That's the Cutest Ugly Animal Ever!

In real life hyenas are U-G-L-Y, and they certainly ain't got no alibi. Remember the hyena in Life of Pi? Monster! Or the ones in The Lion King? Bad minions! So, when we first picked up this book, we really didn't know the animal on the cover was a hyena. And then we read the book and it all makes sense: beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and do unto others as you would have them do unto you. So, since we don't want hyenas making fun of our appearances, we won't make fun of them. We're all God's creatures here. (But seriously, look at these guys!)




The baby is kind of cute, though.
And the baby is the inspiration for our story today: Pinduli, by Janell Cannon, author of Stellaluna. In the story Pinduli doesn't have a problem with herself until she runs into some other animals who tease her about her appearance.

At the beginning of the story, Pinduli (isn't she adorable?) and Mama Hyena are having a hard time finding food. They are separated in their hunt, and Pinduli comes across different animals. She meets a pack of wild dogs, a lion, and a zebra, and each make fun of her appearance: her ears, her stripes, and her tail. She becomes very self-conscious, so she tucks her ears and tail in and rolls in the dirt until her striped coat is a pallid gray. As she shame-facedly makes her way home to Mama Hyena, she runs into the animals that made fun of her. The animals think that she is a ghost that has come to punish them, so Pinduli toys with them. All of the creatures confess that they teased the young hyena because another animal had made fun of them. Pinduli understands their motives and advises them to "find your tormentors and make peace," She also tells them they should always leave a bit of every meal as an offering to the ghost. By the end of the story, the animals are reconciled and with all the food offerings left for the "ghost," Pinduli and her mother no longer have to scrounge for food.

Aside from the character building that could come from this story, there are many opportunities to teach students how to visualize, or how to see the story in their minds using their own imagination. This is an important reading strategy that greatly improves reading comprehension. Imagine the lovely pictures students could form in their minds with text like this from Pinduli: "The sun was low in the East African sky. The animals had been sleeping all through the hot afternoon, and now they begin to stir." There are many pre-reading and post-reading tasks to practice visualization:

• Take notes to draw their own pictures of what they think the scenes looked like after the read-aloud (would also teach to pay attention to details in the text). See example worksheet below.
• Have discussions with a partner or as a class of what Pinduli looked like when her feelings and appearances were changed
• Draw a sequence of events through their visualizations. See example below.
• Discuss what the landscape of Africa looks like where Pinduli hunts
• Write a narrative with a picture of something they visualized explaining why they visualized this, what details in the text made them visualize what they did, and what does their visualization tell them about the characters, themes, or main ideas
• Copying a passage of a story onto big paper and explicitly showing children what words trigger visualization is a wonderful idea we found on Pinterest (of course!), example below.

 

This story may need some background information because of some vocabulary that students may not be familiar with or animals they may never have seen before. In order to visualize to the greatest extent, students should know what words and animals are in the story. Of course, there are many other ideas for teaching and developing visualization skills, but these were some of our favorites. Again, if you enjoy the story of Stellaluna, you will no doubt enjoy what Pinduli has to offer. Just remember: real striped hyenas are not as cute as Pinduli. She is the cutest ugly animal you'll ever see.

Alternative Points of View & Making Inferences

Hello, readers! This week we're talking about a reading strategy called making inferences. It's where students learn to assume, or infer, things from the text that may not be explicitly written. This happens a lot when an event happens in a story and the characters who have been affected act in a certain way, like if a child slams the door shut after a fight with his or her siblings. In that instance, we can infer that the child is angry. In class this past week, we watched a read-aloud of a wonderful book called Knots on a Counting Rope; it was only close to the end of the book that we realized the child narrating part of the story was blind! He described how he saw darkness and he asked what blue was, so that's when many of us in class finally connected the dots.

There are actually a lot of books out there that are wonderful for teaching students how to make inferences.

