Focus Question

How does knowing about literary elements impact understanding a story?

                A student knowing the different types of literary elements has a huge impact on their understanding of a story.  Being able to identify the different literary elements in a story demonstrates what the student understands is happening in the story.  If the students understand character, setting, theme, and conflict, they are going to be able to identify things in the story that other students may not find important or be able to pick up.  If you gave a student a particular focus element to watch during the story the student will be able to follow that element and really understand on another level what that particular element means to the story as a whole.  In the book “Lucky,” the setting plays a really big role in the whole story.  The student knowing that what they need to pay attention to, such as setting, will be able to follow the setting in the story and understand that the desert is a key element in the story.  Likewise, following a character in the story instead of just reading the story as it is, will allow the student to realize what this particular character means to the story, and appreciate that character, as a whole.  In “Lucky,” Brigitte is an important character who is worthy of following.  Without understand Brigitte as an individual, a reader could miss what she lends to the story.

Five new books

Title: Alice the Fairy

Author: David Shannon

Grade Level: Early Elementary

Rating: 4

Summary:  This book is about a little girl who is telling the audience all about her being a fairy. Throughout the book she tells the reader what she can do as a fairy, and what she still needs a little work on.  She also tells us how she is not a permanent fairy, just a temporary fairy, which means she hasn’t gone to fairy school yet.

Opinion:  Although I found the story fairly interesting, I think that this book would be more of a free read book instead of one that the teacher reads out loud to the class.  The reason for this is because although the book is pretty entertaining, it is a book that would be more appealing to girls than to younger boys.  The story was fun, and it really gave young girls a story that they can relate to.  What little girl hasn’t pretended that they were a fairy?  It was also cool how the author decided to use a font that looks like the little girl’s writing for the book.  It just adds to the story and makes it a little more fun to read.  The pictures are also interesting, I am not exactly sure what the illustrations are made with but they look like paint to me.

Connection: If you were to read this book to the whole class, it would connect really well with fantasy.  What do the students like to pretend to be?  If you were teaching a classroom around grades 2-3 you could use this book as a mini lesson and inspiration for a writing assignment where your students write about what they used to pretend, or like pretending to be.  This would be a fun little activity to get the students creating juices flowing. They could practically write about anything!

Title: The selfish Crocodile

Author: Faustin Charles and Michael Terry

Grade Level: k-2

Rating: 3

Summary: This book is about a crocodile that lives in a river and won’t let any other animals drink or swim in “his river.”  All the other animals are scared of the crocodile, and have to travel far away every time they need a drink or want to swim.  In the end, one of the forest animals helps the crocodile when he needs it the most and changes the crocodile’s whole attitude about being selfish.

Opinion:  When I read this book the first thing that stood out to me was that I felt like it was a little boring.  From the beginning it was pretty easy to predict what was going to happen next, and I feel like this is one of those books where a young student probably could have told you what they thought was going to happen next and more than likely been right about it.  I still think that it is a good book to read to a class, it has a good story line, and pictures that are likely to hold young students attention through the whole story.

Connection:  I think that this would be a really good book to use at the Kindergarten level.  It could be presented as a mini lesson on the importance of sharing.  We see the crocodile being very selfish in the beginning of the book, and because he is so selfish when he needs help none of the other animals are willing to lend a hand except for a single mouse.  After the crocodile gets help, and realizes how selfish he was being, he decides to share the river like he always should have done.  The story ends with you pointing out that sharing makes friends.  Because the crocodile shares the rest of the animals become his friend.  This would be a great book to use to show kindergartners the importance of sharing and the results of sharing with others.

Title: Bear Feels Scared

Author: Karma Wilson, Jane Chapman

Grade Level: K-1

Rating: 4

Summary: This story is about a bear that gets lost in the woods on a dark rainy night.  Bear is scared out in the woods all alone and doesn’t know what to do.  Bear’s friends get worried and start a search party to look for bear, and end up finding him jus feet from the den entrance.

Opinion: This book is a cool book to read to little kids because it is something that they may be able to relate to.  Many kids are scared of the dark, so this may be able to be a book that you can have a discussion about.  The topic could be presented as “what things can be scary at night?”  It’s also a great book to teach kids about rhyming.  There is rhyming on almost every page, and the fun thing about this rhyming is that it is semi predictable.  The pictures are also exciting, the illustrator of this book used acrylic paints to create each picture.

