Story Time Monday

If you're in a bit of a silly mood, or just need a laugh, you can't go wrong reading children Are You a Horse? by Andy Rash. Roy the Cowboy gets a saddle for his birthday, but he doesn't know what a saddle is. He reads the instructions that come with it: "1. Find a horse. 2. Enjoy the ride." Roy doesn't know what a horse is, but he sets out to find one. Along the way, he meets all sorts of things and animals who give him clues about what to look for.

He learns that a horse is a living thing (i.e., not a wagon); that it has legs (i.e., not a snake); that it doesn't change colors (i.e., not a chameleon); that is is fast (i.e., not a sloth); that it is friendly (i.e., not a crab); that it eats grass, not cowboys (i.e., not a lion); and that it doesn't have stripes (i.e., it's not a zebra). All of this is pretty silly; I mean even little kids know that you won't find most of these animals in a dessert! The repetition of Roy's question "Are you a horse?" to every thing and animal he meets heightens the "read-aloud" pleasure which comes to a head when he finally shouts "Why can't I find a horse?!" (My students love it when I "shout" or "yell" during a read-aloud.)

Finally Roy does find a horse. Yippee! Let's go for a ride, he says, and the horse readily agrees. The last picture shows the horse riding on Roy's back. Amazed looks from the kids and then the slow spread of giggles and cries of "That's not right!" Too funny.


For my littlest students, the three year olds, I read Mo Willems There is a Bird on Your Head! which is also very silly. The trick to reading Mo Willems' books is to really ham them up as you read and to read them slowly so the little ones can look at the pictures and get the jokes. Luckily, I've heard storyteller Judy Freeman (http://www.judyreadsbooks.com/) read this way, so I have a model to follow.



Hearing the kids laugh as they appreciated these great books certainly got the school week off to a happy start.