Guiding Question: How can one poem be interpreted differently by various people?
We examined the nursery rhyme "Old Mother Hubbard" in three different books. We noticed a wide variety of styles in the illustrations - some serious, some funny, some cartoony. We noticed that some authors retold the poem exactly and some used "poetic license" and changed or left out some parts. Once we had examined each one (and practically learned the poem by heart!) we voted on which version we liked the best.
Grades 1, 2, 3
Guiding Question: How does Caldecott winner David Wiesner create a picture book? Which of Wiesner's books won a Caldecott award?
Tuesday - Caldecott winner
The Three Pigs - Caldecot winner
Sector 7 - Caldecott Honor
Free Fall - Caldecott Honor
Tuesday, by David Wiesner
Frogs rise up out of their ponds on a random Tuesday night, fly through the air of their lilly pads, and have all kinds of adventures in the neighborhood. Wiesner's signature watercolors put the reader right in the action: we get a frog's eye view of the experience. This is a great example of dramatic irony as well, since we know what happened that night, but the policeman doesn't!
After "reading" this wordless book, we viewed Wiesner's website, which showed the process he used for creating this book.
Grades 4, 5
Guiding Question: How can we find books in the non-fiction section by browsing?
Working in pairs, students competed to see how quickly they could locate the right Dewey section in our library to answer a particular information need. Using a Dewey "cheat sheet" they found the Dewey number that best matched their question and found that section's number in our library.
This Dewey "cheat sheet" is posted on the end of the Dewey section for easy reference any time.
