literacy exploration porject

7/29/2019 Literacy Exploration Porject

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Sylwia Denko

Children's Literature Exploration

ELD 307

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Asch, F. (1994). The Earth and I. Orlando, FL : Hardcourt Brace Company.

The Earth and I is a book about a boy who is "friends" with the Earth. It talks about how

they work together, helping each other. The Earth makes him very happy, but when there is

pollution, the Earth is sad and this makes the boy sad. He works to clean up the Earth because

once again, they are friends and they help each other.

Genre: Fiction

Common Core Standards: K.RFS.1 - Demonstrate understanding of the organization and basic

features of print.

Grade: Pre-school and Kindergarten

Activities: I would read this book on Earth Day. It is important for the children to recognize the

importance of our earth and what it does for us. The day before, I would have the children do an

activity showing us where they live. It would be made from circles glued together. The middle

circle would have their home street name, then their town, their state, the country, and then the

Earth on the outside. When introducing the book, I would ask the children why the Earth is so

important to us. I would ask them to think about the natural elements of our Earth and what we


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use it for. When reading the book, I would have them echo read, me pointing to each word as we

read to show that there are spaces and how words work to write a sentence. After collecting

answers from the students, I would write on the board all the things the Earth does for us. We

would have a discussion about pollution and how and why it makes the Earth "sad". Then, I

would have each child draw a picture of them using the Earth. They could then share their

drawings and we could add their suggestions to the list of how the Earth helps us.


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Bunting, E. (2011). Tweak Tweak . New York, NY: Houghton Mifflin Hardcourt.

Tweak Tweak is about a mom elephant and a baby elephant who go on a walk. The mom

tells her son to hold on her to tail and if he has a question about anything he should tweak

(pull/twist) her tail. He would have questions about all different types of animals and what they

do. Whenever the mom would answer the question he tried to mimic the animal (ex. a monkey

climbing a tree). He realized that he could not do a lot of the things that the other animals could,

but he could do different things. Every animal is unique.

Genre: Fiction

Common Core Standards: RL.2.1 Ask and answer such questions as who, what, where, when,

why and how to demonstrate understanding of key details in a text.

Grade: 2nd

Activities: Before reading the book, I would have a discussion about good questions students

should be asking themselves when they read a book. These questions are "who?, what?, where?,

when?, why?, and how?". These words should start at the beginning of each question and can be

modified for each story. I would then read the story and have the students listen closely. During

the story I will ask a variety of questions. I would give my students a worksheet that had

questions I would give them a worksheet with questions about the story. Then, I would have the

students make up their own "5 W and 1 H" questions to ask the class about a different book we

read.


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Name _______________________________ Date___________________________

Types of Questions


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Who were the two main characters in the story? Who were other

characters?

What did the elephant mother tell her son?

Where did the mom and son go?

When during the day did the story take place?

Why is it important to ask questions?

How are you special and unique?


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Cybele, Y. (2012). A few bites . Toronto, Ontario: Groundwood Books.

Ferdie has trouble feeling motivated to eat his vegetables. Luckily, his sister Voila has a

great imagination that helps convince him to eat. She describes the reasons why he should eat

his broccoli, because dinosaurs had to eat it to survive. She described his carrots as orange

power sticks that help aliens have amazing vision. She described the settings and situations so

well he decided to eat them! Eventually, she gets tired and her imagination does not work too

well. Because his sister had no more inspiration to create another story, he did not finish his

dinner and therefore, could not get dessert. Ferdie goes to play with his toys and uses his

imagination to create his own dessert.

Genre: Fiction

Common Core Standards: RL.K.3 With prompting and support, identify characters, settings, and

major events in a story. RL.K.6 With prompting and support, name the author and illustrator of a

story and define the role of each in telling the story.

Grade: Kindergarten

Activities: Before introducing the story, I would have a poster with a "story map" on the board.

On the poster I would have an outline with blank spaces to write in the author, illustrator, title of

the book, characters, setting, problem, solution, and theme. I would explain why all of these

elements are necessary and how together, they create a great story. I would explain the roles of

both the author and illustrator as well. Then, as we were reading the story together, we would

fill out the story map. I would have a worksheet for the students that was identical to the one I

had on the poster.


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Jay, A. (1997). 1 2 3 A Child's First Counting Book . New York, NY: Dutton Children's Books.

