Jenkins, S. & Page, R. (2003). What do you do with a Tail like this? New York, NY: Houghton Mifflin.
Age 4-8 years
I have read books by Steve Jenkins before and loved them, so I was looking forward to this book, and it did not disappoint. I loved the pictures and the guess who quality. It was similar to “Eye to Eye; How Animals see the world” with its illustration style and combination of fact and story. I feel like this would be a great book for kindergarten, it has simple wording style that does not confuse or mix up the fact with too elevated of writing. I think this would make a great discussion with students on animal survival.
Some of the characteristics of quality nonfiction are accuracy, organization, style, and design which I think this book qualifies for most of these. It features some great accurate animal facts; the story follows a question/ answer pattern where you can really ask students what they think and get their opinions/ responses before turning the page. The design and style of the book are similar to other book by Steve Jenkins, which the overlapping paper design and the simple story.
Lesson Sketch
To use this book for a lesson, I would use this with a lesson on animal survival and habitats. As we read through the book, I would ask student “How does this type of nose help this animal?” “How can an animals ears help them to survive?” “How can their different tails affect where they live?” Question like this will get the students thinking about the different animal and how they live. After reading, I would lead the discussion into animal coverings, what type of animal coverings help those animals survive, it might be fun to go back into the book and point out the different types of animal coverings. For the activity students will group different animals by their covering, and then write 1 sentence of how it helps that animal to survive.
Objective: Students will group animals by their covering to show different classifications, and then write 1 sentence about how their covering helps each animal to survive.
NGSS Standard:
K-LS1-1. Use observations to describe patterns of what plants and animals (including humans) need to survive. [Clarification Statement: Examples of patterns could include that animals need to take in food but plants do not; the different kinds of food needed by different types of animals; the requirement of plants to have light; and, that all living things need water.]
ELA Common Core Standards
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.K.1
With prompting and support, ask and answer questions about key details in a text.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.K.3
With prompting and support, describe the connection between two individuals, events, ideas, or pieces of information in a text.
Links:
https://www.rif.org/literacy-central/book/what-do-you-do-tail
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