Children Literature---Gorilla by Anthony Browne

SUMMARY
Hannah loves gorillas.  She reads, draws about gorillas but she has never seen a gorilla.  Her father is always busy at working.  The night before her birthday, she receives a gorilla toy at the foot of the bed.  But it is just a toy, Hannah throws the toy into the corner.  Something amazing happens, the gorilla gets bigger.  Hannah is frightened, but the gorilla talks to her with a nice smile and wants to take her to the zoo.  The gorilla wears her father's hat and coat and swings through the trees towards the zoo.  They creep into the zoo and see many gorillas.  She thinks the gorillas are beautiful, yet sad.  Then, the gorilla takes her to the movie and they have meal together.  They go home and Hannah falls asleep.  Next morning, Hannah wakes up and sees the toy gorilla.  She rushes downstairs to tell her father what had happened.  Later, her father takes her to the zoo.  And she is very happy.

ANALYSIS

CHARACTERS
Protagonist---Hannah
Antagonistic---Hannah's father
Foil Character---Gorilla

SETTING
Backdrop Setting--- with no specific starting point of time

NARRATIVE POINT OF VIEW
Limited Narrator---through Hannah's eyes to see the story

PLOT
Plot Type---Dramatic Plot

Setting: Hannah wants to go to zoo, but her father is too busy to take her there.
Conflict: When she receives a toy gorilla, she throws it into the corner.
Rising action: The gorilla gets bigger.
Climax: The gorilla takes her to the zoo and they have a meal together.
Denouement: Her father takes her to the zoo.

CONFLICT
The protagonist against Another---she feels unhappy about her dad just gives her a toy gorilla instead of taking her to the zoo.

THEME
family

STYLE
Word Choice---easy to understand
Sentence---descriptive sentences
Exposition / Dialogue--- about half-half

TONE
Warm

AWARD

Kurt Maschler Award
Kate Greenaway Medal


REFLECTION


This is the third book reflection of Anthony Browne's.  I really enjoy reading his books.  So much imagination in his books and also, the gorillas.  It's an enjoyment to read his books.  I like the story a lot with the imaginary character, gorilla that the author created.  I can see gorilla's images every where on the wall or even  the statue of Liberty.  
This book talks about a little girl who can't really spend her time with her dad because her  dad is always so busy.  I think it's the reflection of the kids nowadays for their parents are always busy working and earning money.  Always, the parents forget the most important thing is to spend more time with their kids.  I'm glad that my parents accompanied me through my childhood time.

Children Literature---Officer Buckle and Gloria by Peggy Rathmann

SUMMARY

Officer Buckle loved to write down safety tips and thumbtacked these on his board.  He shared his safety tips at schools, but nobody listened.  One day, the police department bought a dog, named Gloria.  Officer Buckle started to take Gloria to school when giving speeches.  Since that day, everyone loved his speech and more schools asked him to give a speech for them.  After every speech, Officer Buckle took Gloria out for ice cream.  Officer Buckle loved having a buddy.  One day, a television news team videoed Officer Buckle in the state college auditorium.  That night, Officer Buckle watched himself on the news, and found out the truth.  He felt sad and stopped giving speech.  Gloria went to school , but looked lonely on the stage.  Children wrote letters to Officer Buckle and hoped they could come back.  Later, Gloria and Officer Buckle were buddies again.


ANALYSIS

CHARACTERS
Protagonist/Round Character--- Officer Buckle
Foil Character---Gloria

SETTING
Backdrop Setting---With no specific time or place, but introducing the main character at the beginning

NARRATIVE POINT OF VIEW
Limited Narrator---through Officer Buckle's eyes to see the world

PLOT
Plot Type--- Dramatic Plot

Setting: The dog, Gloria, arrived in the police station one day.
Conflict: They started to give speech together to different schools.
Rising action: TV show at the  Stale College auditorium
Climax: Officer Buckle found out the truth that everyone likes to watch Gloria's show, not him.
Denouement: They were buddy again!


CONFLICT
The protagonist against Self---He was depressed that everyone love Gloria, but not him.  Finally, he realized that only he and Gloria could make a wonderful team and good buddies.


THEME
The importance of friendship and being safe

STYLE
Word Choice--- Sometimes, use capitalized type of words can grab attention.
Sentence--- Use longer sentences to describe situations.
Exposition--- Most of the sentences provide the situation.
Dialogue--- Dialogue is most used by Officer Buckle.

TONE
Humor, warm

AWARD
1996 Caldecott Medal Winner

REFLECTION
It's a very interesting book to describe the friendship between a human and a dog.  There are some interesting ideas in this book like different tips at the beginning of the book.  When I read each safety tips, I laughed a lot!  Some tips are actually very useful.  What I like the most about this book is the friendship between Officer and Gloria.  People sometimes have strops with friends because of little things.  For me, friends are important and essential in my life.  This book let me know that I should cherish the friends around me.  We all need friends and so our life can full of joy and happiness with friends.

