Pete the Cat: Rocking in My School Shoes by Eric Litwin and art by James Dean is a fun book
about a student excited about their new shoes. The book has colorful and
detailed illustrations to help students understand what is happening. Sometimes
the wording is colored red or blue instead of black.
·
Multiple meanings
for the same word can be approached with pictures, illustrations, and skits to
gain understanding. Pete is rocking in his school shoes partly because he is
singing with his electric guitar. He is also rocking red shoes because they
look good on his paws. Rocking might also mean swaying back and forth in a
chair. Students need to become familiar with homophones, so the teacher may bring
these different meanings up when they are in a text such as comparing tying a
bow to taking a bow. These could need labels and props to build a schema.
·
Words are written
and repeated to make them sound poetic in the story. The way the words are
written on different lines and sentences are broken up helps to keep the rhythm
of the story consistent. Students may need to hear, read, and learn familiar
nursery rhymes and see them written out. The students will catch onto the
patterns in poems.
·
The character’s
attitude about the day is displayed through his actions. He is not worried or
rushed. He is happy about his shoes and his day at school. The book does not
actually say how he feels, but the story demonstrates it. The instructor should
model the character’s emotions as she reads words. The teacher may use pictures
of faces with different expressions on Popsicle sticks for the students to
raise when they believe they know what the character is feeling.
·
The book
illustrates the different rooms and areas a school provides for students to
learn. Some ELL students may come from situations without special classrooms
for music, art, and gym. They may have eat lunch in their classroom or it may have
been dangerous to play outside. This book may open up an understanding for what
is normal in America and prompt a field trip to the different areas of the
school.
Clifford’s First School Day by Norman Bridwell is a book about a girl who
remembers when she first brought her dog to school when it was a puppy. Emily
Elizabeth has to hold hands with a family member to get to school safely. It
has a simple storyline that will help students make connections with their own
experiences with school and laugh over the antics of Clifford.
·
Sometimes stories
are not told in the order things happen. Flashback scenes usually provide the
audience with more information before returning to the original timeline.
Students may need to see a picture timeline of events or people at different
points in their life to show when they were young and it is the past and when
they were older in the present.
·
Safety is
practiced when children hold hands with an adult they trust when they cross the
street. This will be practiced and demonstrated in the first few weeks of
school. Animals should be on leashes, so they are under their owner’s control
and they are kept where they should be.
·
Fictional stories
often tell us about very unlikely events. Teachers may let students bring in pets
for show and tell, but they would insist the pet have a collar and be on a
leash. They would not allow students to have them at school during a planned
cooking day. However, these events in the story help make it funny.
·
Stories are told
from different perspectives. In this book, Emily Elizabeth is telling the
story. When the teacher says something, Emily does not use quotation marks
because she is remembering what was said and the words are not exact. The
teacher may have a student tell a story and record it word for word on the
board in quotes, then have another student tell a story and summarize it on the
board without quotes.
No comments:
Post a Comment