Children Make Terrible Pets

Picture books have a way of showing me the world from new points of view, in simple ways and often funny ways. Humor opens doors :)

Awhile back I read Mr. Tiger Goes Wild with my students--it was one of my favorite Interactive Read Alouds. I loved the book, so I naturally wanted to see what else the author, Peter Brown, had written. Among many books, Children Make Terrible Pets caught my eye.

For all patient mothers who have listened (and listened and listened) to the ongoing plea for a dog or a frog-- this story is for you. And for your animal-obsessed children. :) Peter Brown deftly explores the question: What if a wild animal took YOU as a pet? The results, as you may imagine, are fantastically funny, and may hit close to home (I remember the snakes my brothers would bring home). Enjoy!

5 Valentine's Day Stories to Love

I am completely biased, but Valentine's Day is probably best spent in an elementary school. There's a party, and LOTS of card giving! Hearts and chocolate and innocence. I love it.

I also love to share stories. Here are a few of our classroom favorites this year:

1. Love, Splat by Rob Scotton. The illustrations are delightful and funny! There is also Splat the Cat: Funny Valentine, an engaging lift the flap book, perfect for younger readers (but not so much for 3rd graders).

2. Happy Valentine's Day, Dolores by Barbara Samuels. This is a new favorite! I immediately bought my own copy. The story and pictures are very simple, and it was a spot-on tool for teaching character development. We also made a LOT of inferences using the pictures.

3. Valentine's Day by Alice K. Flanagan. It was nice to add a NONFICTION book to our Valentine's Day repertoire. Easily understood and lots of good vocabulary.

4. Valentine Hearts Holiday Poetry by Lee Bennett Hopkins. This I Can Read book is great for students to read on their own once they have heard it read aloud.

5. Arthur's Valentine by Marc Brown. Classic.

Share the love! What are your favorite stories?

Interactive Read-Aloud Lesson: How Do Illustrations Add to Our Understanding of the Story?

This week my third graders and I are taking a deeper look at STORIES, particularly at the clues that illustrations give us about the setting, the characters, and the plot. I was looking for picture books that would generate thoughtful discussion--fortunately we had a book fair last week, so I had several brand spankin new picture books! After reading Mr. Tiger Goes Wild! with the kiddos, it was obvious that this one was a perfect fit for the discussion I wanted.

Learning Goal: I can explain how illustrations add to the text in a story.
Key Questions:
What clues do the illustrations give about the characters?
What clues do the illustrations give about the setting?
What clues do the illustrations give about the plot? 
Can you make predictions based on the illustrations?

FYI, these are the ELA Common Core Standards for Reading: Literature that this lesson meets:
1st Grade: RL 1.7 Use illustrations and details in a story to describe its characters, setting, or events.
2nd Grade: RL 2.7 Use information gained from the illustrations and words in a print or digital text to demonstrate understanding of its characters, setting, or plot.
3rd Grade: RL 3.7 Explain how specific aspects of a text’s illustrations contribute to what is conveyed by the words in a story (e.g., create mood, emphasize aspects of a character or setting).

We started by talking about our learning goal 

{I can explain how illustrations add to what is written in a story}.

QUESTION: What clues can we find to help us understand the CHARACTERS, especially Mr. Tiger?Student responses included . . .

• Mr. Tiger has his eyes open and everyone else has them closed.
• The colors are dull except for Mr. Tiger.
• Everyone looks posh.
• Most of the animals are herbivores (I was so delighted with this observation by several of my students!). Mr. Tiger is different because he is a carnivore. Maybe this makes him more wild.

QUESTION: What clues can we find to help us understand the SETTING?

We looked at many pictures throughout the book, and made the following observations:

• He lives in a town or city.
• It is very dull colored and boring at the beginning.
• Guesses as to which city it might be included: New York City, Paris, and London. The kids guessed these cities mostly because of the pigeons. :)

QUESTION: What clues can we find to help us understand the PLOT?

The previous page says that Mr. Tiger has a wild idea . . . and then we turn to the picture of Mr. Tiger walking on all fours. No words. Just an illustration showing us what his wild idea was. I read it once without showing the picture (the kids agreed that there was missing information) and then again, this time showing them all the pictures. They understood so much more! (Just the learning moment I was looking for! ZING!)

Then we compared these two illustrations: one of Tiger being wild in the city and one of Tiger being wild in the wilderness. How are they the same? How are they different?

Reading and talking about this book was a BLAST! The children were riveted. Success! Thanks to Peter Brown and Mr. Tiger.

What kinds of questions do you ask during read aloud?

