Are You Ready to Play Outside? (An Elephant and Piggie Book)

This book would be great during character lessons about being a good friend but even better would be a great story for helping to teach inferencing skills.

After having some trouble with "My Friend is Sad" I knew I needed to give Willems' Elephant & Piggie books a second try. I really enjoyed this one. It had the simplistic yet clever style I like from the Pigeon books. The message was simple and silly. I understand more clearly how these two

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characters can be so appealing.

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Piggie and Gerald are ready to play outside, that is until the rain comes. However, with a little inspiration from seeing some worms play in the rain, Piggie and Gerald decide to give it a try and end up having a blast!

This was a cute book about two friends that are excited about getting to play outside together. When it starts raining they are upset that they cant play, but then they see some worms playing in the mud so they try it and have a blast. About the time they start having fun the rain stops, and they

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are now sad that it's not raining. So the elephant decides to spray water from his trunk and they have more fun in the "rain."

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I really liked the book, "Are You Ready to Play Outside?" I would read this book to kindergarten. This book is about a little pig that wants to go play outside. Well the little pig and little elephant went outside to play. Then it begins to rain and the pig gets angry, so the elephant covers his

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head with his trunk. For a little while the pig just stands there mad but then realizes how fun it can be to play in the rain. After this it stops raining and the little pig gets angry because he liked the rain so the elephant sucks up water and blows it on him like it is raining. The pig hugs the elephant and tells him how good of a friend he is and they play all day. I think that this book had a very good lesson to it. First it could teach the students that not everything can go your way and you just need to get over it and move on. Another lesson this story teachs is how to be a good friend. I really think that kindergarteners would love this book!

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This book won the "Theodor Seuss Geisel Award" 2009/2010. I love Mo Willem's books and I highly recommend them for any primary children. The illustrations are very simple, but the facial expressions on the characters are simply fabulous. You can just look at the pictures and the book is absolutely

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hilarious. I really like to read Willem's books to my ESL Kindergarten classes because he uses very simple humour and doesn't have too much going on in each page.

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Gerald and Piggie are hysterical in Are You Ready to Play Outside? I think any child can relate to Piggie's ever-changing emotions about the rain. This a great, very relatable book.

4Q, 4P: Another creative story with compelling illustrations from former Sesame Street writer.

This is the story about Piggie and Gerald and their friendship. The two are so excited to play outside but Piggie gets very upset when it starts to rain. Piggie yells, "I DO NOT LIKE RAIN". Gerald an elephant and Piggie's good friend holds his ear up to protect Piggie from the rain. They notice two

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little worms enjoying the rain and they decide to follow in their footsteps. Once they start enjoying the rain it goes away and they are again miserable.

Gerald and Piggie are super adorable. The illustrations are super simple yet very adorable. There is not much background in the illustrations, the focus is the two characters. The writing of the characters is so timeless and fun. Piggie yells quite a bit, which makes for a fun read-aloud. A great set of characters to follow on other adventures.

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This book was adorable. I can see kids absolutely loving it because even I thought it was enjoyable and fun to read. The pig plays the grumpy character that kids often embody while the elephant looks on the bright side (well, more accurately he just sorta tries to cheer his friend up). A classroom

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connection could be to a unit on weather... maybe kids could come up with different activities to do in different kinds of weather, learn about different weather and the seasons.

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I thought that this book was great. It was a great story about how complaining about something does not get you very far and that if you just try it first you may end up liking it. This could be a great story to read and talk about the different things kids have complained about and if they have

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ever tried them and then enjoyed it.

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Not usually my style but I enjoyed the pig's enthusiasm, then utter depair that it was raining. Good for anyone who lives in the northwest and is tired of the rain.

Mo Willems is probably my favorite current childrens picture book author, and he doesn't disappoint with this cute, simple, yet enjoyable story. Piggie is so excited to play outside when it starts to rain! What a nightmare, but piggie like all children should learn is that you should make the best

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with what you got, and that is exactly what he does. He learns to love the rain, but then it stops...

