Sunday, July 28, 2013

What We’re Reading: The Gruffalo

A few months ago, Ezra hoped to check out a book from his classroom library. He had read it earlier in the week, but couldn’t find it to take home. “It’s about a mean buffalo,” he said as we searched the shelves.

A few days later he found it. The book was not about a buffalo, but a gruffalo. “A gruffalo? What’s a gruffalo?” you ask.

Like the fox, the owl and the snake in The Gruffalo by Julia Donaldson, Ezra, Amanda and I have discovered this monstrous creature with “terrible tusks, and terrible claws, and terrible teeth in his terrible jaws” that lives in “the deep, dark wood.” Rather than flee from the beast like the woodland creatures, we have welcomed the Gruffalo into our lives, and have reread this book many, many times over the last six months.

Last weekend we went camping. Once Ezra looked around and realized we were in the forest, he immediately realized he was in the perfect setting to stage his own production of The Gruffalo. He cast us in our roles, gave stage directions, and fed us our lines. Ezra starred as the mouse, the protagonist who eventually comes face to face with the fantastical creature he fabricates.

No comments: