A child's calendar

This book is a very good book in my opinion. It is a book which has a peom for each of the 12 months of the year. Not only does this book shoe and teach opetry but it also teaches children about the different times of the year and what happens in each of the months. The pictures in this book are

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very detailed and really catch the readers attention.

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A Child’s Calendar is a collection of lyrical poems about each month of the year. Each poem details the weather, activities, and holidays of each month. One particular poem illustrates the month of October. It paints a picture of the tress as their leaves turn, of migrating birds, and all hallows

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eve.

I really enjoyed this collection, but I found that the months don’t quite match the seasons in my area of the country. However I would still use this book to illustrate lyrical poetry. All of the poems are written in the same way, and would provide a good source of examples for children to look at.

A very easy way to use this book in the classroom would be to have a "poem of the month". For each calendar month, I would post a corresponding poem with the classroom calendar. Another idea would be to create a book of poems that match the months and seasons of the classrooms location. The class could work together to write a poem for each month as we get to it.

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This book is a great example of poetry. There are twelve different poems in this book, one for each month of the year that describes that month. They are all rhythmic in nature and are shorter that an entire story book. Also there is emphasis placed on the words themselves, while it conveys the

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message about each month.
Age Appropriateness: Primary, Intermediate
Media: Charcoal, Crayon, Pastels

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Intermediate, primary
This is a good example of poetry. It is a collections about the months from the perspective of a child. Each poem has four or five stanzas and a in an ABCB rhyme pattern in each stanza. The poetry has not place only time an no characters.
Media: watercolor

This book is from a child's view and focuses on poems about the seasons. The artwork shows families doing specific things throughout the year such as making Valentines or going on a picnic.

There are 12 poems - one for each month of the year. They are simple to read and understand but still have much depth and feeling. The illustrations are supberb. They complement each poem with their rich detail. Beautiful watercolors in their own right.

A Child's Calendar by John Updike describes each month of the year in poems. Starting with the days are short and rivers and frozen in January all through the first snowflakes of December.

I really enjoyed the rhyming of this book. The poems were well written and were detailed with each month of the

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year.

In a classroom, I could read this book only by the month and keep the suspension of the children up. We could also make a classroom calendar and have students put the days up.

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This book is a book of 12 poems. Each poem represents a month of the year. Each month describes the season which it is in.

This is an excellent classroom book. I think the author did an excellent job portraying each month and each season. Each poem had great rhythm.

1. Each child chooses a month

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from a hat. The month that the child chooses, they write a poem about it and draw a picture to be added with it. After creating poems and pictures, the class will then create their own personal calendars with all these bounded together.
2. Each child picks a month and draws a picture of what they might do in that month.

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This book is an anthology of poems, grouped together by the months. Each poem's title is the month. One of my favorites is May. The poem talks about the children going outside without their coats on and that apple and pear blossoms are floating in the air. Daddy is planting tomatoes and the

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favorite thing to do is watch baseball. The illustrations for this poem show the children at the candy store and a boy with a cat smelling a flower. I liked this poem because May is one of my favorite months of the year. It is hot weather but just reading this poem made me feel nostalgic. Another poem I liked is October. It says the month is amber, gold and brown. The geese are flying and frost bites the lawn. Then the children come out as witches, goblins and pirates going house-to-house trick or treating. The illustrations show the children dressed up in Halloween costumes and a group of children playing in a pile of fall-colored leaves. This poem is special to me because fall is my favorite season. I look forward to all of the changing colors of the leaves and the cooler air.

I liked the two families in this book because as you go through the months, it shows them spending time together. This book explains the seasons, weather, holidays and activities you can do throughout the year.

Some extension ideas would be to read this book throughout the whole school year. The first day of each new month, I would read the appropriate poem and then we could make a bulletin board where all of the children make their own illustrations to post with the poem on the board.

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This is a book of poems for each month of the year. This book is great for introducing a new month.They are simple,sweet and describe the months with clarity, adding details and smells that brought vivid picture to your mind. My two favorite poems are the months of April and the June. The

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illustrations were also lovely, I liked the fullness they conveyed. I would recommend this book. The pictures make the reader see what message the poem is saying. I consider these concrete poems.

