by D'Arcy Norman www.flickr.com
*Picture book for preschoolers through third graders, realistic fiction (based on a true story)
*A nice tugboat driver and the garbage barge as main characters
*Rating: Here Comes the Garbage Barge! is a great book to share with students during any recycling lesson–they’ll laugh but get the point!
Short, short summary:
Jonah Winter has written a picture book based on a true story about the Garbage Barge (1987) that traveled up and down the east coast–trying to find a place to land and dump almost 3200 tons of garbage. Basically, Long Island’s landfills were full and polluting the groundwater. So, some businessmen decided that they should ship the garbage to farmers in the south and pay them to bury it on their land. Burning garbage was expensive, so a city called Islip (near New York City) decided to take the businessmen up on their offer and put their trash on the barge to ship south. In the picture book, with wonderful illustrations by Red Nose Studio, a little tugboat named Break of Dawn driven by Cap’m Duffy St. Pierre, set out to pull the garbage barge from Islip to North Carolina. But when the captain and his smelly barge got to North Carolina, he was turned away–the same thing happened in New Orleans, Mexico, Belize, Florida, Texas, and so on. Finally, with a REALLY smelly barge behind him, Cap’m St. Pierre had to take the garbage back to Long Island. The courts got involved, and finally, the garbage was taken off his hands. But as the author points out, the moral of the story is: “Don’t make so much garbage.” He also tells us that Islip now has a recycling program.So, what do I do with this book?
1. Many teachers and parents will read Here Comes the Garbage Barge! in connection with Earth Day or even at the beginning of the school year to talk about the importance of recycling and being good to the environment. This book can also be used with a science lesson on “green” living. It has a lot of practical applications to today’s science curriculum and could start a great class or home school discussion as well as classroom or home recycling program.
2. This is a great book to discuss problem solving! Poor Cap’m St. Pierre has a huge problem–how to get rid of the garbage. Long Island and Islip have a huge problem, too–too much garbage. Ask students to use their problem solving and brainstorming skills to come up with solutions to the problem BEFORE you read them the end of the story. When looking at students’ solutions, evaluate each one to see if it is a good solution or not through class discussion. Even though this happened in 1987, students today might have a better idea of what SHOULD have happened to all that garbage.
3. You could use this book to help you teach the six plus one traits of writing. It is a great book for organization–the beginning grabs the readers’ attention with all the garbage and then it is organized by the barge’s trip down the river–trying to stop at different states–before the story and the barge circle back to the beginning–to right where they started–garbage in Long Island. The circle format is one form of organization that many authors and essayists use.
Add a Comment