Where the Wild Things Are By Maurice Sendak

 

About Book

Title: Where the Wild Things Are
Arthur & Illustrator: Maurice Sendak
Genre: Fantasy Fiction
Major Book Awards: Caldecott Medal
Recommended Age range: 3 to 5
Appropriate Grade Levels: Pre-k to 3rd Grade

Summary

This super fun book written by Maurice Sendak, talks about Max, a boy who was sent to bed without supper by his mother, because he was wild. He takes this chance and goes on an adventure far away in his imagination. After sometime of "traveling," Max was able to reach the land of where the wild things are. The big creatures tried to scare Max, but he looked at them straight in the eyes without flinching once. The wild things were scared and crowned Max as king of all the wild things. As he was in control, he ordered the creatures to dance, sing, and be wild as much as they want for the next few days, as this is what he always wanted to do at home. After some time, he grew tired and sent them to sleep without supper. This made Max miss his mom, as this is what she did to him. He understands that being in charge or being the adult is hard work, and wants to return to a place where he is loved most. So he "sailed" back to reality and is ready to be a little boy again. When he awakens, there was hot supper ready for him to eat in his bedroom.

Evaluation - Would I Incorporate this book in the Classroom?

This book was pretty good. The illustrations played an important part in telling this story. It started off with mostly text and illustrations on one side, but as Max enters his room and goes on his adventure, the illustrations slowly filled both pages and the text decreased. But once Max was ready to wake up or return to reality, the illustrations went back to one page, just like the beginning of the story. I see myself using this book for lower elementary grade levels. I would definitely tell my students to pay attention to the illustrations as we read. They would have to use inferencing skills to figure out what is going on, on pages with just pictures. I would incorporate this book as a fun read aloud, because it teaches kids that their parents always have their back, even if they're in trouble. Another thing that this book teaches is imagination because having an imagination is powerful. As we read together, we can talk about other life lessons from this book. At the end the students can do a fun activity where we take paper plates and they can create their own "wild thing" or animal.