Curl Up with a Good One

I thought that I could outrun the common cold this time. Every school year it is a race of endurance to see how long I can keep ahead of the germs. Eventually it catches up with me, and this week I found myself working around a raspy voice and constant sneezing. What a perfect time to pull out A Sick Day for Amos McGee!

This 2011 Caldecott Medal winner by Philip Stead is a delight to read, especially when I am under the weather. The story follows Amos McGee through his daily work routine, and he is easy to love immediately, for the care he puts into simple jobs. The smallest details make up the heart of the narrative. He makes a breakfast of oatmeal and tea. He waits for the bus. He plays chess with the slow-moving elephant and tends to a sniffly rhino (no small task). There are many jobs to do, but Amos makes time to care for each animal one by one. He knows exactly what they need. When one day Amos stays home sick, roles reverse, and he is taken care of by the very friends who are usually looked after by him. It is tender and beautifully accompanied by the woodblock and pencil drawings of first time illustrator Erin Stead. Not only is this book a nice reminder that good things often come back around to help you, it also happened to solve a puzzle for me. Once I found myself in Barnes and Noble, searching for the perfect thank you gift. I needed a book that was warm and real and delightful. It needed to have emotional depth but also be buoyed up by lightness and ease. As soon as I pulled A Sick Day for Amos McGee off the shelf, I knew it was a perfect fit.

25 Favorite Christmas Picture Books

I hope everyone is enjoying the holidays!

One of my favorite things to do is snuggle up with the family 
and a stack of treasured holiday books.

This is my list of 25 Favorite Christmas Picture Books
 (in no particular order):

1. The Trees of the Dancing Goats by Patricia Polacco
2. Winter is the Warmest Season by Lauren Stringer
3. The Gift of the Magi by O. Henry
4. The Polar Express by Chris Van Allsburg
5. The Hat by Jan Brett
6. An Orange for Frankie by Patricia Polacco
7. The Missing Mitten Mystery by Steven Kellogg
8. The Wild Christmas Reindeer by Jan Brett
9. Snowmen at Night by Caralyn & Mark Buehner
10. The Christmas Wreath by James Hoffman
11. How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr. Seuss
12. Strega Nona's Gift by Tomie dePaola
13. Madeline's Christmas by Ludwig Bemelmans
14. Welcome Comfort by Patricia Polacco
15. An Early American Christmas by Tomie dePaola
16. The Baker's Dozen: A Saint Nicholas Tale by Aaron Shepard
17. Olivia Helps with Christmas by Ian Falconer
18. It's Christmas, David! by David Shannon
19. Christmas Tapestry by Patricia Polacco
20. The Night Before Christmas by Clement C. Moore
21. Book of Christmas Carols by Tomie dePaola
22. Twelve Days of Christmas by Jan Brett (I learned from this book that traditionally the 12 days of Christmas are celebrated AFTER December 25, until Jan 6, Three Kings Day)
23. The Snowman by Raymond Briggs
24. The Three Snow Bears by Jan Brett
25. The Legend of the Poinsettia by Tomie dePaola

Merry Christmas!

How We Almost Lost Thanksgiving (and the Superwoman Who Saved It)

I found a new book yesterday—it has been in my classroom for years, unnoticed! (To be VERY honest, I thought it was a book about Betsy Ross and the American flag; apparently, I didn’t even read the title). But on the last school day before Thanksgiving I wanted to read a Thanksgiving story to my students. I flipped through my holiday books, and there it was: Thank You, Sarah by Laurie Halse Anderson. It is a great feeling, reading a book for the first time, not to mention reading it out loud to a gaggle of 8 year olds. I never know how they are going to react to a story—with interest, disinterest, giggles, or insight, or a mix of it all. They loved this book. And I was shocked that I owned it all this time and was only just discovering it. I loved sharing with my group of bright-eyed chatterboxes the story of Sarah Hale, a “dainty little lady” born in 1788. The list of things she accomplished in her lifetime is phenomenal. Makes me tired just thinking about it! Here are a few:

• Wrote and published novels and children’s books
• Edited the Ladies’ Magazine (which published works by some of the most famous authors of her time, such as Poe, Hawthorne, Stowe, Longfellow, and Dickens)
• Raised five children
• Wrote Mary Had A Little Lamb
• Advocated for schools for girls and opposed slavery
• By night, she made hats and wrote thousands of letters

