The Umbrella

The Umbrella
Written and Illustrated by Jan Brett
Publisher: Putnam Juvenile
September, 2004
Grade levels: K-3
Theme: Multicultural and Rainforest

Summary: A young boy named Carlos enters into the Cloud Forest in hopes to finds all sorts of animals. He leaves his umbrella at the base of the Fig Tree and climbs up it to get a better look. Carlos doesn't have much luck at the top of the tree. He can't seem to find any animals because they have all one by one hoped into the umbrella.The umbrella then toples over because there are so many animals trying to fit and they all run away. Carlos climbs down the tree gets his umbrella and heads home, but he is determined to try again the next day.

Reflection: My favorite part of this book are the illustrations. The colors are beautiful and there is so much detail. There is not much of a plot, but I think this book is great way to begin teaching children about a Cloud Forest and the animals in it.

Pre-Reading: We will begin by talking about somethings you might see in a Cloud Forest. I will explain to them that a Cloud Forest is like a Rainforest. I will show the students some of the pictures in the book and we will talk about what they notice.

Post-Reading: We will be making our own Cloud Forest in the classroom. Students will have a choice to either make animals, plants or flowers. To make our plants, animals or flowers we will use all different colors of paper.

About the Author:

Jan Brett lives in a seacoast town in Massachusetts, close to where she grew up. As a child Brett loved drawing and reading. She was a student at Boston Museum school. She loves traveling with her husband and gets many ideas for her stories. Brett has over thirty seven million books in print.