Tuesday, June 19, 2007

5. Sea Horse the Shyest Fish in the Sea by Chris Butterworth


Nonfiction book annotation
By: Angela Wilcox


27 pages



Butterworth, C. (2006). Sea horse the shyest fish in the sea. Cambridge, MA: Candlewick Press.

Author Creditability: Chris Butterworth performed research about sea horses and talked with marine zoologists to learn more. She encourages us all to learn as much as we can about the sea horses so we can help protect them and keep them from going extinct. She has also written more than 70 other children’s nonfiction books on various subjects.

Summary: This informational picture storybook informs the reader about sea horses. This book focuses particularly on the life cycle, characteristics, and habits of the Barbour sea horse. Most Important Access Features: This book contains captions that are done in a smaller font size than the story and give factual information about sea horses. They are located throughout different places on the page, some are at the bottom, some are in the shape of a wave going across the page, and some are just simply over to the side. In the back of the book there is an index, a general paragraph about sea horses and how they need to be protected, an author and illustrator note.

Description of Illustrations: John Lawrence did a wonderful job with the illustrations in this book. He used vinyl engravings, watercolor washes, and printed wood textures to create these illustrations that turned out marvelous for this book. He stated that he tried to imagine what it would be like to live under the water and this helped him to draw his illustrations.

Grade Level & Uses: K-3rd grade It would go great with an ocean or sea life unit.

Standards: K science: 1. Develop an understanding that living and non-living things have identifiable characteristics. 9. Discover how environmental concerns relate to land, water, and air.
1st grade science: 1. Explore the basic patterns of living systems. 2. Investigate the diversity of living things.
2nd grade science: 1. Explore the functions and systems of living things. 2. Research the diversity and interaction of living things.
3rd grade science: 1. Investigate the interactions of objects and organisms.



Related Texts & How Related: This books could also be used for a sea horse unit.
Mister Seahorse by Eric Carle
The Life Cycle of a Sea Horse by Bobbie Kalman

Quality/Awards:
John Burroughs List of Nature Books

Personal Response to Book: This book is beautifully illustrated. I love how the author used the text to flow along with several of the illustrations. This book was a very easy read and I plan on using it this upcoming school year with my ocean unit. I know the children will love it!

1 comment:

I love nonfiction said...

Another wonderful book about these mysterious creatures is Seahorses by Sally Walker. This one is illustrated with color photographs. Several of the photos show seahorses in relation to a human's hand, which depicts the tiny size of some kinds of seahorses. I learned almost as much from the photographs in this book as I did the print text!