Why I Picked It Up:
My sister who lives in England, introduced us to the character of the Gruffalo. We had no idea what it was, but she bought my kids cups and saucers with the Gruffalo on them. I immediately checked out the story.
Why I Finished It:
It’s a cute story. The story line is straightforward and repetitive. Little mouse tricks potential predators by saying he is meeting the Gruffalo. Each time, the mouse describes this terrible creature which scares the predator away. The repetitiveness is similar to the Gingerbread Man story and the characters are reminiscent of Where The Wild Things Are.
Who I Would Give It To:
Definitely a great book for primary grades. A fun read aloud for young students with plenty of teaching potential.
Integration Ideas
Visualization
Read the story to the children, not showing them the illustration of the Gruffalo. At the end, have students draw what they think the Gruffalo looks like, using the text description provided by the mouse. After kids share their drawings they can compare theirs to the illustration by Axel Scheffler.
Descriptive Writing
Students can write a description of their own “protector.” Students can draw an imaginary creature that can protect them. From the drawing they can write what it looks like or what it does.
Technology + Descriptive Writing
Students can build a creature with the Build Your Wild Self tool: http://www.buildyourwildself.com/ (being very secretive about what their creature looks like!). Students can then describe the creature in a paragraph. Have students exchange paragraphs and build a creature based on their classmate’s description. Then they can compare creatures to see how close they were!
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