Fourth graders have just finished a sleuthing project involving the organization of non-fiction books in our collection. Not all libraries use the Dewey Decimal System, but most do, and it's good to know that there is a system using numbers from 000-999. Girls found the lowest numbered and highest numbered books in a range and then together we hypothesized about the category. The Story of the Three Wise Kings (220) and The Three Muslim Festivals (297.4) helped us easily figure out that 200s were books about religion. A Short Walk Around the Pyramids & Through the World of Art (700) and Iditarod Dream ( (798.8) made us think that 700s might be about travel. We were stumped when we added Sailing is for Me (797.1) and Songs of the Wild West (781.7). What else besides travel? The 700s cover a wide range of titles about arts and recreation, including sports.
We have also had some fun with thesaurus work. Ask your daughter for some exciting synonyms for BAD and for BREAK.
