Tomie DePaola has written and/or illustrated over 200 books. Students in PreK through 1st grade have been listening to and discussing several of Mr. DePaola's titles in the library over the past couple of weeks.
First grade decided that The Art Lesson was Mr. DePaola's autobiographical story from his own childhood. As evidence they cited the name of the little boy (Tommy) and the last page of the book that shows a man with grey hair drawing, with several other pictures of Strega Nona, Anthony, The Barkers and others hanging on the wall. Students were able to determine that since Mr. DePaola has drawn those illustrations of his books, that he was the little boy in the story.
A big surprise for kindergarten was what lead to an impromptu research lesson while listening to Bill and Pete. Even with using illustrations to help "tell" the story, kindergarten was still stumped when Pete (a bird) became Bill's (a crocodile) toothbrush. After looking at several websites, we discovered that the character Pete must be based on an Egyptial Plover who "They are sometimes called "Crocodile Birds" based on the claims to have observed these plovers plucking bits of meat of open-mouthed crocodiles" ("Egyptian Plover." (n.d.) Toledo Zoo. retreived 11/25/13 from www.toledozoo.org).
First grade decided that The Art Lesson was Mr. DePaola's autobiographical story from his own childhood. As evidence they cited the name of the little boy (Tommy) and the last page of the book that shows a man with grey hair drawing, with several other pictures of Strega Nona, Anthony, The Barkers and others hanging on the wall. Students were able to determine that since Mr. DePaola has drawn those illustrations of his books, that he was the little boy in the story.
A big surprise for kindergarten was what lead to an impromptu research lesson while listening to Bill and Pete. Even with using illustrations to help "tell" the story, kindergarten was still stumped when Pete (a bird) became Bill's (a crocodile) toothbrush. After looking at several websites, we discovered that the character Pete must be based on an Egyptial Plover who "They are sometimes called "Crocodile Birds" based on the claims to have observed these plovers plucking bits of meat of open-mouthed crocodiles" ("Egyptian Plover." (n.d.) Toledo Zoo. retreived 11/25/13 from www.toledozoo.org).