Feasts

Thanksgiving and other holidays approach, but instead of examining stories about Thanksgiving, I looked for books about feasts and feasting. From the very short "The Beastly Feast" and "Mouse Mess" to the more involved "Stone Soup", let's turn our attention to FOOD! Another fine book that almost ends in a feast is "Heckedy Peg" described in an earlier post.

The Beastly Feast
By Bruce Goldstein

Illustrated by Blair Lent

"The beasts are having a feast!" begins a romping rhyme that describes a menu made up of each animal's contribution to the pot luck. Bears bring pears and parrots bring carrots, fleas bring peas and flies bring pies until everyone is full. At the end of this little story, the beasts all clap, then take a nap. For very young children, this book will be a fun read-aloud, and older children can use it to inspire writing their own rhyming pairs. What food (or other word) might rhyme with your name?

Stone Soup
By Heather Forest

There are several versions of the classic story "Stone Soup". This one stays close to the original tale, but has captivating illustrations and a simpler story. Two travelers stop in a mountain village hoping for a meal, but when the villagers refuse, the travelers tell them they can make soup out of  a stone. The villagers are fascinated, and are soon sucked in to help, first with a pot of water and a fire, then by bringing a few carrots, some onions, potatoes, and so on. Before long, all the ingredients of a fine soup have been provided by the villagers, and they marvel at the cleverness of the travelers. The illustrations are vibrant, and a cute feature pictures each vegetable offered by a villager in a speech bubble on the page. A recipe for Stone Soup is included. This book provides opportunities for writing lists of vegetables, recipes for favorite foods, procedural writing,and stories about sharing, as well as cooking activities in the classroom.

Mouse Mess

By Linnea Asplind Riley
"Mouse Mess" is a delightfully light story portraying a mouse in a human kitchen at night foraging for food. The pictures are boldly colorful and the rhyming words just as vivid. The mouse happily crunches and crackles through a feast of delectables, blissfully dropping pieces and crumbs everywhere as he goes. When the mouse is finally full, he heads for a bath in a teacup but leaves an enormous mess behind. Kids love this story about a feast of food that is a feast for the eyes and ears as well. This is a great book to introduce onomatopoeia (remember? words that sound like the sounds they describe), to make lists categories of foods, or to inspire writing about favorite foods, a topic near and dear to the hearts of children everywhere. It is also one of my favorite books to teach rhyming words.

Story Props for "The Beastly Feast", "Stone Soup", and "Mouse Mess"

The first group of play vegetables can be cut apart and put back together thanks to the miracle of Velcro. The second group comes in a basket and these vegetables are one-piece. The first cooking set shown has pots, pans and utencils only. When looking for dish sets to play "Stone Soup", make sure there are bowls for soup in the set like those below.

Great Halloween Read-Alouds

Scary, Scary Halloween
by Eve Bunting
Illustrated by Jan Brett
This is the best Halloween story out there for children who trick-or-treat. Jan Brett's illustrations are outstanding: realistic yet fanciful at the same time and rendered in brilliant colors. As in her other books, the attention to detail and to compostion is unmatched. Eve Bunting's rhyming story-within-a-story about three kittens watching costumed children go from door to door on Halloween is enchanting and the rhythm musical.  I love to turn off the lights and read this story aloud by flashlight.



My Monster Mama Loves Me So
by Laura Lueck

Another rhyming book, My Monster Mama Loves Me So is about a baby monster whose mother loves him just the way he is. Baby monster describes all the things his monster mama does for him that shows him she loves him, such as giving him cookies filled with bugs and lizard juice to drink. The pictures are bright and very cute (not a bit scary) and the story is fun to read aloud because of the catchy rhythm of the poetry. On the last page a completely different monster mama and baby appear with the reassurance that your monster mama loves you, too. This book is a good inspiration for writing a description of a child's own monster creation, illustrated, of course.


Winnie the Witch
by Valerie Thomas

Everything is black in Winnie the Witch's house, including her cat Wilbur. When he is awake, Winnie can see Wilbur's luminous green eyes, but when he is sleeping, he is invisible to his owner. Winnie decides to use her magic to change the color of his fur, but when Wilbur is green, he blends in with the grass. The next wave of her wand changes him to a brightly multicolored cat, but he is so embarrassed that he won't come out of the tree inWinnie's yard. Finally, Winnie realizes that she could see Wilbur, black fur and all if she added color to her house. The illustrations are really well-done, imparting to Winnie and Wilbur their lively personalities.

Story Props for Halloween Read-Aloud Books

Back-to-School Books

September is the back-to-school month in the U.S. Many children, of course, are nervous about their first day of school. These stories bring some of those childhood fears about school to light and in doing so, can help kids deal with them. In each story, the main character's problems are realistically resolved in a satisfying way without becoming overly saccharine. These books would also make a good inspiration for writing in those first school days. All of them are easy for children to make text-to-self and text-to-text connections with to enhance their comprehension.

Vera's First Day of School
by Vera Rosenberry

Vera can't wait to join her siblings at school but she somehow gets distracted and misses the school bell. Horrified, she runs home and hides from her mother. When her mom finds her, she helps her get back to school without losing face, and Vera ends up having a good first day. The children in this story are believably imperfect, and the story's resolution realistic and reassuring.

My little sister actually did this when she was young, and my mom was quite surprised to discover her behind the couch while vacuuming when my sister was supposed to be at school.


Timothy Goes to School
by Rosemary Wells
Rosemary Wells precisely captures the feelings of childhood in her stories, and this one is priceless. We all know how it feels to be compared to someone who is better at everything. Timothy tries his best, but feels always outdone by Claude. He becomes more and more dispirited as the days progress until he gets to know Violet, a classmate with the same problem named Grace. The two of them become fast friends and gain a sense of belonging that is essential for school success.


Chrysanthemum
by Kevin Henkes
Before she starts kindergarten, Chrysanthemum is proud of the name her parents lovingly gave her. But once at school, Chrysanthemum's classmates make fun of her long name that has "half the letters in the alphabet". They make fun of having a flower for a name, and Chrysanthemum is devastated. In the end her name is given the respect due it when her teacher reveals that her first name is Delphinium! All of Kevin Henkes' books speak to concerns that are very real to children, and he handles them with deference.

This is a wonderful book to inspire young children to count the letters in their names (first or last) and compare their physical lengths as well as the number of letters in each name. Other activities include sorting children's names by first letter and by number of letters, and putting names in alphabetical order by first letter.

The stuffed mouse to the right is available at IKEA for $2.99 as of this posting. Click on the picture to link directly to IKEA's web site.

Story Props for Back-to-School Books