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PreSchool-Grade 3–John Updike reads each of his 12 poems celebrating everyday life month by month (Holiday House, 1999) at a deliberate, measured pace. Background music plays lightly, changing with each piece to reflect the season, month, holiday, etc. that is being presented. Appropriate sound

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effects such as crunching snow and geese honking add texture to the even reading. The accompanying book features colorful watercolor illustrations by Trina Schart Hyman portraying the activities of a multiracial Vermont family. The slow-paced narration has little inflection and may not hold the interest of the youngest children. This read-along is a good way to introduce poetry and teach the months of the yea

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A child's calender is a poetry book. There are several differnt poems that are grouped together by months and explain characteristics of what things occur during each month. During the poem of Januray, it describes the snow falling, and how very cold it is outside. It talks about that you have to

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wear jackets and mittens to stay warm. During the month of December, in the second poem, Christmas is here and this is when the snow begins to fall.

I enjoyed this poem because I think its fun to know what is gong to happen for the whole year. The weather as well as the holidays make the poem fun.

In the classroom, I would read one poem per month to match the calender.

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This poetry book is about the months of the year. Each month describes the weather ,holidays, and activities that families usually will engage in that particular time of year. This poetry book is accompanied with beautiful illustrations of multicultural families enjoying eachother and the seasons

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of the year.

John Updike describes every month in our calendar year in a very perfect way. This poetry book was easy reading for my second grader and still interesting enough for me to enjoy. Our favorite poem is August. There's a wonderful picture of a family at the beach with a little boy showing off his "tanlines".

I would have students listen for and write down the adjectives as I read the poem aloud without telling them the title of the poem. These adjectives will give them clues to what month of the year the author is writing about. Another idea would be to assign them their birth month and have them write a poem about themselves.

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In this book each month is described in a little poem. Each poem gives little details that best relate to each month.

I thought that this book was very cute and the illustrations were very well done and matched each month perfectly.

This book would be very good to use in cirlce time discussions. We

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could focus on each month as we move through them throughout the year. As a class activity we could make our own class activity.

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This book has a poem for each month, describing the weather conditions and activities one would see a person doing for each month. The author writes about the month of January through December.

The author describes the months perfectly, and I see some of the things he describes in the months during

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my everyday life. Also, I do some of the same activities that he lists during the seasons.

One could read this book while learning the months of the year, and depending on the month you are in while reading it, one could do an activity pertaining to that month (like February and passing out valentines.) Also, the teacher could read this during a poetry unit and have the kids write a few rhyming sentences about their favorite season.

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This is a collection of John Updike's poems about the different months of the year. The poem October is about the month October. It describes all the fun of Halloween and the change of colors; amber, golden, and brown. June is about a poem about the month of June. It describes fun summer activities

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like little league, hopscotch, and hide and seek.

I enjoyed the poems and the illustrations. The illustrations were very bright and represented each month very well.

One way that this book could be used in the classroom would be if you are teaching young children the different months of the year.
Also you could read it together in class and then make a poster on a large sheet pf paper and put it up in the classroom somewhere and recite it as a class throughout the month. You could also have children write their own poems about their favorite month after reading all the poems in the book.

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Summary:
This is a collection of poems. Each poem is about a month out of the year. Each poem relates to the months by illustrating the season changes, the holidays, and the sights and smells that each month brings along.

Personal Response:
I liked this poem book because it's an easy way to integrate

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poetry into the classroom each month. It's a great way to have the kids talk about the seasons, the weather, or even the holidays.

Classroom Extension Ideas:
1. I would the poem of the month out loud. We will write our own monthly poem as a class and I will have each student illustrate a line in the poem.
2. I will have my students write about their favorite month.

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Summary: A Child's Calendar is a collection of poems that describe changes that occur in each of the twelve months of the year. It also describes what children do during the twelve months. The poems describe the landscape and the weather during each month. The book also describes the activities

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children do during the month that is being describe.

Personal Reaction: I thought was a book. I really enjoyed how the poems were written to describe the weather of the months. I also liked how the poems express the holidays that are celebrated in each month. This would be a good book to use in the classroom when discussing the months of the year. This book could be used for so many lessons in the classroom.

Classroom Extensions: 1. This book can be used in a lesson when discussing weather changes throughout the year. 2. This book can be used when discussing different holidays that occur during the year. 3. This book can also be used when discussing poetry in the classroom.