Connection: As I briefly touched on in my opinion section, this book would be good for a few different mini lessons in the early elementary school classroom.  It would be a good interactive book to have a discussion about what things at night might be scary.  This type of discussion could really get the students creative juices flowing and allow a fun interactive discussion where everyone can be heard.  It is also a great book to use to teach kids how some books use rhyming.  This book does such a good job of using rhyming that it would be fun to ask the kids what they think the author is going to use next.  Again, this is another interactive mini lesson where the kids feel like they can really participate.

Title: Who Took the Cookies from the Cookie Jar?

Author: Bonnie Lass, Philemon Sturges

Grade Level: Kindergarten

Rating: 5

Summary: This book is similar to other “Who Took the Cookies from the Cookie Jar” books.  The skunk is missing his cookies and the whole book explores skunk going around to other characters and trying to find out who took his cookies from the cookie jar.

Opinion:  The cool thing about this book is that although the “Who Took the Cookies from the Cookie Jar” has been made into many books and different stories, these two authors are able to give it a little twist of their own.  I also thought it was cool how the authors incorporated rhyming into the responses of why each animal didn’t take the cookies.  For instance, when skunk thinks that it was mouse, mouse says: “Who, Me? Couldn’t Be! Please don’t tease, I eat cheese.”  These little rhymes make the book fun to read.

Connection:  Just like Bear Feels Scared, I think that this is a good book to use to teach students about rhyming in books.  It does such a good job of using rhyme, and not making it feel like every word has to rhyme with one another.  Another thing that this book does really well is use repetition.  Because much of the book repeats itself over and over again this would be a great book to use with young readers to help them identify words.

Title: The Very Cranky Bear

Author: Nick Bland

Grade Level: Pre-K

Rating: 5

Summary:  This book is about four friends who are looking for a place to play on a very rainy day.  They go into a dry cave and run into a VERY CRANKY BEAR.  All four of the friends try and do something to make the bear not so cranky, but it ends up that the “most plain” of all the friends is the one who helps the most.

Opinion: Following with the rhyming theme that I have stumbled across in these posts, this book does a good job of rhyming through the whole book.  Although the author uses rhyming on every page, it doesn’t seem too overwhelming or like he used too much.  The illustrations in this book are also very interesting to me.  When reading this book, I felt like the pictures were very plain, but that is why I found them to be so cool.  The story itself it also fun to read, the story focuses on the cranky bear, but it also focuses on the hero being the character who seems like the least important.  Throughout the whole story the sheep is said to be plain, but when the other three animals can’t cheer up the bear, it is the sheep that finally comes through.

Connection:  One connection that I immediately thought about was how everyone is important.  As I said, in this book the focus is on every character except for the sheep.  The sheep is seen as the character that just stands on the outside because he doesn’t have anything to give.  But in the end, it is the sheep’s kindness and willingness to help out that puts the bear in a good mood.  This is a very important message to send kids.  Everyone is important, and sometimes kids don’t understand that everyone can bring something to the table.



David Wiesner

Where did David Wiesner originate from?

·         David Wiesner was born on February 5, 1956 in Bridgewater, New Jersey.

·         He attended college at Rhode Island School of Design.

·         In 1983 he married his wife, Kim Kahng, who he also co-authored his book Loathsome Dragon with.

·         Now, the couple lives in Philadelphia with their children.

What kind of work does Wiesner do?

·         Wiesner is an Author/Illustrator who is known around the world for his wordless picture books.  His career started in 1981 by illustrating books for other authors; however, by 1987 he was the Author/Illustrator of his own books.

Has he received any major honors?

·         David Wiesner has won the Caldecott Honor Medal, given out each year by the Association for Library Service to Children to the artist of the most distinguished American picture book for children, three times.  He first won the Caldecott in 1992 for his book Tuesday, in which frogs fly around town on their lily pads!  His next medal came ten years later with his book The Three Pigs.  This book is a play on The Three Little Pigs with a huge twist, where the pigs actually escape from the story!  Finally, his most recent Medal winner came in 2007 with his story Flotsam.  Along with his three Caldecott award winners, Wiesner also had two books land on the Caldecott honor list.

What does Wiesner think?

·         "My books need readers. The beauty of visual storytelling is how interactive my books become. When I create picture books, it isn't just my author's voice telling the story; each reader reads the book in his or her own way. And so there are limitless possibilities within each book—and the stories that emerge belong as much to the reader as they do to me.” (Houghton Miffin)

Famous Books Wiesner has written:

·         Free fall

·         Hurricane

·         June29, 1999

·         The Loathsome Dragon

·         Moo!

