BASIC DOCUMENTATION
Book Title: Science Verse
Author(s): Jon Scieszka
Illustrator/Photographer/Artist: Lane Smith
Publisher: Penguin Group
Copyright Date: 2004
Genre: Contemporary Realistic Fiction
Brief Annotation:
A boy is told to listen for the ‘poetry of science’ and begins to hear everything in a science poem i.e. water cycle, food chain, etc….
Your Rating (1-5) and why:
2.5 (maybe)
This book was hard for me to rate. I’m not sure if I liked it but it has a few things that were creative. Some of the pictures were confusing to me and I thought a few of the poems were less about science and more ‘filler’ to a page. I liked the concept of the book and there were some poems I enjoyed and would want to use before or during a unit of study.
Readers who will like this book:
Readers that like gross things; readers that like science concepts; readers that enjoy rhyming poems
Teaching Strategy from Tompkins:
#48 Word Sorts (p. 136-138)
Word sorts are ways to examine words and/or categorize them according to their meaning, spelling, graphophonemic clues, similarities or other pattern.
I like this idea in that students can identify the words by spellings or categorize them by context i.e. have water cycle, food chain and the scientific method as headings then place words for their categories under the correct heading (observation, preditor, evaporation, etc…)
This would be a great way to review previous material or introduce a new subject and identify previous or existing knowledge.
Question to ask about this book before a read aloud:
Ask students to brainstorms science subjects or topics and list or create a graphic organizer as they call them out.
Optional, but noted as extra effort:
1. Interest Level (age): 8-10
2. Grade Level Equivalent (grade): 3.8
3. List awards
Parent’s Choice Award Gold 2004 Non-Fiction
ALA Notable Children’s Book Award 2005
There are several notable features of your documentation for this book. First, you didn't really like it, but you rose above your personal reaction to find the instructional value. Recognizing that the poems could be use to introduce or reinforce a concept in science is smart, although as you pointed out, a teacher and her students would want to double check the accuracy of some facts given the whimsical presentation. Do you know how to tell if a book is nonfiction? Remind me and I"ll show you in class.
ReplyDeleteSecond, your strategy choice is an excellent match for the content of this book. Sorting using concepts is very applicable to content area study. Remember when we sorted words from Edward and the Pirates--in that case, I had some categories in mind, but I let you play around first to see how you would group the words. This is called an "open sort" (let students discover); the opposite is a "closed sort" where teachers give the category headings. It's worth thinking about, as a teacher, how you want to sequence your sorting activity.