Snow

Title: Snow
Genre: Caldecott
Author: Uri Shulevitz
Major Awards: Caldecott Honor
Age Group: Pre-K-1st grade

This is the story of a little boy encountering snow for the first time. He spies one snowflake, and says "It's snowing!" His grandfather replies, "It's only a snowflake." He spies two snowflakes and says again, "It's snowing!" A man then replied, "It's nothing." He spots three snowflakes, restating, "It's snowing!" A woman walking by says, "It'll melt." The young boy becomes annoyed that everyone, from his grandfather to the television, is not believing that a snowstorm is occurring. In the end, the snow does stick, and a full-on snowstorm covers the town. 

I am undecided if I would want this in my classroom or not. It teaches a great lesson on persistence, and not letting other's opinions bring you down, but it was a bit boring. It did have pretty illustrations of the town being covered in snow, but the actual story was not very well-written to me. It just did not really excite me or make me want to keep reading. 

This story would best suit Pre-K through first grade students, in my opinion. There are very few words on each page, and the words that are there are very easy to sound out. It is a very easy read, and would be perfect for beginning readers. The illustrations do not seem very "American", and look more like a village in England, so I think these students would find them interesting! 

In my classroom, we could create our own snowflakes using paper, and hang them up around the classroom. We could also make "real" snow, using baking soda and shaving cream, which I think many students would have a blast with! There are also worksheets online I could print out, which involve students writing the main idea of the book, and the details that support that. There is also a worksheet where the students have to write certain words from the book in ABC order.