Monday, 30 January 2012

AGAIN! AGAIN! AGAIN!

Those were the 3 sweet and precious words that my first grade cuties were shouting after introducing them to their first hilarious Mo Willems Pigeon series book. After reading every snowman book ever written to my students in January, my firsties were ready for something different, something funny. My grade level teaching partner suggested we introduce our students to the funny works by Caldecott Honor author, Mo Willems. The Pigeon books, like no others, have made my firsties laugh! HARD! It is so nice to see young children enjoy quality literature so much! One of my cutie patooties was very excited to read another Pigeon series book, and exclaimed "I can't wait for the laughing part! I love to laugh!" Now if that doesn't just make your heart melt! If the Pigeon series books are new to you, take a look at the titles below!
 

 
 
 

 

Using the artwork in the Pigeon series as inspiration, one of the things we worked on last week, was our own 'Don't Let The Pigeon...' art. My firsties created some great Pigeons thanks to the PDF tutorial found on Mo Willems' Website. While the writing extensions are endless (persuasive writing anyone?), I chose to imitate the speech bubbles found in the series. While the finished art product is simple, it follows the understated simplicity of the pictures found within the pages of Willems' literature. Take a look at some of the great art the grade 1's came up with!







Now I am off to do some professional reading...I hope the Pigeon doesn't try to persuade me to 'stay up late' and watch The Bachelor! If you have any other Mo Willems related activities, please share!