I’ve been trying to teach my class this year how to take action and not wait for someone else to solve their problems. It’s been an ongoing struggle—as I read this book to them, I could tell they were digesting the idea of a “bold, brave, stubborn, and smart” person who had an idea and worked hard to bring it about. This dainty little lady loved Thanksgiving-- and it was being forgotten by a lot of Americans, especially in the new states forming in the West. What did she do? Sarah Hale picked up her pen. She wrote letters by the thousands, urging Americans to make Thanksgiving a nationally recognized holiday. Imagine, the ENTIRE country celebrating and giving thanks on the same day. For a country embroiled in a civil war, that idea was powerful. We needed a little more coming together and a little less falling apart. Sarah appealed to FIVE consecutive presidents of the United States (that is some stubborn waiting!) before Abraham Lincoln made our Thanksgiving a national holiday in 1863, thirty-eight years after Sarah began her quest. I want the girls and guys in my class to have heroes like this lady. This book was a great find, just at the right moment too. The illustrations are witty and fun, and the story is inspiring. In the spirit of giving thanks, here are the things that have been on my mind:

• I am grateful that my husband doesn’t get annoyed when I read the Kindle over his shoulder (currently “we” are reading Catching Fire). You know how food tastes better when it is snitched from someone else’s meal? It just might be the same with books.
• I give thanks for a break from the children, so I can go back with renewed energy and patience.
• I give thanks for cinnamon & hibiscus herbal tea with cream.
• I give thanks for family.
• I give thanks for the beautiful DIY wreath made of ribbons that one of my students made for me. It is the first decoration to go up! Many more to follow.
• I am grateful that I am not sick with a cold or fever! Bring on the holidays. 

What are YOU thankful for?

Picture Book Picks for Halloween

The Stranger & The Widow's Broom
This is a throwback to the 1990’s—I remember pouring over all of Chris Van Allsburg’s books, reading them one more time just to make sure I had the story right, totally wrapped up in the mystery of it all. There is something nicely strange about ambiguous endings, which Chris Van Allsburg has in abundance. Most stories end up happily ever after, or even miserably ever after, but the author at least TELLS you outright how things end up. When I first read these two stories, it was altogether new to encounter a story whose ending was up to my own interpretation & insight. I used to ask my dad to just tell me what it meant and he was wise enough to resist.

The Stranger, first published in 1986, is as full of compassion and warmth as it is with mystery. Farmer Bailey and his family take in a man who has lost his memory. As the season should be shifting from summer to autumn, the stranger stays with them, and the leaves aren’t changing. The clues are there on every page—what name would you give to the stranger?

Another Van Allsburg classic, The Widow’s Broom, published in 1992, has plenty of Halloween elements: witches, pumpkins, ghosts at night, and tough kids trolling the neighborhood. The black-and-white illustrations are rich with detail, and even the plain broom stick shows emotion. This story, like The Stranger, has undertones of compassion (the widow and the abandoned broom form an unlikely friendship) as well as a clever twist to save the day.

In this spooky season, curl up with some stories that will leave you with a healthy dose of mystery!

More Picture Books for Halloween: they’re a scream :)

• The Monster at the End of This Book by Jon Stone (my first and favorite)
• How to Mash Monsters by Catherine Leblanc (also useful when dealing with coworkers/relatives . . . )
• I Need My Monster by Amanda Noll
• Leonardo, the Terrible Monster by Mo Willems
• A Monster Followed Me Home by Mercer Mayer
• PLUS a bonus Chapter Book: The Witches by Roald Dahl

Happy Reading!

8 New Folktales and Fairytales

I'm no Einstein, but I DO know that stories like these help kids to make sense of the world, BECAUSE they are fictional.

 

I am LOVING each new book on the New York Public Library’s List of 100 Titles to Read and Share.

On to #24 through #31!

#24 Aesop in California by Dough Hansen

 

3 Cheers!

The best stories always come home with you, and Doug Hansen brought a handful of well-known fables to his home state of California. The details are rich and well-researched—it shows in the illustrations and the wording that reflects a very local interpretation of the age old classics. The introduction is also a must-read, and it gives you clues about hidden objects to look for in each illustration.

 

From the author:

“I especially chose fables that offered opportunities to illustrate the gloriously diverse animals and habitats of the Golden State.”

Each story takes only one page and will capture your imagination.

This was a welcome glimpse into the wildlife of my neighbor state.

#25 Can’t Scare Me! by Ashley Bryan

3 Cheers!

A lovely rhyming rhythm tells how a giant slowly tricks a boy and how the boy out wits the giants in return.

#26 Demeter and Persephone by Hugh Lupton and Daniel Morden

3 Cheers!

It is about time I read this story. Somehow I managed to make it through high school AND college without having it assigned. This story is written with younger readers in mind (about 6^th grade) but can be read out loud to 4^th and 5^th graders.

Get ready, because the illustrations are gorgeous.

The NYPL also suggests two other titles by the same author, in the same series:

Theseus and the Minotaur

Orpheus and Eurydice

#27 Grandma and the Great Gourd: A Bengali Folktale by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

3 Cheers!

I loved this classic story of a women who outwits the ravenous beasts in the forest. 
Full of beautiful colors and creatures.

