Title: Whistle for Willie
Author: Ezra Jack Keats
Summary
I chose this week's children's book from one of multitudes of great books mentioned in our weekly PowerPoint lectures. This book titled "Whistle for Wille" is about a young African American boy named Peter. During the course of this book, other characters that are mentioned are Willie which is Peter's dog, and Peter's mother and father. The main theme of this book is Peter learning to whistle for his dog Willie. Peter tries and tries to whistle throughout the course of this book, but struggles to make any sound come out when he blows air through his lips. However, Peter remains persistent and finally learns to whistle by the end of the story surprising both himself and his dog Willie. I implemented this book into my summer school classroom as a transitional read aloud activity. I found a great free read aloud version of the story on YouTube to share with my students. I have shared the link to the read aloud of story that I used below on my reference section. I have a small group of first graders this summer, and the book did a great job of maintaining their interest level and keeping them entertained. My students loved the pictures of Peter dressing up as his father, and hiding from his dog Willie. I would definitely recommend this book as a classroom staple for early childhood classrooms.
Classroom Activities
The book titled Whistle for Willie, is a cute engaging book for young children that also does a great job showing representation for African American students. Recently when I showed the students of my summer school classroom this read aloud, it brought forth the whole group discussion over the topic of whistling. My students are right at that age where some of them knew how to whistle and some of them were right in that stage of learning. My classroom quite humorously ended up turning into quite the loud air blowing room that day. If I were to further teach upon this story, I would incorporate an assisted writing assignment, where students could write a story of sorts of where they would hide to try and whistle to their own dog or pet. I would then allow time for students to illustrate their writing. I found a website that offered additional resources and activities to use in accompaniment with the story. I have attached the website under my reference section below. This children's book is a great book by an award winning author the provides opportunity to read more of his stories and implement cute and educational activities.
References
📗 Kids Book Read Aloud: WHISTLE FOR WILLIE by Ezra Jack Keats. ✔️SFX. (n.d.). Www.youtube.com. Retrieved March 25, 2024, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gPUtm7g4dMM
Mularien, R. (2022, February 11). Whistle for Willie Activities and Lesson Plans for 2024. Clutter-Free Classroom | by Jodi Durgin. https://jodidurgin.com/whistle-for-willie-activities-lesson-plans/
No comments:
Post a Comment