This is the one of the best back to school books there is! The main character of this story is SO nervous for her first day of school. Her dad has to encourage her and help her get to school, despite her many protests. However, the reader gets a BIG surprise when they finds out that the main character is actually the teacher who is so nervous for her first day! This book helps show students that we as teachers are just as nervous for our first day of school as they are for theirs and helps relate everyone in the classroom. A fun activity that you could do with this book, is having everyone write down their feeling about the first day of school on an index card ( or for younger grades pick a word out of pre-made stacks) and creating a class  collage to compare how everyone is feeling. I would then personally have my students do a short writing activity on what they learned from seeing how their classmates felt vs how they felt. Was it the same? Was it different? Did it relieve any anxiety seeing how else the rest of the class felt? 

Lexile Measure: AD502L

Follow David as he does a lot of things that makes his mom say "No!". David learns at the end of the story that even though his mom can tell him no a lot it's all because his mother loves him. This is a great book that kids LOVE and will have them cackling. This a great book to have students make inferences with since there is not much writing or dialogue to the story. You could have students write what inferences they pulled from the story and what in the pictures lead them to believe their inference. Once everyone has finished their writing prompt you could have a class discussion to see what inferences everyone agreed with and where they differed. 

Lexile Measurement: BR100L

If you've ever had a problem or know a child who has ever had a problem that would just not go away, than this is the book for you! This book follows a child who has a problem and isn't sure what to make of it. We see the child's journey as he figures out how to handle his problem and what he does when he finally faces it. The book never tells us exactly what the child's problem is, so this would be a great book to use when discussing making inferences and predictions. After reading this book, I might would make a "Problem to Opportunity" board and have the students come up with ideas that would help them and their classmates when they face a problem and aren't quite sure what to do about it. 

Lexile: 500L

Miss Nelson is Missing is a fun story about a teacher who is absent one day and has a mean substitute. This book would be a great read aloud for many things. One idea is to compare and contrast the teacher and the substitute. The students could also draw inferences from the actions of the characters to infer where Miss Nelson really is. It is also a good story to read to the students before they have their first substitute! 

Lexile Level: 340L

This book is a great read aloud for lower elementary grades, especially Kindergarten. The  teacher could read this book on the first day of school in order to create rules for the classroom. The class would then create an anchor chart together with two columns. One column would be for actions that are allowed in the classroom and another column would be for actions not allowed called the No, David column. A great lesson for this book could be on making inferences about the character.

Lexile Level: BR