Lend An Ear: Where the Wild Things Are

In this book, Max puts on his wolf costume in pursuit of some mischief, chasing his dog with a fork and talking back to his mom, and gets sent to bed without supper. Fortuitously, a forest grows in his room, allowing his wild rampage to continue unimpaired.

Activities:
READ THE BOOK
1.Look at the front cover: read the title and author. Look at the picture on the cover: What kind of feet does the Wild Thing have? What is he doing in the picture?

2. Say This is the title page and it says Where the Wild Thing Are? What is a Wild Thing? Look at the 2 Wild Things, what is different/same? Point to the boy in the costume Is he a Wild Thing? How is he different?

3. Begin reading. I would often stop to let Brooke talk about the pictures. As long as she is talking about the book, I will stop and let her ask her questions or tell her story. If she talks about something else, I say We can talk about that when we finish reading the book but that rarely happens if it is a good book.

4. I pointed out the differences between the pictures of the Max in his room and when his room began to grow into a forest. We talked about imagination.
5. I pointed out the expressions on Max's face, Does Max look happy or scared? etc.
6. "Let the wild rumpus start!" What is rumpus? What do you think it means? Jake helped with this question.

7. When we got to the page where the wild things are hanging on the tree. Brooke looked carefully at each wild thing. I asked her How do the wild things look the same (e.g. they all have sharp claws, yellow eyes ...) and how they are different (e.g. one has human feet, one has a beak ...) She thinks the one in front of Max looked like PopPop since his hair "sticks up" and it "has hair all over his face"

8. At the point Max leaves to return home, Brooke pointed the the wild things and gave them voice, "Don't go, I love you, Stay here with me" are some of the phrases she used in her high-pitched Wild Thing voice.

ART Create a Wild Thing together. Use your imagination to create a Wild Thing. Be sure to use detailed descriptors to describe your Wild Thing (e.g. his tail is long; and skinny and looks like a rat's tail, his teeth are sharp, like a lion's teeth etc..)

STORY TELLING Using our wild things and a puppet of Max (made from a photocopy) We practiced retelling the story. I went first to model re-telling since we really haven't done this yet. I retold the story in basic, simple sentences that the kids could also use.

Max put on this wolf costume and acted like a Wild Thing. His mommy told him to stop and Max said, I'll eat you up. Mommy said, go to your room without any supper. In his room a forest grew and grew and grew. Max got into a boat (had a boat puppet) and went far away to where the Wild Things live. Max and the Wild Things swung on trees and marched and danced. Max said, Be Still. The Wild Things went to sleep. Max was sad and lonely and went home. The Wild Things said, Stay here, Don't go, We will miss you. But Max went home and his Mom put his supper in his room. The End

Brooke told some basic parts of the story. It was difficult to understand her from behind the puppet theater but I could make out parts of the story in sequence. For instance, Max was naughty. Go to your room, Don't go, Max went home and lots of phrases I couldn't make out in between but a great accomplishment for re-telling the story.

KIDS IN THE KITCHEN

Make a Wild Thing to eat! We gathered raisins, almonds, dried apricots, dried apples, coconut, dried cranberries, and mini-Reese's Pieces from the cabinets. On toasted English Muffins, I spread peanut butter and let the kids create an edible Wild Thing.