·         Sector 7

·         Tuesday

·         The Three Pigs

·         Flotsam

My Opinion:

Through all the reading I did researching David Wiesner I never found any articles or quotes of people who have a problem with any of the work he has done.  Likewise, I never found anything stating any controversies over his work.  Wiesner’s books are cool because they allow you to let your imagination flow with what is happening in the story.  Although his pictures make the story what it is, you are allowed the privilege of making up your own dialogue to accompany the amazing artwork.  My favorite book of Wiesner’s is Tuesday, because it allows you to do just that.  There are very minimal words in the book, the words that are shown basically just tell you the time of night.  Other than what time it is, Wiesner leaves it completely up to you to use your imagination with what is going on in the book.  Many people think that Wiesner’s imagination stems from his childhood.  It says on his publisher’s web page that the last thing he saw when he went to bed at night were images of elephants, rocket ships, and books that filled the wall paper all around him.  Many attribute these things to his imagination that he shows now in adulthood through his illustrations.

Bibliography

ALSC. "Caldecott Medal Home Page." 2010. Association for Library Service to Children. 11 September 2010 <http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/alsc/awardsgrants/bookmedia/caldecottmedal/caldecottmedal.cfm>.

                This website was used to find the exact definition of the Caldecott award.  The material used from this site is trusted to be accurate because it came from the official site of the Association for Library Service to Children.  The Association for Library Service to Children is the foundation that actually awards illustrators the Caldecott medal.

Books, Houghton Miffin. "The Origin of a Wordless Author." 2010. Houghtom Miffin Books. Saturday January 2010 <http://www.houghtonmifflinbooks.com/authors/wiesner/bio/bio.shtml>.

                This website was used a lot during my research because of the accurate information that it contained.  Like the Association for Library Service to Children page, this was the official webpage for the Houghton Miffin publishing company, so it is very reliable information.  I used this site to find the quote from Wiesner himself, as well as find a biography about him.

comminfo.rutgers.edu. "David Wiesner." David Wiesner. 11 September 2010 <http://comminfo.rutgers.edu/professional-development/childlit/wiesner.html>.

                This last site was used to find the list of all the different works that David Wiesner has done.  It seems to be a research website started at Rutgers University and this page in particular was dedicated to Wiesner.  The webpage is cited to other sites where they found their information so I think that material here is probably pretty accurate.  It also matches up with the information that I got from Houghton Miffin.

Link to Publisher’s Website:

http://www.houghtonmifflinbooks.com/authors/wiesner/bio/bio.shtml

Title: Trick or Treat, Smell My Feet

Author: Diane de Groat

Age level: K-3rd Grade

Rating: 4



Summary: This book is about a brother and sister getting their costumes ready for Halloween trick or treating, as well as the mix up that ends up making Gilbert wear a ballerina outfit!?

Opinion: I think that this book was entertaining. I wrote that the age level would be around K-3rd grade because it is a good book to be able to read to younger kids, and I feel like around second or third grade the students should be ok to read this book by themselves. The story is written as one that can easily keep the students attention, especially with the pictures that are drawn. I also think it's cool that the illustrator in this particular book chose to use water colors to make the pictures. The colors that the watercolors bring out make the pictures very attention grabbing.

Connection: This book would obviously be a good book to use during the Halloween time. It centers on an activity that students can relate to, in having a Halloween party at school and going trick or treating with a sibling. It also has hidden points that would be good to point out to the younger students. One of which I picked up on was that "You are you, and I am me," they use something like this a couple times in the book where the older brother says to his sister "I would do that if I were you, but I'm me." This is a good message to students that they don't have to follow what others are doing, and they can be themselves.

Title: Amazing Snakes!

Author: Sarah L. Thomson

Age level: 1-3 grades

Rating: 3



Summary: This book is written with a ton of facts about snakes. It talks about anything you want to know about snakes in general.

Opinion: I think that this book is obviously very informative. It would be a great resource for students who have to do a research project or a presentation about snakes. However, I don't think that it is as captivating as it could be. Snakes are very interesting and fun to learn about, but I feel like the way they are presented in pretty dry. One big positive for me when reading this book was the pictures that they show in the book. When they talk about a certain type of snake they do a good job of showing a real picture of that snake. This is a cool feature because many students may not have known what a rattle snake looked like before reading this book.

Connection: As I mention before, this book could be very useful in a research activity. It's a pretty easy read for students to go through and pick up some facts about snakes. Another really good feature that this book provides that is extremely unique is that they put in parenthesis how to pronounce words that kids may have problems with. An example was "prey," they would put underneath it (say it like this: Pray.) This makes a book that is already kid friendly even easier for students who may have problems sounding tricky words out by themselves. It would be cool to have the whole class read this book and have a group discussion about interesting facts that they learned. You could write out all the different facts that the students learned on the chalk board or big sheet of paper to show all the different facts learned.