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Summary: This book is a collection of poems that describe the changes in weather that occur throughout the year. This is an excellent poem book about how the weather changes each month. It is very descriptive as to how it describes the seasons, and holidays. In addition, it describes the activities

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that children may do during the particular month it is describing.

Personal reaction: I thought that overall this was an excellent book because it described each month, holidays, and weather that take place. I think this would be an excellent book to use in the classroom when discussing weather, seasons, and holidays. Also, this book is a great and easy way to incorporate poetry in the classroom.

Classroom Extension: (1) When discussing weather or season changes this would be a great book to read to your class.
(2). Students can pick their favorite month or holiday and write about why that particular month is their favorite.

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Rather than twelve short poems, this book is really more like one long poem in twelve parts, as each transitions naturally to the next (sometimes explicitly referencing what's come before), painting one picture as a unified whole. And the poetry is pretty good, though not great---there are some

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nice turns of phrase and unusual but evocative imagery (as well as appeals to the other senses!). I especially enjoyed the October poem.

But some parts are pretty bland, and there are some missed opportunities. For example, for the month of July, Updike discusses Independence Day with this stanza: "America / It makes us think / Of hot dogs, fries, / And Coke to drink." Now, I realize this book is for kids, but really? That's all he's got to say about what America means...hot dogs, fries, and Coke? That's just weak, in every respect. On the other hand, that month ends with this cute and clever wordplay, quasi-metaphor and part pun: "And Tabby dozes / In a pool / Of fur she sheds / To keep her cool." But a lot of the other months are similarly given to conventional references to church, and God as the author of nature, and so forth. Not that that wouldn't appeal to most of the book's audience, but it struck me as rather trite and meaningless.

The illustrations are nice, interesting to look at, and complement the poems---and one even made me laugh out loud: in August, Updike writes, some people "go to seaside / Bungalows / And take off nearly / All their clothes"...and the accompanying picture shows a rear-view of a boy at the beach who has in fact removed even his bathing suit, arms proudly upraised, as his mother rushes toward him to correct this faux pas.

The accompanying CD narrated by Updike is also pretty good, but something about his voice and intonation or something is at times eerily reminiscent of a creepy clown, or Mormon "prophet" Thomas S. Monson (same difference)...but maybe that's just me. On the whole: cute, and possibly a good way to teach kids about the months of the year...but it could have been better.

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Updike, John. A Child's Calendar. New York: Holiday House, 1999. The nicest thing about this collection of poems is that it focuses on each month of the year and the poet describes the changes in nature and the rhythm of the seasons each year. There is a lot of imagery in each poem. For example,

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for the month of September the poet used words like "apple', "chalk". "blackboard", and "new books." You really get a feel for the special changes tht occur in that month. There is rhyming in each poem and metaphors and similies. I like this book and I thinks is very appealing along with the sweet illustrations by Trina Schart Hyman. Age Group: 7-10 years.

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Summary: "A Child's Calendar" is about all the the months and what goes on each month. It talks about the seasons and what you can do each season for each month.

Personal: This book was not that appealing to me. I just thought it was a good choice for preschool to maybe first grade to teach them

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about the 12 months on the calendar and each season.

Classroom: This is a good book for when there is a lesson on seasons and months of the year. It is especially good for kindergartners when they learn their seasons, months, and days of the week.

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A Child's Calendar is a book of poetry about each month. Each month's poem is about what happens in that season in nature and in life events. This is a good set of poetry to begin a child on because they can relate to the descriptions in the months as things they experience in these months. It

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helps them learn about seasons and how they match up to months. The combining of words helps expands vocabulary and writing to enrich students writing and language.
This book could be used for a year long classroom activity. The book could be presented at the beginning of the school year and on the first class day of each new month the poem for that month can be read. The class can compare things in the poem to what they see or do in their own lives in that month. Students could be asked to write their own poetry at the end of the month about that month. Or just to introduce students to poetry and read the poems throughout the year.

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A Child's Calendar is 12 poems about each month of the year. It was a very descriptive and informative for a child. It tells about what happens in nature, life and the holiday of each month. The pictures are great and would help children use their context clues to guess the month and what is going

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to happen in that poem. I would read this to a 3rd to 4th grade class.

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