One that we found and were really enchanted by was Encounter, by Jane Yolen. Not only are the illustrations beautiful and, again, just enchanting, the author uses wonderful, mysterious descriptions. The book is about when Christopher Columbus and his entourage landed in San Salvador in 1492. Far from the positive rhyme "In fourteen hundred ninety-two Columbus sailed the ocean blue," this story actually isn't about Columbus and it ends on a melancholy note. The story is about the natives on San Salvador and it is told by a young boy. The boy has a dream warning him that something bad is about to happen, and he tries to warn the rest of the villagers when he sees the signs that his nightmare is coming true. They ignore him because he is a child, but he continues to try to save his people. As we know from history, in the end the natives are forced to adopt European ways, including customs, clothes, religion, and more and the explorers take all the gold they can carry.

That sounds like a sad, lame book for a classroom read-aloud, right? Wrong!

Look at these descriptions of the explorers and their belongings from the point of view of the boy. Remember, he has never seen these people or the objects they brought with them. See if you can guess what the boy is describing - some are objects and some are thoughts.
1. "The hand [of the man] felt like flesh and blood, but the skin was moon to my sun."
2. "...I watched how the sky strangers touched our golden nose rings and our golden armbands but not the flesh of our faces or arms. I watched their chief smile. It was the serpent's smile - no lips and all teeth."
3. "They (the natives) desired all that the strangers had brought: the sharp silver spear; round pools to hold in the hand that gave a man back his face; darts that sprang from sticks with a sound like thunder that could kill a parrot many paces away."

So what do you think?

1. The boy is describing his dark skin compared to the stranger's white skin.
2. The boy realizes the strangers want gold and not to be friends with the natives. The serpent's smile is cunning, tricking, and dangerous.
3. The boy describes a sword, a mirror, and a gun.


Of course, many of the illustrations in the book help show what the boy is talking about. As a lesson in making inferences, though, during a read aloud a teacher could wait to show the illustrations until she was done reading the text on each page. The teacher would get the students to think about the descriptions and make inferences about what they mean. In this story, there are different emotions the boy implicitly expresses that would provide for beneficial discussions. We found this idea on Pinterest and loved it: having students write a narrative with descriptions of objects like the boy did in the story and then displaying them. It would also be fun to allow students to read each other's narratives, or to have a show and tell time where students could read their narratives to the class.

What we enjoy about this book is that, like Knots on a Counting Rope, it's a serious book. It would be great for Columbus Day of course, but also for standards teaching about the New World and exploration in world history. It's important to try to understand other people's point of view, and since we learn in American history that Columbus was a neat explorer who helped discover our country, we tend to think highly and positively of him. In this story as we read the boy's point of view, we see the greedy motive and lust for power in the explorers - far from the good image of them that we grew up with.  
There is a video on YouTube about Encounter; it is a trailer of the book and could be used as a preview or a review, depending on the lesson. It also points out the importance of seeing stories and history from various points of view and not only our own. 
https://www.youtube.com/watch/?v=01SKUjCCVGU

Prepare to Fall in Love

If you aren't already in love with Kevin Henkes, that is. The majority of teachers are probably in love with him.

Well maybe not in love with him, but certainly with his books!

He is the wonderful author of many beloved stories (especially stories with mice as characters...) such as Chrysanthemum, Julius, Lilly, Kitten's First Full Moon, Jessica (one of Jessica's personal favorites!), and this story, Sheila Rae, the Brave. Aside from the perfectly pleasant illustrations, the stories themselves are simply splendid. For now, we will focus on Sheila Rae, the Brave and how it could be used to teach the reading strategy called "making connections". This strategy, as you may have guessed, is where the student relates various aspects of a story to himself; the characters, plot, conflict, or even setting are some examples of things that students could relate to. A popular way to help students organize their thoughts with this strategy is using "When I heard/read the part about...." followed by "It reminded me of....". This formula can either be written on a chart during a lesson where the teacher can write students' answers or on a worksheet like this one at Teacherspayteachers.com (we love this website and have met so many teachers that use its awesome-sauce resources).

