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You have accessed the blog site for Choosing and Using Books for Children. Throughout the term we'll use our blog to record the books we read and the ideas we have for using them when we're teachers. By the end of March, our class will have read at least 280 books. Happy reading!

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2. Add your name in the "label" box before you post each documentation.

One important recommendation:
Create your documentations in a separate Word document, then cut and paste in a blog post.

Basic Documentation

Book Title:

Author(s):

Illustrator/Photographer/Artist:

Publisher:

Copyright Date:

Genre:

Brief Annotation:

Your Rating (1-5) and why:

Readers who will like this book:

Teaching Strategy from Tompkins or Yopp & Yopp (you'll link a strategy to at least 10 of your 40 books) :

Question to ask about this book before a read aloud:

Optional, but noted as extra effort:

1. Interest Level (age):

2. Grade Level Equivalent (grade):
Use book wizard to help with the previous 2 areas


3. List awards

4. Does this book have a book trailer? If so, cut and paste the web address here.

Monday, January 23, 2012

Science Verse

Book Title: Science Verse

Author(s): Jon Scieszka

Illustrator/Photographer/Artist: Lane Smith

Publisher: Viking

Copyright Date: 2004

Genre: Poetry

Brief Annotation: Mr. Newton informed his class that they’d be able to hear the poetry in science if they listened carefully. Unfortunately for the main character he was cursed with the science verse. He heard everything as a science poem! From evolution to the food chain to matter to the solar system, everything he learned about science was in a poem. There are so many topics covered in this book with fun and catchy poems about each of them.

Your Rating (1-5) and why: 3 – Some of the information in the book isn’t correct in the science aspect of it and it may lead to inaccurate knowledge of science. I think it’s a fun book in general and does give basic information about a broad range of topics in science.

Readers who will like this book: Children interested in science and want to learn more. Also, children who may not be interested in science but are looking for a new way to view science as a subject may find this interesting.

Teaching Strategy from Tompkins or Yopp & Yopp: A possible teaching strategy to use with this book would be to make a Word Wall. (Tompkins, pg. 139-141) There are a couple of different ways to approach this with this book. One would be to make a word wall, read the book and add words to the wall based on the alphabet and the first letter in each word. As the science class moves through different units, the class can reference the word call and create definitions for the words they are learning about. Another approach would be to make more of a Unit Wall where the different sections of the wall had a group of words based on the units, or poems from the book. This way the words would be grouped together and the class could go back to that section when the unit was being discussed. I think either one would be a great strategy for this book.

Question to ask about this book before a read aloud: What is your favorite science subject? Can you tell me more about that?

Optional, but noted as extra effort:

1. Interest Level (age): 3 – 5

2. Grade Level Equivalent (grade): 3.8

3. List awards: 2005 Golden Duck Award

4. Does this book have a book trailer? No

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1 comment:

  1. Suzy Kaback & FamilyJanuary 25, 2012 at 3:06 PM

    I'm glad you were able to appreciate the humor in this book, while also recognizing that the science is often not accurate. The fact that this book is cataloged in the fiction section of libraries is further confirmation that you shouldn't have students use ideas from Science Verse in a research project. Was there a CD in the back of the book? There should have been, but if not, let me know and I"ll look around for it. The CD is an audio version of the book narrated by the author.

    Did you know that this same author/illustrator duo wrote The Math Curse (and many other favorites)? I'll bet you did.

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