Book Title: Henry Aaron’s Dream
Author(s): Matt Tavares
Illustrator/Photographer/Artist: Matt Tavares
Publisher: Candlewick Press
Copyright Date: 2010
Genre: Biography picturebook
Brief Annotation: In this account of Hank Aaron’s life and baseball career, we learn about his beginnings as a skinny kid from Alabama who held his bat the wrong way to becoming one of the best all-around players ever. Aaron struggled to enter a sport dominated by white players and surrounded with racism, but as a child, he watched Jackie Robinson and looked to him for inspiration when he faced intense challenges while trying to achieve his dream. Years later, in an exhibition game in his hometown right after he had been hired by the big leagues, Aaron gets his first of many hits while playing against his hero, Jackie Robinson, and the Dodgers.
Your Rating (1-5) and why: 5—Matt Tavares captures the story of Hank Aaron with excellent description and detail and beautiful representational art. Readers learn about the pre-civil rights era and the many injustices Aaron and other black players faced and how their courage and perseverance greatly impacted both baseball and America. You definitely don’t have to be a baseball or a sports fan to enjoy this inspiring book.
Readers who will like this book: Children who like history and/or nonfiction; readers who like sports stories, particularly those about baseball; teachers or adults wanting to integrate an interesting picturebook into a unit on civil rights
Teaching Strategy from Tompkins or Yopp & Yopp: K-W-L. This book lends itself well to a K-W-L chart because it contains a lot of factual information. Using this strategy and brainstorming ideas for the chart “allows students to benefit from their collective background experiences and knowledge, sparks their memories of their own experiences and understandings, and prepares them for the literature” (Yopp & Yopp, p. 36). In addition, this activity alerts the teacher to the students’ understanding of a subject and can influence instructional decisions, such as how much time is devoted to a subject or background information the children should know in order to fully comprehend the text. I would probably add a fourth column, as suggested in Yopp & Yopp, that would be for items under the “want to know” portion but that weren’t covered in the book to give the students an opportunity to further research questions that interest them.
Question to ask about this book before a read aloud: Who was Henry “Hank” Aaron? (after they answer…) He is known as an amazing baseball player and a stellar hitter, but why else is Hank Aaron significant to American history?
Optional, but noted as extra effort:
1. Interest Level: K—grade 2
2. Grade Level Equivalent (grade): 5.4
3. List awards: 2011 NCTE Orbis Pictus Award for Outstanding Nonfiction for Children--Recommended book, Smithsonian's 2010 Notable Books for Children
You did a lovely job of summarizing and enxtending in response to this book. I think it's a great example of a book whose text and illustrations complement each other so that the whole is greater than the parts. I know all author/illustrators strive for this outcome, but not all achieve it. Tavares does (in my opinion!).
ReplyDeleteUsing a KWL chart (or any response format that focuses on getting kids to activate/build background knowledge before reading, and then to track learning during reading), is a good match for nonfiction books.
Can you imagine pairing this book with a Matt Christopher story--for those sports lovers in your class?