This book that we recommend, Sheila Rae, the Brave, is so good for teaching this reading strategy because it oozes with relatability. Everyone has been scared and brave, and judgmental and kind in their lives, even children. In the story, Sheila Rae isn't scared of anything - not even the principle when he walks by, or stepping on the cracks of the sidewalk, or walking backwards - but her little sister Louise is scared of everything. She thinks she isn't as brave as her sister, especially after Sheila Rae tells her straight up that she is a scaredy cat. Sheila Rae exudes pride in her bravery, but takes it a little too far when she decides to walk home a different way. She ends up getting herself lost and she becomes scared, crying because she fears she will never see her family again. But fortunately Louise has been secretly following Sheila Rae and she knows the way home. Her sister's weakness gives her courage and strength, and she gets them safely home. She is brave along the way home, also stepping on cracks and walking backwards. When they arrive home, Sheila Rae is appreciative and tells Louise that she is, indeed, very brave.

It's so cute, right? You can listen to it yourself here.

 So when teaching "making connections" through this book, students can pick out events (or other parts) in the story and tell their connection to it. For example, one student may say "When I heard the part about bravely eating yucky food, it reminded me of when my family was at someone's house and I was afraid to eat the vegetables, but my mom made me." Surely many students will relate to the part where Sheila Rae realizes she is lost. Most people were lost sometime in their childhood and it is terrifying! It would be beneficial to acknowledge the admirable characteristics of the sisters: they don't fight very much, they are forgiving, and they care about each other, as relatives should.
You could also relate this story to different subjects: Sheila Rae isn't afraid of thunder or lightening, so that could relate to something like what makes thunder so loud and lightening so bright, or even safety procedures during a storm and connections that students have with bad weather; for history, Sheila Rae's bravery could be related to historical figures like Abraham Lincoln or Rosa Parks. Obviously there are many directions a teacher could go with this story, so since it is so versatile read it for yourself, recommend it to your friends, and join the Kevin Henkes fan club! (That may not actually exist, but you could be the ambitious one to start it!).

Improve it, please.

In so many cases, including ours, learning about the U.S. government system and elections and politics and campaigns (and yada yada ya) was one of the most boring times in school (besides reading Machiavelli's The Prince...). Not only are all of those topics dry, they are also intricate and confusing. This post is a plea to all teachers and future teachers: improve it, please. Add some spice to these bland topics! Help the children really learn about the government.
Because teaching children about government is very important. It shows them their roles and responsibilities as citizens. Don't we wish that all U.S. citizens took their rights with more gratitude? Well, voting is a great right that we have and what better way to encourage today's children to appreciate the government, its complexity, and citizens' role within it than with books? Literature is a wonderful, effective way to teach about the government since, again, the topic can be difficult and confusing. The book America Votes: How Our President is Elected, by Linda Granfield, covers a wide variety of topics relating to politics, many of which meet the Common Core standards. 
Throughout the book are important lessons for students to learn, such as elections are not actually boring, and voting makes each of us a powerful part of our community. There are also lots of facts - and we mean a lot! Take a look at this comprehensive summary we made for you (who needs Amazon for information on books when you have us?):

- The history of voting

- Voting (what it is and how it works)

- Congress (who is in it and what it does)

- Roles of the President

- Primary Action

- Campaigns 

- Election day

- Political Parties

- Symbols related to voting and campaigning

Also, like we promised, the topics included in the book meet some different Common Core standards. Of course, it depends on what grade you're teaching. Here are a couple examples, one from 5th grade and one from 2nd:

SS5H2 The student will analyze the effects of Reconstruction on American life.

a. Describe the purpose of the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments.

SS2CG2 The student will identify the roles of the following elected officials: 

a. President (leader of our nation) 

b. Governor (leader of our state) 

c. Mayor (leader of a city) 

So it depends on what you're focusing on when you teach and use this book. The first standard we listed is part of Historical Understandings, so maybe you could do a little curriculum integrating (Mrs. Dickens would be so proud!) and mix history and English. The second standard listed is part of Government. There are so many fun activities you could do as a post-read aloud activity. 

Of course, there's always the classroom elections idea, which is a wonderful, interactive way for students to be involved in learning (always a good idea). And look at that kid in the picture. He is very serious about his vote! He looks like a responsible school citizen, doing his civic duty. Don't you want all of your students to take voting that seriously when they're adults? Another fun activity would be to create or use real people running for an office and "campaign" for them. The class could be divided up and create posters, fliers, or even commercials. One last idea: drawing out some political cartoons to relay information about parties. This could be fun during a real election year or after doing a little research on previous runners in an election. 