This book is a simple counting book. Each page counts up from the previous one and

there is a picture that depicts the number on the page. For example, it starts out with "1 one little

girl sleeping". It has the symbolic representation of the number, the word, and a picture. Each

page also has a fairy tale on it. The page with the number 3 has "three little pigs" etc.

Genre: Fiction, Fairy Tale

Common Core Standards: L.K.2. Capitalize the first word in a sentence and the pronoun.

Grade: Preschool-Kindergarten

Activities: This book would have to follow a whole unit on fairy tales. I would read the book

once and ask the children if they recognized the pictures from somewhere. It is important to

make connections to the past and I would explain this to them. I would tell them to keep in mind

which letters are capitalized because this is important. There are a lot of proper nouns in the

book that they should pat attention to. While reading, as a class we would point them out

together. Then, I would have them create their own number book. They would start out by

numbering each page with the symbol and then the word. They could then page by page go

through and draw and label the rest of their book. When writing their own book, I would make

sure to discuss when a letter should be captialized and when not so they could do the same in

their book.


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Montgomerie, A. (2013). Non-Metals . New York, NY: Crabtree Publishing Company.

This is a non-fiction book about non-metals. First, it explains what non-metals are and

how they compare to metals. The book goes over information about atomic structure, different

groups on the periodic table, and then it gets into a few of the elements. There is an explanation

of oxygen, sulfur, nitrogen, phosphorus, carbon, hydrogen, oil, fuel, and the noble gases.

Genre: Non-fiction

Common Core Standards: W.3.7 Conduct short research projects that build knowledge about a

topic.

Grade: 3rd

Activities: This would be in conjunction with a science lesson. I would read the book out loud so

every student would have an understanding of non-metals as a whole. After reading about a

single non-metal, I would ask a few volunteers to tell me something new that they have learned

or a piece of information that they thought was most interesting. After finishing the book, I

would have a signup sheet for each of the non-metals in the book. I could pull students' names

out of a hat to choose in what order the children could sign up for a non-metal (or I could

randomly assign students to a non-metal). Once they were assigned they would do research and

made a poster about their topic.


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Numeroff, L. (1981). Beatrice doesn't want to . New York, NY: Scholastic Inc.

Beatrice is a young puppy who is left at home with her older brother. Her older brother is

baby-sitting her but he needs to get a book report done so he takes Beatrice to the library against

her will. She is complaining the entire time because she does not want to be there. After not

knowing what to do, her brother takes her to a class where a librarian reads stories to children.

Beatrice hates it and she cannot wait to leave. After a while however, the libraian catches her

attention. Eventually, Beatrice does not want to leave and this time she is keeping her brother in

the library against his will.

Genre: Fiction

Common Core Standards: SL.K.1a follow agreed-upon rules for discussions. SL.K.1b continue a

conversation through multiple exchanges. W.K.3 Use a combination of drawing, dictating, and

writing to compose informative/explanatory text in which they name what they are writing about

and supply some information about the topic.

Grade: Kindergarten

Activities: *Critical Literacy* Before reading the book, I would have a think-pair-share

discussion and then a whole group discussion about power. "Who do you think in your family or

school has power? Does this ever change?". I would allow the student who just finished

speaking to choose the next speaker. I would encourage the students to keep our classroom rules

in check and make sure everyone was taking turns properly and being polite to the listen. While

reading, I would ask questions to clarify the story. At the end I would ask "Do you think the

ending would have been different if a different "power" was there, for example Beatrice's mother


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instead of brother. How would Beatrice have acted?". After a whole-group discussion, I would

have the students draw a picture and/or write about when they do and do not feel in power.

Peyo. (1983). What do smurfs do all day? . New York, NY: Random House.

Genre: Fiction, Poetry

Common Core Standards: RF.K.2a Recognize and produce rhyming words.

Grade: Kindergarten

Activities: Before reading the book, I would have a discussion about rhyming. I would have

written on the board words in pairs, some that rhymed, some that did not. As a class, we could

go through the works together, reading them out loud. Together, we would circle that pairs of

words that rhymed. Then, the children would read the book on their own. I would like to either

have a copy of the book for each child, or I could put this book on the overhead. I would have

the children read it and circle the words that rhymed together. Afterwards, we could go through

the book and count how many rhyming pairs we found. Then, on the board we would make

rhyming word together. I would write a word on the board and have a volunteer tell me a word

that rhymes with it and then I would have students tell me rhyming pairs without me prompting

them.


