This is a question you can ask your child before you read Gus was a Friendly Ghost , Georgie and the Robbers, and What's a Ghost Going to Do? Have your child look at the covers of the books and talk about what they may have in common. Ask, "What looks the same about these books? What looks different?" Comparing and contrasting literature is just one important reading skill to help your child become a stronger reader.
Read the stories, and then compare and contrast the stories once again. By doing this, you will help your child make text to text connections, which is another important reading strategy.
Gus was a Friendly Ghost and What's a Ghost Going to Do? were written by Jane Thayer and illustrated by Seymour Fleishman, and published in 1961 and 1966.
In these stories, the reader can see the Gus tries to be kind. He wants to be a good ghost and take care of the house he haunts. In the first story, a mouse takes advantage of Gus's friendly nature, and Gus has to figure out a way to solve his problem before his house's owners get too upset.
In the second book, Gus's family has sold his house and it's going to be torn down, so he has to find a new place to live. He tries living in other places, but none of them work out. He must somehow convince the person who bought his house to restore it instead of tearing it down, but the man can't hear Gus. Gus must figure out a way to save his house.
Georgie and the Robbers was written and illustrated by Robert Bright and first published in 1963. Georgie is shy and never scares anyone. He is friends with a cat and an owl. He reminds his owner to go to bed by creaking the stairs. When robbers come to the house and take all the antique furniture while the owners are away, Georgie has to be brave and find a way to capture the robbers. He has to protect his house.
After reading these books, you will see that they have several things in common and several things that are different. All three are cute stories with gentle, helpful ghosts who have problems they need to solve.
You can take making connections to the next level by asking your reader if they ever had a problem to solve like Gus or Georgie. What was their problem and how did they solve it? This is called text to self connections. If your reader can find a text to world connection - a time they've seen something like what they saw in the books happen in the world or on the news, it is a text to world connection.
Of course, you can use any books you have on hand to work on making connections. They don't have to be these books. When your child makes connections to and with the books they read, they become stronger readers.
NICU Book Project Update
Since September 24, 2015, sixty-eight books have been donated to our book project. That means we were able to bring literacy to 13 more newborns than I could have reached on my own. I want to thank all of you who have generously helped with this project.
We are still collecting books, and probably always will be, so if you'd like to help, there is still time to do so.
You can order from the Amazon gift registry and the books will come right to us, so that we can package them up and give them to the littlest of babies. Click on the link to access it. Amazon gift registry.
You can bring new or like new books to either Angie or myself.
Or, you can order books for your own children from this link to Usborne books. Your order will be shipped directly to your house. Usborne sends me a percentage of the sales in free books for the babies. This way your kids gets books and the NICU babies get books. Everyone wins.
Janelle sent these books to help our Spanish families. She also sent books for English speaking families. Thank you!
I greatly appreciate the help we've received on this project. Literacy changes lives, and for these little ones who are starting life way too tiny and sick, it means so much. Hopefully getting five books will give them a start on an at home library and help turn them into Lifelong Readers.
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