Trade Book Tuesday: Two Bad Ants

I am really  excited to introduce my Weekly Feature: Trade Book Tuesday! I can not tell you how many trade books I've hoarded collected over the years, but I just can not get enough of them! A GREAT trade book is priceless and when it's good, it's good! 

Click on the book to order from Amazon.com! 

The first book I think every teacher should have in their collection of Children's Literature is Two Bad Ants by Chris Van Allsburg. Have you read it? If you haven't, you need to. You {yes, you, the teacher} will get a good laugh at this quirky book with hilarious antics {ANTics...HA! Get it?! No pun intended!} of two naughty ants that stray from their colony into a giant mountain {...a house} full of swirling, brown whirlpools {...or coffee as you may know it} and giant, shiny crystals {those would be sugar crystals, SHUGAH!}. They have a shockingly not so good time in this fantastic story of adventure, drama, and cheeky humor!

This book is PERFECT for teaching Perspective/Point of View. I have used this book to teach this skill with 3rd, 4th, and 5th graders and they ALL love this book! It's a great introduction to perspective and it truly lays a great foundation for understanding why we all have opinions or certain points of views on things based on age, life experiences, height, beliefs, etc, etc.

The illustrations are fantastic, and in classic Chris Van Allsburg style, the story {secretly} teaches a lesson that is sure to bring about great conversation with your little readers! It's a great way to reinforce those listening skills....Wait? Kids forget listening skills???

Naaahhhhhhh....

I have a great little packet you can check out at either one of my teacher stores that uses Two Bad Ants for this exact skill! The mini unit can be used to introduce or review point of view/perspective based on Common Core RL.3.6!

Simply click on any of these pictures to link to the packet! :)

Here's some examples of two of the activities from the packet! The "Personal Perspective" activity is so fun for the kiddos {and was for ME, too!}. It was so fun to find out everyone's point of view/perspective on different topics and most importantly, why! It was a great conversation piece and definitely a higher order thinking activity!

I hope you enjoy this book with your little friends as much as I do! Get ready for LOTS of Chris Van Allsburg trade books! I use them ALL the time!

**P.S. -- The first three people to COMMENT on this post, get this mini unit FO' FREE!!! Leave your email address and I'll send it to you tonight!! WOOHOO!!! Don't forget to Follow my TPT and TN stores, too!**

HAPPY READING!