More Mr. and Mrs. Green by Kieth Baker

Book Genre: Fiction

Publisher Information: Harcourt, Inc., 2003 (68 pages)

Summary: Mr. and Mrs. Green are Alligators who enjoy life. They fish, paint, and go to the park together. The first chapter has Mr. Green catching all the fish so Mrs. Green makes him swap sides of the boat, trade fishing poles, and still doesn't catch the fish Mr. Green. does. He finally admits to her he has been using jelly beans! Mrs. Green uses Jelly Beans and begins to catch fish, too. Chapter 2 has Mrs. Green wanting to paint Mr. Green. She uses bright, beautiful colors. Eventually Mr. Green falls asleep while posing and then wakes up to find his picture is a crazy mixed up mess of color, but tells Mrs. Green, he loves it. They hang it on the wall with the many other pictures she has painted of him. The nest chapter has Mr. and Mrs. Green going to the park. They enjoy the butterflies, birds, monkey bars, wading pool, the flowers, and best of all the ice cream truck!

Personal Rating: (****Great) This is an incredible book because the author uses math equations to figure out the amount of fish being caught, uses interesting adjectives to describe the painting, and even mentions Picasso in the book. She uses wonderful illustrations of all the things the Greens see in the park and really keeps the two of them on the move. This is a great book for integrating math, art, and nature.

Reading level: 2
Interest Level: ages 4-8 (use as a read aloud to ages 4-6)

Possible Uses of the text integrated units of study:

Math: The book already show the number of 16 fish as 8+8, 4X4, 1/2 of 32. Some of these equations may be too hard for second graders, but this book could be used by first through third grade as the students progress in math. Using the book, I would cut out several fish, place them in a paper bucket and label the bucket as 8+8, 4x4, 1/2 of 32 as a model for the students. They would then create their own buckets of fish with as many forms of the amount as possible, depending on the grade level. Also, Mr. Green uses Jelly Beans to catch the fish and these would be good counting props, as well. The different colors would be useful for subtraction and addition and there's nothing like a jar full of jelly beans and an estimate contest with the winner winning the jar of jelly beans.

Art: Mrs. Greene uses very bright colors to paint Mr. Green and his portrait is an abstract. This would be a great way to introduce various forms of painting such as Cubism, Impressionistic, and Abstract. The students would create various paintings using these art forms after viewing pictures depicting these modes of art.

Science: Students would study alligators and their natural habitat.

Reading: This is a series of books and the reader will want to read more! Great motivational reading book.

Potential Problems: The book uses some hard words like enthusiasm, perplexed, and stupendous. These would be hard words for a student to decode if they are deficient in word skills. This book is fun enough that the students would not want to quit reading even though the words can be challenging.