This summer in a training I learned about creating photo essays as another way to tell a story. I went last week to visit my brother, sister-in-law and niece in Chicago. My other sister who lives in St. Charles and my Almost First Grade niece went to visit with me. One our first day there we went to the Shedd Aquarium. It was by far the most amazing Aquarium I have ever visited. I took almost 700 pictures while I was on vacation. I wanted to try to put together a photo essay (which is another way to write a non-fiction or informational text book). I wanted to share my book with you on the blog. I hope you and your families consider creating a photo essay to make your own books. I am going to print this and bind it together into a book this year for school. Here are the pictures I wanted to share with you. Photo essays do not require a lot of text (although you can add as much text as you want). In order to understand what a photo essay is, think about the really cool coffee table books they sell at book stores that are full of pictures on one particular topic. The topic of my photo essay is the Shedd Aquarium. I hope you enjoy this little book (in blog form) that I have put together for you. Maybe you could make a photo essay of what you did this summer to share with your new First Grade Teacher. Wouldn't they be so impressed if you came to school with your photo essay! Your new teacher would be blown away at what a great author and illustrator you are. Be sure to share them with your past Kindergarten teachers. Enjoy my photo essay!
My Trip To The Shedd Aquarium
By: Carole Dawn Arrendale
This is the skyline of Chicago.
This is the entrance to the Shedd Aquarium.
This is a close up of a really cool statue outside of the museum.
This is the round statue outside of the museum.
I saw a neat dolphin show.
I saw a diver in a huge fish tank.
I saw an enormous sea turtle.
What a strange looking creature!
This woman is a scientist and an animal trainer.
This is a Beluga Whale.
This is a starfish.
Here are a lot of starfish.
These are two different kinds of stingrays.
I got to pet this stingray.
My sister petted this stingray.
These are called moon jellyfish.
These were my favorite jelly fish.
I think these jellyfish are beautiful.
I am pretending to hold a jellyfish.
This jellyfish looks like it is flying!
These are a different type of jellyfish.
These jelly fish are blue.
This jellyfish is very little.
I saw this penguin.
I think seahorses are very weird looking.
This seahorse was very strange, but very pretty.
The eels scared me. They are so creepy looking!
This is me being silly in front of a giant fish tank.
This is the giant fish tank.
I love all of the different colors of the fish.
I don't remember what this was called but it is really cool.
The coral was very colorful.
I like the patterns on this fish.
These fish are very bright.
Shark!
The sharks are so graceful.
Nemo!
This is how they grow the coral for the fish tanks in the museum.
This is coral they grew and now it is ready to be placed into the fish tanks.
THE END
So that is my photo essay for my trip to the Shedd Aquarium. See how easy that was to create? The pictures tell most of the story. I only used one sentence under each picture. I want you, the reader, to really study the pictures and see how much information you can gather from looking at the photos. I hope you enjoyed my essay. Try to create one yourself. It is very easy if you have a grown up to help you with the pictures.
On a different note, all of the Kindergarten teachers and many of the First Grade teachers are already back in their classrooms this week creating a wonderful learning environment for you. The First Grade teachers are so excited to have you come into their classrooms. They are working so hard to make your first day (and the whole year) a fun and exciting learning adventure for you. I am hoping to get some of them to read a book out loud to post on the blog for you. This is going to be an amazing year for you. We (the Kindergarten teachers) are so excited to see you grow and learn in First Grade. Just a few more weeks and your amazing journey begins.
