A Ticket Around the World By Melissa Owens and Natalia Diaz

About Book

Title: A Ticket Around the World
Author: Melissa Owens & Natalia Diaz
Illustrator: Kim Smith
Genre: Nonfiction [informational]
Major Book Awards: No major book awards
Recommended Age Range: 7 to 9
Appropriate Grade Levels: 2nd to 4th grade

Summary

This book written by Melissa Owens and Natalia Diaz follows a young boy taking many trips to visit his friends in 13 different countries, all located in 6 continents. The first country he visits is Costa Rica, where he introduces his friend and share interesting facts about their country such as the foods, culture, environment, language, population, wildlife, landmarks, etc. And for the next 12 countries that he stops by, he does the same as well, each coming with a small map that allows the reader to visualize everything he talks about. At the end of the book, the boy reminds us the places he has visited and asks a question about each country for the readers to think about and eventually answer.

Evaluation - Would I Incorporate this book in my Classroom?

This book was definitely very informational. I loved how it talked about the basics of each country through a boy who travels to meet his friends. I also really liked the illustrations in this book. It had a map for each country he visits and pictures that goes a long with it. I liked the colors as it wasn't too bland or too much. The way the text is written and the pictures is drawn allowed me to easily follow a long as the boy is talking about each aspect about the country and it flowed nicely into the next country he visits. It allowed me to travel without having to travel. I would definitely use this book in my classroom and believe it is appropriate for 2nd to 4th grade. This book can be used during a unit where I talk about the diversity or culture around the world. During this unit, students will be able to learn about each other's cultures. Since this book is an informational picture book, it is pretty long. I would use this in my classroom, but not as a read aloud. An activity that I would do it put students into groups of 4 and each group will be given 2 countries from the book that they will be responsible of. The group will then read the pages of the two countries and put together a quick presentation about them and share it to the class. This will help us get through the whole book without having to read every single page. And hopefully by the end of the lesson, students will be able to learn something new.