#28 Grim, Grunt, and Grizzle-Tail : A Story from Chile by Fran Parnell

3 Cheers!

Whether your kids are like princesses or little monsters, this book is for them!

Students in 3^rd or 4^th grade should be able to read the text on their own, which makes this a great choice for learning about folktales.

#29 Hansel and Gretel by The Brothers Grimm, Illustrated by Sybille Schenker

3 Cheers!

Transparent pages, block cut pictures, a good dose of black and white contrast, and a fair amount of dread makes this a great rendition of the classic story Hansel and Gretel.

#30 Nasreddine by Odile Weulersse

3 Cheers!

Every page of this book is a picture I would put up on any wall in my home. Beautiful and engaging, Nasreddine paints the perspective of a young boy who listens to all the laughing voices instead of his own heart.

 

 

#31 Whiskers, Tails and Wings: Animal Folktales from Mexico by Judy Goldman

3 Cheers

This collection of folktales is best suited for older readers with a longer attention span.  There are 5 stories in this collection, each including the folktale itself, a historical/cultural guide, and a glossary of native terms found in the story. Great resource for a study of Mexico.

Next up is a list of new poetry books :) Stay tuned!

8 More Picture Books to Share

Over the past month, we’ve explored the picture books on the New York Public Library’s list of 100 Titles to Read and Share. While writing these book reviews I have definitely found some new favorites!

Two weeks ago we looked at 10 picture books from the list. My favorites were . . . actually it is too hard to choose! I loved them!

Here is the last set of picture book reviews (bittersweet moment . . . sad to leave the picture books, happy to move on to novels). I was glad to see a trend of multicultural books crop up in this part of the list.

And without further ado--

 

#16 Pancho Rabbit and the Coyote: A Migrant’s Tale by Duncan Tonatiuh

 

4 Cheers!

This book was a conversation starter for my husband and me.

It is a beautiful story, told with complete simplicity. No drama, no politics, no pity, just a story revealing the true experiences of real people—EXCEPT there are no people in this book. All of the characters are animals. Rabbits, chickens, ducks, snakes, and a coyote. And what my husband pointed out is that having animals experience the terrible ordeal of crossing illegally from South to North makes the story approachable in a way that telling it outright wouldn’t be able to do.  Making the characters into rabbits wipes the slate clean. You don’t see race. You don’t see nationality. You see a father caring for his family and the dangers they face. Animals make us comfortable enough to approach the content feely, leaving behind all our human misconceptions. This book will appeal to adults and children for its warmth, its honesty, and the beautiful way the illustrations capture the characters’ thoughts.

 

 

#17 Picture a Tree by Barbara Reid

 

2 Cheers

Creative interpretation, good repetitiveness for young children, but I didn’t love it.

 

#18 The Silver Button by Bob Graham

4 Cheers!

Reading this book is an act of embracing the celebration of the ordinary details of everyday life. Every sentence is a hasty beginning and ending of a new story. Quite possibly a story you find yourself in the middle of a hundred times a day.

“Oh High Street, Bernard had his shoelace tied for the second time that morning . . . and a man bought some fresh bread from the baker.”

A summation of the hummm-drumm seconds that make up a minute, in any city, in any family.

  






 

#19 The Story of Fish and Snail by Deborah Freedman

 

3 Cheers!

A fresh romp through the pages of a book-within-a-book!

Lots of dialogue, and most of the info comes through the illustrations.

 

Dive in!

 

#20 Take Me Out to the Yakyu by Aaron Meshon

3 Cheers!

Baseball fans will cheer for this fun book that takes place in 2 countries: the US and Japan. One boy takes us through the cultural highlights of his favorite game.

 

 

#21 This is the Rope: A Story from the Great Migration by Jacqueline Woodson

3 Cheers!

When you read this book, read the author’s note first and then dive into this family’s story of hope and change and progress.

 

#22 Unicorn Thinks He’s Pretty Great by Bob Shea

No joke, this book is pretty great!

Goat is happy with his friends on the playground, until Unicorn shows up with his magical tricks. Packed full of illustrations that will make you smile, and a lesson that every grumpy goat needs.

 Cameo appearances by:

A piece of toast

A waste-paper basket

A plunger

A smiling lake

3 Cheers!

(3 and ½ for the piece of toast)

 



 

#23 Water in the Park by Emily Jenkins & Stephanie Graegin

2 Cheers

Nothing about this book struck me. I didn’t spend any time lingering on the page or anticipating the next word.

 

Next week we will dive in with Folktales and Fairytales!

 

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