Reading with the Rays: Take me out to the Trop

Take me out to the Trop!

It’s baseball season, so what better time to get to know your Tampa Bay Rays than now? Research the team’s players and find out their hometowns. On a map, mark where each player is from. How many states are represented by the team? How many countries? Diversity brings strength to a community. Click on the comments button below to discuss the ways that diversity brings strength to our Rays team.

Reading with the Rays: Rhyme time

Rhyme time

Rays pitcher Dan Wheeler’s son’s favorite book Eight Silly Monkeys by Steve Haskamp has a lot of rhyming words in it. Rhyming words have similar sounds such as chair, stair and cat, hat. Songs are often composed of rhyming words. Often songs are based on everyday observations. The daily newspaper is a great resource for writing found poetry or songs. Choose one interesting story from the St. Petersburg Times and write a song using words you took from the article. Illustrate your song and share it with your family and friends. Click on the comments button below to share your poem with other summer bloggers.

Reading with the Rays: Poetry in motion

Poetry in motion

The poem Casey at the Bat by Ernest Lawrence Thayer is a classic. You can read the poem on the Baseball Almanac’s Web site. The poem, printed in the San Francisco Examiner in 1885, is considered one of the best baseball poems ever written. Now it is your turn to write a poem about baseball in Tampa Bay. For inspiration, log onto tampabay.com or tampabay.rays.mlb.com, or you can look for baseball articles on the pages of the St. Petersburg Times. Click on the comments button below to share your poem with other summer bloggers.

Reading with the Rays: The picture of sports

The picture of sports

Baseball is one of many professional sports. Remember, sports is not just about the conventional baseball, basketball, hockey or football. Recreational activities and sports go hand-in-hand. Hiking, swimming, playing golf, bowling, walking, tennis, badminton and bicycling are great ways to have fun and build character. Look in pages of the St. Petersburg Times to find photos of people playing sports and participating in other recreational activities. What type of recreational activities do you enjoy? What are your favorite sports? Click on the comments button below to share your thoughts with Rays fans and students across Tampa Bay.

Reading with the Rays: Catching Rays

Catching Rays

You can catch Rays every day on the pages of the St. Petersburg Times. Keep track of the Rays’ travels by reading the Sports section of the St. Petersburg Times every day during the summer. What city were the Rays in yesterday? Where are they today? How was the game yesterday? Who made the best plays? Who is your favorite player? How many games have you seen this season? Do you watch the Rays on television? How has your experience been at Tropicana Field? Let’s talk about Raysball! Click on the comment button below to share your thoughts with Rays fans and students across Tampa Bay.

Reading with the Rays: Connecting the past and present

Connecting the past and the present

Author George Santayana said, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” What does this phrase mean? How does this phrase apply to the articles you read in the St. Petersburg Times? Do the articles reflect a changing world? How so? Have the people in the present world learned from the lessons of history? Is history repeating itself? Click on the comments button below to share your thoughts with Rays fans and students across Tampa Bay.

Reading with the Rays: Learning of the times

Learning of the times

The history of the Negro Leagues of baseball is important and extensive. As you learned in Reading with the Rays, more that 2,500 men and women participated as players, coaches, managers and officials in the official Negro Leagues. Which player did you choose to research at the Negro League Baseball Museum’s Web site? What information did you learn about that player and about the time period in which the player lived? Click on the comment button below to share your thoughts with Rays fans and students across Tampa Bay.

Reading with the Rays: Creating teamwork

Creating teamwork

In the book Challenge at Second Base, Stan Martin learns the meaning of determination and teamwork. Now that you have created your teamwork collage (find the directions in the Reading with the Rays St. Petersburg Times Newspaper in Education publication), discuss the information you learned about the importance of teamwork in a variety of settings. Click on the comment button below to share your thoughts with Rays fans and students across Tampa Bay.