Elephants Can Paint Too!
Review by: Brian Beck
Author and Illustrator: Katya Arnold
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Year of Publication: 2005
Genre: Informational, Non-Fiction
Summary: This book explains how elephants are just like people. They eat, hang out with friends, even go to classes. It goes on to show elephants painting and how they are able to make artwork.
Professional Review: With a HORN Book Rating of 3, this book is praised for it's impressive photos capturing the elephant's ability to paint. It was also noted that it was clever to compare the child and the elephant on opposing pages, to see their similarities and differences. IT was also appreciated that the book provided many facts about elephants.
My Review: I am really impressed with how this book was able to compare an elephant and a human's painting. I was very interested to see the similarities in both the artworks. I do enjoy the colorful photographs. I think the author did a great job with explaining how elephants can paint just like humans paint. I would have liked the facts to be a main part of the page's text, since it seemed the most interesting.
How to Use in the classroom: This book would be great for teaching students about the abilities of other animals. I think this could included in a whole unit about how animals can do things humans can do. Students would be very interested in the unit since they usually all love animals. An art activity could be included as well, and the students could try painting in a non-conventional way, such as finger painting, or painting using their feet, etc. It would be messy, but a fun way to try to mix-up their way of painting. Since it took the elephants time to learn the skill with using their trunk to paint, it would take time for the students to master a new skill as well, demonstrating how animals and humans are similar.
Review by: Brian Beck
Author and Illustrator: Katya Arnold
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Year of Publication: 2005
Genre: Informational, Non-Fiction
Summary: This book explains how elephants are just like people. They eat, hang out with friends, even go to classes. It goes on to show elephants painting and how they are able to make artwork.
Professional Review: With a HORN Book Rating of 3, this book is praised for it's impressive photos capturing the elephant's ability to paint. It was also noted that it was clever to compare the child and the elephant on opposing pages, to see their similarities and differences. IT was also appreciated that the book provided many facts about elephants.
My Review: I am really impressed with how this book was able to compare an elephant and a human's painting. I was very interested to see the similarities in both the artworks. I do enjoy the colorful photographs. I think the author did a great job with explaining how elephants can paint just like humans paint. I would have liked the facts to be a main part of the page's text, since it seemed the most interesting.
How to Use in the classroom: This book would be great for teaching students about the abilities of other animals. I think this could included in a whole unit about how animals can do things humans can do. Students would be very interested in the unit since they usually all love animals. An art activity could be included as well, and the students could try painting in a non-conventional way, such as finger painting, or painting using their feet, etc. It would be messy, but a fun way to try to mix-up their way of painting. Since it took the elephants time to learn the skill with using their trunk to paint, it would take time for the students to master a new skill as well, demonstrating how animals and humans are similar.