EXTERNAL LINK

Children Literature---The Paperboy by Dav Pilkey

SUMMARY

When the paperboy and his dog wakes up, the mornings are still dark, and even cold.  His family members are still asleep.  After they finish their breakfast, they put the newspaper in a large red bag and go delivery.  The paperboy rides his bike and his dog follows.  They knows their routes well by heart.  It is the happiest moment for them.  Little by litter, the world around them wakes up, and he is about to finish his delivery.  When they get back home, their family wakes up, but the paperboy and his dog crawls back into bed and sleep.  Now, it's time for them to dream.

ANALYSIS
CHARACTERS
Protagonist---the paperboy
Foil Character---the dog

SETTING
Integral Setting---the story happens every morning of the paperboy's jouney

NARRATIVE POINT OF VIEW
Omniscient Narrator

PLOT
Plot Type--- Progressive Plot
The story talks about what the little boy does every morning, every day.

CONFLICT
The protagonist against Self
---because he and his dog needs to wake up in the cold winter morning, and he has to ride his bike with his dog in the dark to deliver the newspaper.

THEME
The other experience of life before everyone wake up.

STYLE
Word Choice--- easy to understand for children
Sentence--- In this book, there are some repetitions when talking about the boy and the dog's work.
Exposition--- The writer used omniscient narrator to describe the paperboy and dog's movements.
Dialogue--- no any dialogue

TONE
Warm

AWARD
Caldecott Honor Award

REFLECTION
This book is very unique because the mail character is a black boy, which is very rare to see.  The story talks about a very normal person's life, yet, it touches our heart the most.  I was really attracted by this story because delivering newspaper is quite a hard work.  On the journey of delivering newspaper, he feels that it's his happiest moment because he can think of other things on his own.  After he finishes his job, he goes back to sleep and ready for his dreaming time.  The paperboy's life may be seem normal but full of happiness when feeling the complete calmness in their hearts.

EXTERNAL LINK


Dav Pilkey's Website

Children Literature---The Hello, Goodbye Window by Norton Juster

SUMMARY
Nanna and Poppy's house has a Hello, Goodbye window.  The little girl loves to do trick with the window outside before she goes into the house.  She can do lots of things in the kitchen and sometimes Poppy plays harmonica for her in different ways.  Sometimes, she stays over in the house, and the next day, they go back to the kitchen, and the window is waiting for them.  She helps Nanna and plays all afternoon.  If she gets tired, she takes a nap.  Sometimes, when she sit by the Hello, Goodbye window, some people would come to visit her.  When Mommy and Daddy finish their work, she has to go home and leaves Poppy and Nanna.  They blow kisses goodbye at the window.  She dreams someday she could have this special window too.

ANALYSIS

CHARACTERS
Protagonist---The Girl
Flat Character--- Nanna and Poppy

SETTING
Integral Setting---the story happens in grandparents' house when the little girl is still young

NARRATIVE POINT OF VIEW
Omniscient Narrator

PLOT
Plot Type--- Parallel Plot
The little girl leads us to her story through the things happen next to the window.

CONFLICT
The protagonist against Self
---because when she has to leave grandparents' house and goes back to her own house, she feels happy and sad at the same time.

THEME
Experience the happiness in life

STYLE
Word Choice--- easy to understand for children
Sentence--- not too long, with child like way to say
Exposition--- Most of the sentences are exposition to describe her movements.
Dialogue--- less dialogue

TONE
Humorous,  warm, lovely

AWARD
2006 Caldecott Medal

REFLECTION
I have a deep attachment with this story because I used to stay at my grandparents' house during the summer time.  When I was a little girl, everything was so interesting and mysterious and saw everything with different idea to create whole new image.    My grandpa used to teach me how to do things and I used to love to stand by my grandma's side to watch her cooked.  That was the most carefree time of my life.

Not only the story is good, but also the paintings in the books are so lovely, like painting through child's hands because these pictures give a very warm feeling to all the readers.

I enjoy this story a lot, and you?

Children Literature---Milo and the Magical Stones by Marcus Pfister

SUMMARY

On a small island in the middle of the sea, on this island lived Milo and other cliff mice.  They love this island because this place provided them with food and shelter form rough storms and pounded waves against the cliffs.  After one storm came, Milo went out of his cave looking for food.  Then, he found something extraordinary, a strange glowing stone!!  He took the stone back to his cave.  The darker the cave was, the brighter the stone glowed.  This attracted other mice.  Everyone would like to have a glowing stone in their cave.  However, wise Balthazar told them, if they got anything from the island, they must give something in return.