Don't you wish you could have done cool activities like that to learn more about the government and it's details? We would probably remember a little more than the "I'm Just a Bill" song from Schoolhouse Rock (no offense to S.R. - we learned so much from you're awesome songs!). There are many options available. So again, this plea goes out to all you teachers, present and future: improve it, please. 

You're going to wish you wrote this book.

No, really. Our outline for this blog post ended up being 5 pages long because this book is just so awesome. It is entertaining, great for many grade ranges, and hits multiple different standards (even that dreaded "s" word is no match for the mighty power of this book!). Makes you wanna read it, doesn't it? Well it makes us want to share it with you, other future teachers in this labyrinth of standards and codes and regulations and checklists. Where's the fun? Where is the cheat sheet to teaching? This book is just one little trick. From space, to matter, to energy flow in an ecosystem, this little treasure is one you won't want to be without.

Science Verse, by Jon Scieszka, starts off on a dull Wednesday in science class. The excitement begins when the science teacher zaps the student (or reader) with a curse of science verse, saying “ You know, if you listen closely enough, you can hear the poetry of science in everything.” Then begin the 18 poems about different topics in science. We both agreed that these poems could be used from elementary school to high school because they are just too cool - especially compared to a science textbook (eww). Check out this example about the scientific method:

Scientific Method At The Bat

The outlook wasn’t brilliant for my experiment that day;

The only way to graduate was to come up with an A.

So when my lab exploded and turned to blackish gunk,

My chance of passing anything went Titanic—you know, sunk.

I sat and sadly watched the clock, cursed to be alive.

It would take a miracle—no, make that two---get me to grade five.

Then I had a brainstorm, an idea so terrific:

I just had to use those words from the METHOD SCIENTIFIC.

I grab my pen and get to work. You should see my look.

I slowly write Hypothesis. . . Observation . . . in my book.

And now the class bell rings. And now I lose or win.

With one mighty PLOP, I hand my lab book in.

Oh somewhere in some science class, hypotheses are made.

Experiments are conducted. Kids move up a grade.

Somewhere conclusions are concluded, without a bit of doubt.

But there is no joy in this lab--- my results got me flunked out.

So much more fun that a boring definition, right? And this even hits science standards in multiple different grades! 

S3CS5. Students will communicate scientific ideas and activities clearly.

a. Write instructions that others can follow in carrying out a scientific procedure.

b. Make sketches to aid in explaining scientific procedures or ideas.

S2CS6. Students will be familiar with the character of scientific knowledge and how it is achieved. 

a. When a science investigate is done the way it was done before, we expect to get a similar result.

b. Science involves collecting data and testing hypotheses. 

This book and the poems within would be an easy, fun way to introduce a science lesson. We had trouble finding a read-aloud for you, so instead here is a link for you to buy the book because, again, it is so awesome that you want to get it for your own future classroom (or personal enjoyment). 

http://www.amazon.com/Science-Golden-Awards-Picture-Awards/dp/0670910570

See that hyperlink? This book even won an award!

Did you follow the link yet? Notice something about the book? That's right; it's the same author and illustrator as the Math Curse, another fun book about math. We recommend both of them!

Yearning for Fall

Pumpkins, scarecrows, Halloween, and...Multiplication?
How does that even fit in? The book "2 x 2 = Boo!: A Set of Spooky Multiplication Stories" by Loreen Leery is a fun, creepy book about multiplication. Think a book about multiplication sounds a little boring? Wrong. Students and teachers alike will love the mini-stories within the book, each teaching about different multiplication factors. Like the black cat here, it helps students enjoy multiplication, boosts their confidence, and gives them ways to remember multiplication facts through entertaining stories. 

For example, there is one story with witches who cast magic spells using the factor 0 and making people or things disappear altogether. When three angry snakes were chasing the witch, she yells "3x0=0!" and the three snakes disappear. Another story is about a skeleton chef who has to use a recipe for one serving and multiply each ingredient by five to have enough food for all the guests coming to dinner. The recipe calls for 4 smelly toes, so he says "4x5=20. Twenty toes." There is a chapter for factors 0 through 5 with silly, spooky stories such as these ones.

