Tuesday, May 16, 2017

Dinosaurs Before Dark


Main Characters: Jack and Annie

Setting: Frog Creek, Pennsylvania

Summary: Jack and Annie were walking through the woods in Frog Creek, Pennsylvania when they stubbled upon a tree house. They climbed the rope and found different books in the tree house.  Jack opened up a book about dinosaurs and saw a picture of a Pteranodon.  Jack wished that he could go to the time of Pteranodons and suddenly the wind started to blow, the tree house started to spin, and Jack and Annie went to a time sixty-five million years ago.  The pair ran into different dinosaurs like a Pteranodon, a Triceratops, a Anatosaurus, and a Tyrannosaurus rex.  After running into each dinosaur, Jack used the book to learn more about each of them.  After exploring the different dinosaurs, Jack grabbed a book about Pennsylvania and wished to be back in his hometown.

I would use this book in the classroom to show how important reading is in order to learn new information.  I would also use this in a history lesson about dinosaurs.  This text would be best used in a K-1 grade setting since it's simple and students would enjoy the graphics.  I would also add the graphic below from the book to intrigue students and get them excited about reading the book.



Questions to consider:

  • What benefits do series books have for children? Any negative aspects to them?
  • How does this genre of mystery overlap with other genres?


Reference:

Osborne, Mary Pope., and Sal Murdocca. Dinosaurs Before Dark. New York: Scholastic, 1992. Print.

2 comments:

  1. Kara is there one graphic that you feel the students would enjoy the most? If so, maybe you could enlarge that picture and have it on your board the week before you read the text to get the students excited about the book.

    ReplyDelete
  2. That's a great idea. There is one picture that definitely would intrigue students and summarizes the book a little bit as well. I am going to add that to the blog! Thanks.

    ReplyDelete

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