There are
so many books on mixing colors, it’s hard to imagine finding anything new on
the topic. But when I read this to my kindergarten students, they loved it so
much, I had to study it more closely!
Summary from the publisher:
Did you know that monsters love
to
scribble,
scribble,
mix,
dance,
and
wiggle!
Why?
Because monsters love to make new
colors!
Celebrate along with the
hilarious monsters in this wild and energetic picture book from
author-illustrator Mike Austin. Mixing and discovering color has never been so
much fun!
Monsters Love Colors was written by and illustrated by Mike
Austin. It was published in 2013 by HarperCollins Children’s Books.
Opening:
“Monsters
love to scribble, scribble, mix, dance and wiggle!”
My Thoughts as a Writer:
This book showed
me the value of fun word play for connecting with young children. I loved the
rhyming associations with the colors: “Red is the color of ROAR! And SNORE! And
more! more! MORE!” There are funny
asides with bits of monster dialogue and a wonderful over-the-top moment at the
end. I found the scribble art style worked well to bring out the wild, creative
spirit of the cartoony, kid-friendly monsters.
My Thoughts as a Teacher:
There is a
lot more to this book than I realized at first. Different discussion points
could be highlighted, depending on your lesson focus. As well as teaching about
colours and colour mixing, it also shows individual differences (each monster has their own
favourite color and that’s okay) and how art is about playing and being creative
(scribbles can be art too).
After reading this book and seeing how my students
reacted to it, I want to look for Mike Austin’s second book, MONSTERS LOVE
SCHOOL.
Ages: 3 - 6
Grades: PreK - 1
Themes: color, color mixing, creativity,
individual differences
Activities:
Choose an
interesting word from the book (e.g., growl, roar) and create a piece of art to
go with it.
Draw a scribbly
monster for your favourite colour and think of some words to describe it. For
example, Purple is the colour of….
Experiment
with paints and crayons to make your own new colours. Invent a rainbow with your own creative colors.
Sounds like a great book. Love the colorful cover.
ReplyDelete