What we love about this book is that there are so many fun ways to use this book in the classroom. We found multiple lessons already created by teachers (linked below). Using the standard MCC.3.OA.1 (interpret products of whole numbers, e.g. interpret 5 x 7 as a whole number of objects in 5 groups of 7 objects each), this book teaches six different multiplication factors and their properties, or in laymen's terms, it allows us to kill six birds with one stone! It would be perfect to introduce the factors 0 through 5, or to use as a review of those factors. Of course, the book could be used as a Halloween-themed read aloud during a math lesson. 

We came up with a couple different activities to do in conjunction with this book. Since the format of the book is comic strip style, students could mimic the comic strip style making their own multiplication stories (maybe with one of the factors 6 through 12). Another useful activity would be creating recipe cards to give to small groups of 5 or 6; the groups have the "ingredients" and have to multiply the recipe by the number of students in their group for the final product (see what we did there? ;) ). The ingredients would be yucky things like witch nails (candy corn), skeleton bones (pretzels), ghost poop (marshmallows), or cat whiskers (licorice). Students would get a kick out of these activities!

Here are links to previously-created activities using this book:
http://www.loreenleedy.com/books/2x2boo.html
http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/FREE-Book-Activity-for-2-X-2-BOO-A-Set-of-Spooky-Multiplication-Stories-902465

Also, the author has an awesome Pinterest board with tons of great resources! We highly recommend you check it out! You will fall in love (like we did) and you will probably start following all of her boards (also like we did!).
 http://www.pinterest.com/loreenleedy/

Oh, Amelia...

Don't be so literal!

We all remember them: the books about a unique woman who defines "silly". Who hasn't rolled their eyes or laughed out loud at the absurdity of the infamous Amelia Bedelia? Well, we went back and read one of the humorous books and it was just as silly reading it as an adult. In fact, it even reminded us of a character on a popular t.v. show, New Girl. Zooey Deschanel plays Jess, an offbeat young woman who is, as portrayed in the meme below, a lot like Amelia Bedelia...

 

In comparison, here is a passage from the book we read, Good Driving, Amelia Bedelia:

“What a beautiful farm,” said Mr. Rodgers.

“Yes,” said Amelia Bedelia.

“And what a nice bunch of cows.”

“Herd of cows,” said Mr. Rodgers.

“Heard of cows?” asked Amelia Bedelia.

“Of course I have heard of cows.”

“No,” said Mr. Rogers. “I mean a cow herd.”

“So what if a cow heard?” said Amelia Bedelia.

“I didn't say anything bad.”

Ah yes, we just love Amelia. In this particular story, Mr. Rogers offers to ride with Amelia Bedelia to visit her cousin's house because Amelia hasn't driven a car in a long time and may be out of practice. Little does he know, he's in for the ride of his life (see what we did there?). Their conversation, Mr. Rogers directions, and Amelia's understanding of things get them into some trouble, but they eventually make it to her cousin's house. 

This piece of contemporary realistic fiction would be a useful book to introduce a lesson on directions or maps, like for social studies. It would be especially helpful to introduce or use for examples a lesson about homonyms, like in our excerpt of "herd" and "heard." Of course, there is the lesson about friendship, kindness, and community in the story, like when a tow truck worker sees Amelia on the side of the road with a flat tire and stops to help her (Mr. Rogers left her to go find help). The book is considered contemporary realistic fiction because the plot has a distinct order: build up to conflict, climax of conflict, and resolution. It has characters that have been developed through other books in the series, like Amelia, Mr. and Mrs. Rogers, and even her cousin. The story has a distinct setting, namely a country road to her cousin's house. Last, but not least, there is a protagonist and an antagonist; interestingly, they are one in the same in this story, Ms. Amelia herself.

If you'd like a little taste of the fun and silliness of Amelia Bedelia, you can follow this link to part of the book we read: http://browseinside.harpercollinschildrens.com/index.aspx?isbn13=9780688133580 .