Schema: Ghosts, New Orleans, beignets

 The story is set in New Orleans and is about a family who opens a restaurant that is haunted.  Fred, the ghost is a little timid and all of his attempts to scare people off only make the place more interesting to them.  The main character, Marie, a child of the new owner, figures out a way to make him stay and be happy. They make a messy room for him where he feels at home, and they make a dessert, Powdered Ghosts Puffs, in his honor. The illustrations support the text and will be enjoyed by children especially on Halloween.

Cause and Effect: Because Fred couldn’t have a messy place to stay, the effect was that he was planning to leave.

Because Fred made the food fly around, the effect was that the people in the restaurant liked the atmosphere even more.

Drawing Conclusions: How did Marie draw the conclusion that Fred would stay if they made him his own space?

Author’s Purpose: to share about the Rockefeller Christmas tree and Habitat for Humanity.

Cause and Effect: Because the father in the story gave from his heart to the men at the construction site, the effect is that the men wanted to help his family with their home.

Because the young boy was helped as a child with getting a home built, the effect is that he is willing to let his tree be used to help Habitat for Humanity to build a home with the wood from it.

Set in 1931, the out of work father of a family living in a shack has the idea of cutting some Christmas trees to sell in New York City. He and his son drive in one day and ask some construction workers who are building Rockefeller Center if he could park there and sell his trees. At the end of the day, the father leaves with money in his pocket and gives the extra trees to the construction workers that he visited with during the day who put the tree up there at the building site and decorate it with what they had. The next day, the construction workers surprise the family at their shack with extra wood and scrap wood to help them fix up their shack. They men end up building them a new home. The young boy in the story is given a claw hammer by one of the men to extract nails from boards they want to use on the windows. Years pass by, the young boy grows up, returns to live in the little house, and a man comes by from Rockefeller Center to buy a tree on his property that grew from a pine cone he had planted the day after his visit to the city to sell the trees. The tree meant a lot to him, but when he heard that the wood would be donated to the Habitat for Humanity to help build a house for a family in need, he knew it was time to give the tree to the Center. The story also includes historical information about how the men at the site in real life put a tree up in 1931 as a tribute to thank the Rockefeller’s for hiring them to work there. Since then, each year a tree was placed there for all to enjoy. An afterward about Habitat for Humanity is also included.

Text-to-Self Connections: Each Saint holiday from December 6th through January 6th is included. 

Text-to-Text Connections: Strega Nona’s Christmas

Big Anthony is once again the star of the show as he gobbles up the goats special turnips. 

Author’s Purpose: to share the culture of Italy and the special Saint’s days.

Drawing Conclusions: What do you conclude is the reason that Big Anthony gave his special meal to the goat?

The story is set in Calabria at Christmas time. The community celebrates the Feast of Sn Nicola, Feast of Santa Lucia, and several other special days. The food and customs of each day are detailed with the characters actions. The Eve of Epifania was extra special because they believed that animals may be able to speak that night. They wanted to feed them well. Big Anthony ate the goat’s special food so the goat eats Big Anthony’s blanket. Strega Nona gives a special blessing to the people of a dream of food which Big Anthony can not enjoy because he is cold and not sleeping well. On The Feast of Epifania Big Anthony finds the bean in the King’s Cake and gets to be king. Strega Nona will make him anything he desires. He requests the turnips that were for the goat that he had eaten so he can give them to the goat. Children whose culture celebrates the saint days will especially enjoy the story.

Text-to-text connections: What memories of weather do you have? Scary storms, fun days at the sunny beach, or cozy days inside?

Point of View: What a great book to illustrate point of view as each animal says what the weather would be if they were in charge of it. Discuss why each creature would choose the type of weather it chose.

Synthesis: What type of weather would you choose if you could only choose one and why?

Text-to-text: Chicken Little

Drawing Conclusions: What text evidence is given that leads the chickens to the conclusions they draw?

his size: they conclude he’s an elephant

a squirrel: he eats nuts

an umbrella: his wings shelter them from the rain

the world is a refrigerator: it’s cold north wind

a sweater: they are warm under his wing

a hippopotamus: his size

Text-to-Self Connections: Discussions about bullies and how to deal with them, telling someone

Cause and Effect: Because Brenda made fun of Jessica, the effect is that Jessica felt bad inside.

Synthesis: Do you synthesize that Brenda felt good or bad inside when she bullied Jessica? How could you deal with a bully?

Author’s Purpose: The author tells a fictional story with the purpose of teaching students a way to deal with a bully.

Text-to-Self Connections: getting new shoes messed up

Cause and Effect: Because Delly needed the shoes, the effect is that her dad found a way to buy them.

Because the girls scuffed her shoes, the effect is Delly found a way to paint them to be beautiful.

Because Delly’s shoes were the most beautiful and matched her box, the effect was that the bid kept going up on her box.

Drawing Conclusions: What conclusion to you come to about the kind of family that is Delly’s family?

Point of View: Delly tells the story from her point of view.

Delly, the oldest of five, does not have any shoes that are fit to wear so she goes to school barefoot. One of the more wealthy girls makes fun of her for not having shoes. The teacher assigns a project of decorating a shoe box with a box supper inside and auctioning it off to raise money for art supplies at the school’s fall festival.  After her father buys her some shoes, and the girls at school purposefully scuff them up, Delly makes them beautiful again by decorating them with paint her mother has made from the natural resources in nature. The story ends with pumpkin carving and a happy barefoot walk home to feel the sand squish in their toes for the last time until the next spring.  

Schema: honey bees

Text-to-Self Connection: standing still when a bee is near, being afraid of bees

Point of View:  Rhyming text tells two tales from a bee’s point of view and a girl’s point of view as the two go to gather pollen and berries.  Both are afraid of each other, but their mothers tell them to leave one another alone and all will be well.  The blueberry patch in the park, the walk to the park and home, and the little girl with her mother will capture the attention of young readers and especially those who fear bees. After you read the book, read it again going from the page where the illustrations show the differing points of view on the same incident to show students how the author’s purpose is to illustrate point of view and perspective.

Text-to-Text Connections: obeying parents

Text-to-Text Connection: Harold and the Purple Crayon

Large font and colorful, but simple drawings make this a super read aloud. The plot sequence lends itself to teaching predicting. A young boy is about to draw when his mother says that no one draws on this particular day, Doodleday. He disobeys and begins to draw a fly which flies off of the page and is huge! He then draws a spider to eat the fly, then a bird to eat the spider. The text-to-text connection with There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly will be noticed.  Young listeners will love the story and art.

Cause and Effect: Because he draws a fly, the effect is that he must draw a spider to eat the fly…

Because he disobeys his mother, the effect is the disasters that occur.

Predicting: What will he draw next? Do you think he will draw on Doodleday next year?

Schema: honey bees, making butter by shaking a jar, flour

Text-to-self Connections: baking with an adult, knowing the cow as the animal from which humans drink their milk

This is a very sweet picture book about a mama mouse and her baby girl as they go on an adventure to find the ingredients to find something “sweet and new to nibble” and made with “a little bit of love” which turns out to be a huckleberry pie. Baby mouse does not know what Mama is gathering the ingredients to make so as each ingredient is found, students could try to predict what it will be. After reading, students could practice sequencing the places that Mama went to in order to find what she needed. The illustrations support the text and are excellent.

Drawing Conclusions: What do you conclude that the ingredients will be used for?

Sequencing: What order did the mother mouse get her supplies? First: honey, second: flour, third: berries; fourth: milk

Text-to-Text Connections: books where a mother and a child do something together