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Strickland, M. (1993). Poems that sing to you. Honesdale, PA: Wordstrong Boyds Mills Press,

Inc.

This is a wonderful collection of poems put together in a book. These poems are musical

and have beautiful imagery. The book is separated into three sections: poems that dance, poems

that sound, and poems that make melody.

Genre: Poetry

Common Core Standards: SL.3.5 Create engaging audio recordings of stories or poems that

demonstrate fluid reading at an understandable pace, add visual displays when appropriate to

emphasize or enhance certain facts or details. RL.3.5 Refer to parts of stories, dramas, or poems

when writing or speaking about a text using terms such as chapter, scene, and stanza, describe

how each successive part builds on earlier sections.

Grade: 3rd

Activities: During a unit of poetry, I would love for my students to perform a poem themselves.

At this point, we would have already read each poem in the book. I would ask my students to

keep in mind when they really enjoyed a poem because they may have to do something with it in

the future. I would have the students write down their first, second, and third choice of poems

and I would assign accordingly. No more than two people could do the same poem. They would

have to either perform the poem live, or make a recoding of it. Either way, visual elements for

emphasis would be necessary. Afterwards, they would summarize the poem, telling us their

interpretation, explaining each stanza, and talking about how the stanzas are connected to one

another.


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Tafuri, N. (2008). Blue Goose . New York, NY: Simon & Schuster Books.

Blue Goose is about four farm animals, a yellow baby chick, a blue goose, a red hen, and

a white duck who decide to paint their yard while the farmer goes away. At first, they only use

the color paint of their own color (ex. the yellow chick only uses yellow). Later, they work

together and mix their colors to make more. They also helped each other reach things up high so

it was perfect because by working together they finished just in time for the farmer to come

home.

Genre: Fiction

Common Core Standards: SL.K.2 Confirm understanding of a text read aloud or information

presented orally.

Grade: Kindergarten

Activities: I would read the story to the students and they would have a worksheet in front of

them along with crayons. As the story would go on they would color the same objects with the

same color crayons as the characters. The worksheet would have every element that they

characters colored but not in order. The students would have to pay attention and be able to

comprehend what I was reading. They then would have to make sure that they were using the

right color crayon as well.


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Name____________________ Date_________

Blue Goose


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Wiesner, D. (1991). Tuesday . New York, New York: The Trumpet Club.

Tuesday is a very unique and interesting book. There are 29 pages but only 4 of them

actually have words on it. The words are only the time of day that the picture is occurring. It

starts by showing a picture of a Tuesday around 8 pm. The following three pages of words are

getting us through the night and into the next week. My interpretation is that the book is

supposed to depict what happens in the night when everyone is sleeping. It shows frogs flying on

lily pads, chasing crows, and dogs join in as well. In the morning there are investigators looking

at the lily pads that were left from the night before. Then, at the end a new week is starting and it

says "Next Tuesday, 7:58 PM" with pigs starting to fly.

Genre: Fiction, speculative fiction

Common Core Standards: 2.RL.7 Use information gained from the illustrations and words in a

print or digital text to demonstrate understanding of its characters, setting, or plot.

Grade: 2nd Grade

Activity: I would first go over everything that the students do during the waking hours. I would

give them a worksheet with a list of things that we could go over and they could check off what

they did. Then, we could add to it. The children could write their individual differences onto

their sheet of paper. After that, we would go over everything that they think happens at night

when they are sleeping. I would write this list on the board. Then we would read the book. I

would have each child describe what is happening on the page out loud. I would explain to them

that they are writing their own story here. Having seen this story, their imagination would be

running more now and we would add on to the list of what the children think happens at night.


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They could then write their own story of what is happening outside of their own home when they

are sleeping.


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Name: ____________________________ Date:___________________

What Did You Do Yesterday?

Make my bed

Eat breakfast

Brush my teeth

Come to school

Eat snack

Read a book

Play outside

Watch TV

Feed my pet

Go to a special

Play a sport

Play a game

Do my homework

Talk to a friend

Do chores

Ride my bicycle

Add your own!

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