Today we are talking about the new, pretty-much WORDLESS, book from Mercer Mayer. But don’t forget to enter the giveaway for Meredith Zeitlin’s YA book Freshman Year and Other Unnatural Disasters and check out her book trailer here.
Now. . .Octopus Soup
*Picture book for preschoolers through third graders (really any level if you see my activities)
*A poor little octopus as the main character
*Rating: I love wordless books for all the opportunities they provide. My 16-month-old daughter sat STILL while I shared these illustrations with her and told her what was going on! Octopus Soup is a winner!
Short, short summary:
Told like a comic book strip with no words, this is the story of a little octopus who goes on an adventure by hitching a ride on a fishing boat. He winds up in a restaurant where the chef starts thinking, OCTOPUS SOUP! This causes a major chase through the streets to the dock, where the chef THINKS he has his octopus. But luckily the little guy has law enforcement on his side! When the octopus gets back into the ocean, his parents are super happy!So what do I do with this book?
1. VOICE– You can do so many 6 + 1 traits of writing activities with this book. You can do VOICE. Let students write and give the characters a voice. What is the little octopus thinking/saying? How about the chef? What about the parents in the end? How about the lady shopping for melons? And so on. Students can write in paragraph or sentence form depending on their age. They can even write dialogue and practice punctuation.
2. WORD CHOICE–pick a page and tell what is going on. Concentrate on word choice when writing descriptions or even emotions of the characters. The students can use ANY WORDS THEY WANT because the story is there, but Mercer Mayer hasn’t put any words in their head yet (except maybe the ones in the illustrations!) Challenge students to come up with different words to describe the octopus, the soup, the ocean, and so on.
3. SENTENCE FLUENCY–Again, since there are no words, students (in shared writing or on their own) can write the story. Work on telling the story with sentences that start different ways or are varying lengths. This is the PERFECT sentence fluency, 6 + 1 traits lesson!
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