Title: There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed Some Leaves

Author: Lucille Colandro

Age Group: Grades K-2

Rating: 5



Summary: This book is much like the old lady who swallowed the fly, it starts with the old lady who swallowed something, and each time she swallows something they go back and repeat everything she has swallowed.

Opinion: I really enjoy the way that children's books in general are written, and this is another one that does a good job with everything. This is another book that I feel the pictures lend so much to the overall presentation of the book that I really think the author could take all the words out of this book and even a child could follow along with what is happening. The Illustrator did such a good job with having the pictures paint a story of their own that half the fun in this book is seeing what is going on in the pictures. I also noticed early on that it is fun to guess what she is eating the certain things for. I immediately thought after the first few that she was making a scarecrow in her stomach, but I was in for a surprise at the end when she sneezed and everything she swallowed came out!

Connection: Along with the trick or treat book, this is a great book to read to the class during the fall. This would be a good book to read with the other "old lady who swallowed a ____" books. It would be fun to let the kids hear the different kind of stories of the old lady swallowing objects and compare what she is swallowing in the different books. I think that the children would be easily entertained by this book, when I read it to students at Solon Elementary they loved being able to guess what the old lady was going to swallow next!

No Arm In Left Field and Punk Farm

Title: No Arm In Left Field

Author: Matt Christopher

Age Group: Grades 3-6

Rating: 5

Summary: This book is about a young African American kid who moves to a new town and is invited to play on the towns little league baseball team. The majority of kids on the team are accepting of Terry, except for Tony who is not accepting of Terry at all. The story centers around Terry's play on the diamond as well as his relationship with Tony throughout the book

Opinion: I thought that this book was great. I remember when I was younger and I had to read a book I would always go for the Matt Christopher written sports books. I think that Christopher does such a good job of presenting an interesting story with hidden messages that can be very important. It think that the age group around grades 3-6 could very easily pick up on the message of acceptance, friendship, and teamwork that Christopher is trying to touch on.

Connection: Like I talked about in my opinion section, I think that this book does a good job of connecting to a few different issues. It brings up the issue of racism, but it also brings up the issue of acceptance for who someone is and not what they look like. This would be a great book to use in an elementary school classroom. I think it would be extremely effective in a small town classroom. Schools that don't have very much diversity may have students who have never seen people who look different from them. In a case like that, this book would be great to show that color doesn't matter.

Title: Punk Farm

Author: Jarrett J. Krosoczka

Age Group: Any

Rating: 5





Summary: This book is a song book about an animal band. The song presented in this book is Old MacDonald.

Opinion: I think that this book is amazing! I had to read and sing this book to a preschool class last year for my music course, and I found that the kids loved it. I think it's cool that the author took a popular children's song in Old MacDonald and gave it his own twist to make an interesting story. It is very captivating for young children, I found it very easy to keep their attention.

Connection: This is obviously a great book for the younger grades. Not only does it do a great job of keeping the attention of young kids, but the way it is written allows for many different ways to present it to the class. When I read this to the preschool class I had them use instruments for all the times that the animals used instruments in the book. This allowed for a lot of movement and action among the children. Because it's a song book they are also encouraged to sing along during the singing parts. This makes a lot of fun for the whole class!

Prehistoric Actual Size

Prehistoric Actual Size


By: Steve Jenkins

I would categorize "Prehistoric Actual Size" as a very informational book. I think that this book would be a good for students who are wanting to learn more about dinosaurs and the prehistoric animals in general. It seemed a little long for students who are not really interested in the prehistoric age to read by themselves. I personally would rate this book a four out of five due to the great information that it has in it as well as the captivating pictures to go along with all the info. It's a great research book to use, with amazing facts about the biggest and oldest dinosaurs and other prehistoric animals of that time.

To connect this book to our class readings is interesting. I think that it's a good book from an informational standpoint, but it's probably not a book that just anybody would enjoy reading. Relating it back to a previous reading, the pictures in the book are very captivating, as I said before, almost telling a story of their own. I believe that if you took the words out of this book, a child might still be able to really enjoy reading it. One observation that I made relating this book back to an elementary school curriculum, is that it would be really good for setting up a unit intended on showing students that not only dinosaurs roamed the world in prehistoric times, but other animals also lived, and in some cases were bigger than any dinosaur known to man!