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This is a good example of a fantasy because the reader needs to withhold skepticism in order to fully enter into the magic of the book. The author has crafted a believable world where an elephant and a pig are friends who converse and play in the rain.

Illustrations: colored pencil and computer

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graphics (?)

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Great book for early and beginning readers. The plot is simple and easy to follow, but is still engaging. The format more follows a comic book, since all of the text is written in bubbles. This can be confusing to a reader who has not scene this format before.

I love this book! For early readers and English Language Learners, it is a great book because the text is simple enough to ensure success, but it doesn't seem like a "baby" book. The illustrations (especially Piggie's expressions) add to the text.

I can NOT get enough of Elephant and Piggie.

Piggie's crushing despair as she explains, in small text, that she is "not a happy pig". Elephant's sweet solution to the lack of rain. The worms, splishing in the puddles!

Simple - but exciting - text for beginning readers, and hysterical illustrations.

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What's not to love?

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Very cute, a nice story of friendship - my 5 year old kindergartner worked her way through it slowly but surely. Funny ending!

This was a wonderful tale of two friends interacting with one another. More importantly, this is a great story of a friend trying to cheer his buddy up when clouds are grey. It looks like it could be colored pencil of some sort It is for young children so I think he is trying to keep his art simple.

The elephant and the pig are going to play outside, but it begins to rain and the pig gets sad, so the elephant comes up with the idea of lifting his long ear so piggy wont be sad. Later he learns that playing outside still could be fun and the play and play until the sun comes out. The letters on

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this book are big, the vocabulary is open for children to learn and acquire new words. It is easy to understand what't going on by just looking at the pictures and it is fun and entertaining.

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Willems, Mo

Are You Ready to Play Outside?
2008. 64pp. $8.99 hc. Hyperion Books for Children. 978-1-4231-1347-8. Grades K-3

Young elephant Gerald and pig Piggie are excited to play outside, until it begins to rain. Piggie fumes about the rain because he hates to get wet, and Gerald obliges by lending

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an ear to act as an umbrella. Soon, Gerald and Piggie learn that there are fun ways to play in the rain, and Piggie declares that he hopes it never stops raining...just as it does stop raining. Now Piggie wishes it would rain, so Gerald obliges with his trunk. The fun, funny story of friendship is illustrated with simple line drawings of Gerald and Piggie, and the dialogue appears in speech bubbles color-coded to the animal saying them so that it is easy, even for non-readers, to follow who is saying what. This story, part of a series following Gerald and Piggie, would be a good choice for children learning to read and reluctant readers alike; Gerald and Piggie are believable, likable characters, and although they do not talk about their friendship, it is clear to see from the story.

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When I saw the new Elephant and Piggie easy reader on our department's cart of new books, I think I actually squealed. The new entry will not disappoint fans of the series. In this outing, Piggie and Gerald are all pumped up to start playing outside, but a rainstorm appears to threaten their fun.

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Once again Willems somehow crams so much expression onto his character's very simple faces with Piggie carrying much of the dialogue this time. While there aren't as many laugh out loud moments in this story as in some of the other Elephant and Piggie readers, the sweetness of the story and the possiblities for acting it out make up for that fact. I can just see a room full of preschool children running, skipping and jumping with Piggie or you could put Are You Ready to Play Outside? with Rain Play by Cynthia Cotton and The Rain Stomper by Addie Boswell for a rain themed storytime. I can't wait to see what will be next for Elephant and Piggie.

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Yet another Elephant and Piggie book! This one focuses on friendship and helping each other out when we are having trouble finding things to do.

Are You Ready to Play Outside? by Mo Willems won the Theodore Geisel award in 2009. Piggie and Gerald want to play outside but the weather isn't cooperating. It's pouring outside and Piggie hates the rain!

The book has the usual back and forth's so popular in the Elephant and Piggie books. Piggie

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can't contain her energy and Gerald suggests caution when it comes to playing. The rain, though, is something that Gerald can handle better than his friend.

It's a cute book but not as memorable as others in the series are. The one scene that sticks with me is Gerald helping Piggie play in the rain without getting wet.

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