Monday, July 9, 2007



6. Communication by: Aliki
Nonfiction book annotation
By: Angela Wilcox


This is a short picture book with no page numbers.

Brandenberg, A. (1994). Communication. New York: Scholastic Inc.

Author Creditability: Aliki does not list any sources for credibility for this book. The topic is very self explanatory and is never going to outdate as long as humans are living. She did dedicate the book to “all the tellers and the listeners of the world.”

Summary: This book is an enumerative structured book. Aliki discusses the topic of communication and then breaks it down further by discussing different forms, steps, and ways of communicating along with who communicates. She also uses a neutral and conversational writing style to help students understand what is involved in communication.
Most Important Access Features: The end pages of this book contain graphs of different forms of communication along with illustrations of children using these forms of communication. The book is written out in what reminds me of comic strips. The text face is done in Symbol Medium and the dialogue of the characters is written out in Judith Finestone’s (the illustrator) handwriting.


Description of Illustrations: Judith Finestone illustrated this book using watercolor paints, colored pencils, and a black pen. I would say she did a wonderful job by making it very kid friendly and appearing comical.

Grade Level & Uses: Grades K-5; I would use this book to teach about communication and how we communicate appropriately. I thought it would be good at the beginning of the school year when the teacher is going over the rules and building community within the classroom.

Standards: Communication

Related Texts & How Related: These books could be used along with Communication to discuss how we communicate.

Feelings (Reading Rainbow Book) by Aliki
Manners by Aliki

Quality/Awards: none found

Personal Response to Book: I found this book to be very helpful on how to discuss the broad topic of communication on such an easy vocabulary level for children to understand. This is a book that I would love to start the school year out with to help students understand the proper way of communicating and respecting one another.

1 comment:

I love nonfiction said...

There's a book about signals by Gail Gibbons that might be a related text--it discusses and depicts signals that communicate such as smoke signals, Morse code, and traffic lights--guess there's more to communication that speaking and listening:-)

There's also an alphabet book called Hand Signs that focuses on sign language, another form of communication.