In the end, there are two endings provided from the author---the happy ending and the sad ending.

ANALYSIS

CHARACTERS
Protagonist---Milo
Antagonist---(sad ending) other mice, the nature

SETTING
Backdrop Setting--- It was on a cliff in the middle of the sea

NARRATIVE POINT OF VIEW
Omniscient Narrator

PLOT
Plot Type--- Dramatic Plot
-Setting: On a cliff lived many mice
-Conflict: They all wanted to have a glowing stone like Milo's.
-Rising action: They started to look for stones.
-Climax:

• (sad ending) Most mice were too greedy and gather too many stones.
• (happy ending) Other mice gathered stones, but they remembered to place a gift where they had found their glowing stone.

-Denouement:

• (sad ending) Their cliff collapsed, only Milo and Balthazar were survived.
• (happy ending) In the widny winter, they could stay in the cave and let the stone lighting up the cave for them.

(Happy Ending)

(Sad Ending)





















CONFLICT
The protagonist against Another/Nature

THEME
Learn to be gratitude to our surroundings

STYLE

Word Choice--- some words are difficult, but helps children to learn new vocabulary
Sentence--- long sentences were most
Exposition--- most of the time the narrator told everything
Dialogue--- less dialogue

TONE
warm, ironic

REFLECTION
I really love the idea of providing two endings in the end.  No matter you love the happy ending or sad ending, it really tells us that every thought you have will change your life completely.  If the other mice have thankful heart in their mind, they wouldn't go into the sad ending and ruined their home.  What the wise Balthazar mouse said was right, if yo take something from the island, you must give something in return.  It also indicates that our human beings are too greedy to get everything from our nature.  Will us cause the same tragedy like these greedy mice?

Children Literature---Willy's Pictures by Anthony Browne

SUMMARY

Willy loves painting and looking at pictures.  He knows that every picture tells a story.  His works look like some famous works, but not really... You can see Willy and his bananas in famous paintings like Mona Lisa, The birth of Venus, ...and so on.

ANALYSIS

CHARACTERS
Willy the monkey

NARRATIVE POINT OF VIEW
Internal Narrator

THEME
Using pictures to tell Willy's Story

STYLE
Word Choice--- Use kid's way to talk, so the words are easy to understand.
Sentence---Most of the sentences are long because of describing pictures.
Exposition--- Willy described the meaning of his idea about each picture.
Dialogue---None

TONE
Humorous,  warm, lovely

AWARD
Hans Christian Andersen Medal---for excellence in illustraition

REFLECTION
I like this book because it changes the famous paintings by putting Willy in and his bananas.  After painting these pictures, Willy would like to add some words under the pictures.  Plus, the writer help us to understand the picture more, he puts fold-out pages of the original famous paintings at the end of the book.  With his humor, we can see the writer uses different point of view to see a picture, so do us~

 The Birthday Suit

"Quick, cover yourself up!"

Lots and Lots and Lots of Dots

"We gradually started to notice some very strange thins in the park."

Coming to Life

"I was just finishing this painting when I heard a small voice say, 'give us a hand.' "

Children Literature---Make Way for Ducklings by Robert McCloskey

SUMMARY
Mother, Mrs. Mallard, and father duck, Mr. Mallard were looking for a perfect place for their babies.  She was so worried about the place to raise her family where there might be foxes or turtles.  They flew to different places, but when they got to Boston, they found a nice pond in the Public Garden, with a little island on it. They fished there and followed a boat to get peanuts for breakfast.  When Mrs. Mallard was shocked by a bike that almost ran over her, they flew to other places, at last, they found an island on Charles River.  They began to hatch eight eggs.  A policeman, Michael fed them every day.  One day the ducklings hatched out and were called Jack, Kack, Lack, Mack, Nack, Quack, Pack and Quack.  While Mrs. Mallard taught ducklings how to swim and dive and other things, Mr. Mallard took a trip to see the rest of the river, and they agreed to meet in the Public Garden in a week.  One morning, she took the ducklings off the island to find Mr. Mallard.  When they came to the highway, they were stopped by the speeding cars.  Michael the police helped them to cross the road and even called other polices to help them across the street, right into the Public Garden.  They reunited with Mr. Mallard.  The ducklings liked the new island so the family decided to live there at last.

ANALYSIS

CHARACTERS
Protagonist---The duck family
Antagonist---the cars and bikes
Round Character--- Mrs. Mallard
Flat Character--- The policemen

SETTING
Backdrop Setting--- The place was located around Boston, in Public Garden and Charles River.

NARRATIVE POINT OF VIEW
Omniscient Narrator

PLOT
Plot Type--- Parallel Plot
1st plot: The duck couple flew to Public Garden, but found out this is not a perfect place for their little ducklings when Mrs. Mallard shocked by the bicycle.
2nd plot: They flew to Charles River and found this is a perfect place to live.
3rd: The mother duck took ducklings to find Mr. Mallard and finally they lived in Public Garden.

