Saturday, September 6, 2008

"el verano"

el verano
Written by: Carme Solé Vendrell
Illustrated by: Josep MaParramón
Published by Parramón Ediciones, S.A. in Barcelona, España in 1986
ISBN: 0-8120-3647-6
Genre: Picture Book
Reading Level: Grade 1
Activity Level: Grade 1

Summary: This book, written entirely in Spanish, details about the summer. It includes very simple sentences about things that occur in summer. For example, it deals with the people vacationing, the red sun at night, children playing at the beach, etc. The book shows children and their families relaxing together in their boats and enjoying their time off work.

Response: I think this is a very cute book for beginning readers. I also like that the sentences continue from page to page because it makes readers feel as though they are reading faster, since they spend less time looking at the illustrations, because they want to finish a sentence so they do not lose the ability to comprehend the story. This can give them much self-confidence that most beginning readers tend to lack.

The illustrations in the book are probably watercolor and are done in slightly muted tones, but are still very colorful. The illustrator does not put as much emphasis on details some do because he wants the reader to finish this book quickly as well, in order to gain confidence, and not become distracted by the illustrations.

Teaching Connections: A teacher could use this book with a first grade ELL student who is trying to learn English. She could have him read a page and then ask him to translate certain words, such as "colores," "frutos," "tiendas," etc, in order to gradually enhance the students' skills. She could also have the student tell her about the differences he or she has noticed in the summers in America versus those where the child is from, if he or she has been here long enough to answer those questions.

What Students Learn: From this book and this activity, students learn Spanish words for occurrences in the Summer and ELL, when prompted, can learn English words and attempt to increase their skills in English.

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