and individual electronic mail messages.
3. We will gather and distribute prior to the beginning of the project, a "Looney Loves Regional Literature Participant Handbook" featuring the itinerary, the booklist resources, and the pictures of participant school classes.
If you are interested in hosting Looney Lobster and participating in this project, please respond to:
Marjorie Duby
In your message of intent, please include 4-5 titles of picture books associated with your region or the names of children's authors associated with your region.
Last modified: September 16, 2005 by Marjorie Duby, practitioner formerly sited at Joseph Lee School, Boston, MA
Unless otherwise indicated, this website and its contents are the property of Marjorie Duby and are protected, without limitation pursuant to United States and foreign copyright laws. All rights reserved.
Disclaimer: The staff of Inquiry Unlimited attempts to provide appropriate, informative educational links. We check and update links frequently. We cannot be responsible for the content, use of, or quality of materials on any website other than our own. To the best of our knowledge, graphics on this site are public domain. If you find otherwise, please notify us and we will remove them immediately.