CONFLICT
The protagonist against Another/Self.

THEME
Parents' love to children

STYLE

Word Choice--- Easy words with the rhythm like the ducklings' names.
Sentence--- In order to describe some situations, the author used some long sentences but with some repetitions in it, made it easy to read.
Exposition--- Most of the sentences are exposition.
Dialogue--- With little part of the conversation type.

TONE
Humorous,  warm, lovely

AWARD
The Caldecott Award

REFLECTION
This is a very lovely story when I read.  The author used a very lovely way to describe the ducklings' movements like "Before you could wind an eyelash Jack, Kack, Lack, Mack, Nack, Quack, Pack and Quack fell into line..."  With this vivid description, we can easily understand how the ducklings moved.  Plus, the author used the sound "Qua-a-ack!" to tell when Mrs. Mallard and ducklings faced the traffics and the cars went "Honk!", they kept quacking and the cars kept speeding.  When I looked at the illustration and with the sound I made in my mind, the whole situation was just right in front of me.

Also, we can see the enthusiastic policeman, Michael, helped the duck family to cross the road. Some personification descriptions like "... Nack, Quack, Pack and Quack all marching in line behind her.", "...she was so proud she tipped her nose in the air and..." to help readers understand more and picture the image in mind easily.

This is a book that makes me feel happy to see ducks' movements and feel exciting when I reads the speeding cars part.  Also, to use the innocent way to look at animals like we all did in childhood time.


EXTERNAL LINK
The Statue of "Make Way for Ducklings"

Children Literature---Piggybook by Anthony Browne

SUMMARY
Mr. Piggott lived with his two sons, Simon and, Patrick in a nice house with his wife, Mrs. Piggott.  Everyday, he and his sons just opened their mouths and waited to be fed but Mrs. Piggott had to do every houseworks.  One evening, when the boys got home from school and Mr. Piggott got home from work, they couldn't find their Mom but found a piece of paper written"You are pigs."  Since that day, the father pig and pig sons didn't know how to cook or do the houseworks.  Few days later, Mrs. Piggott went back and they all started to help Mom do the housework, and they even sort of liked it.  And Mom was happy.

ANALYSIS

CHARACTERS
Protagonist--- Mrs. Piggott
Antagonist--- Mr. Piggot, Simon and Patrick
Round Character--- Mrs. Piggott, Mr. Piggott, Simon and, Patrick

SETTING
Backdrop Setting

NARRATIVE POINT OF VIEW:
Omniscient Narrator

PLOT
Plot Type---Dramatic(Progressive) Plot

Setting--- The piggott lived in a nice house.
Conflict--- The father and sons never did any housework but Mom.
Rising action--- Mom left a piece of paper written "You are pigs." and went away.
Climax--- When there were nothing left in the house for the father and sons to cook, they started to root around and found some scraps.  Just then, Mrs. Piggott came back.
Dénuement--- The father and sons started to do houseworks and cooking.
End--- Mom could fix the car.

CONFLICT
The protagonist against another

THEME
Doing housework together is a must, not just Mom's work.

STYLE

Word Choice--- easy words
Sentence--- Using same repetition in different paragraphs.  Most of the sentences are long to describe the situation.
Exposition--- Most expositions are the descriptions of Mom's action or the connections between each situation.
Dialogue--- Most dialogues are between the father and sons, Mom doesn't say any words.

TONE
Humorous, satirical, warm

REFLECTION
I was attracted by the title of the book.  From the cover, you wouldn't know why it's called "Piggybook," I mean, there's no piggy on the book cover.  As I started to dig into the book, I found the most essential part of this book is in the pictures.  At the beginning, there were just a few pig pictures in the ads or cereal cartons.  Then, in the next page, I started to see Mom's appearance but we cannot see her face also, Mom's background color is yellowish and somewhat lonely.

We can easily see that it's always bright and shining when the father and sons is on the pitcture, but Mom's is so dim.  It's a really big contrast.  The big change of the father and sons became pigs was when they found out Mom's leaving and the background changed into pig patterns.  Their life became dull and unhappy and lived like in a pigsty.

Days later, Mom came home like a lighthouse lighting up the house.  The father and sons were so happy, not just opened their mouths waiting for food.  In the end, they knew they should help Mom do the housework and later, Mom could even fix the car.

I think the end picture that Mom fixing the car is a really big change because Mom is not just working in the house to be a housewife, she can also do something else she like.  Also, it indicates that the stereotype of Mom doing housework alone has been changed, father and children starts to do housework now.  I believe this is a perfect book to teach children doing housework. :)