A walk through the Costa Rican cloud forest provides a wonderfully lush setting for Jan Brett’s beloved animal illustrations. When Carlos drops his umbrella to climb a tree for a better view of the animals, they all cram into the banana-leaf umbrella as it floats by–from the little tree frog to the baby tapir to the big jaguar and more. It gets so crowded in the umbrella that there isn’t even enough room for a little hummingbird! So over the umbrella tumbles, everyone falls out, and poor Carlos comes back wondering why he didn’t see any animals all day.
In the spirit of Jan Brett’s The Mitten and The Hat, this cheerful tale of escalation will have readers poring over every illustration for the world of details Jan packs in. With its classic story, exotic jungle setting, and brilliantly colorful menagerie, The Umbrella is sure to take its place among Jan’s many family favorites.
- ISBN: 9780399242151
- Author: Brett, Jan
- Published: 2004 , Putnam Juvenile
- Themes: Animals, jungle, Nature, Rainforests, Spanish
- Descriptors: Bilingual, Central America, Costa Rica, Picture Book, Primary (ages 6-9)
- No. of pages: 32
I selected The Umbrella by Jan Brett because I have read her other books such as The Mitten and Three Snow Bears. I not only love her illustrations but love the simplicity of her books and the language she uses throughout it. I also like the way the illustrations on the side of the pages tells the reader what’s coming next. I chose to review this book because I teach pre-k and when I read her stories my class loves it. After reading this book I thought about het other book The Mitten where all of the animals try to fit in the boys white glove that gets lost in the snow. After reading this book it reminds me of the book The Great Kapok Tree: A Tale of the Amazon Rain Forest and all of the animals that whisper reasons to a man who has fallen asleep about to chop down the tree.
This book really made me think of the problem of destroying the rainforests in today’s world and how many animals live there and the natural beauty of the rainforest in general. I think this book can teach children to not rush into things sometimes and try to really sit down and take in everything around you, because if the boy waited he might have seen all of the animals in his umbrella. I also think this book can provoke discussion of the destruction of nature happening to build cities and buildings and people forgetting about the animals living on the earth with us. I think that this book can really help spark conversation about this within the classroom and engage children of various ages. I think that after reading this story the boy might go back into the cloud forest the next day and maybe sit down and wait for the animals to come out or take his time instead of climbing up the tree. The author could also have the boy bring in something else and then name some other rainforest animals that get into mischief with it.
I think that this book could be a great addition to a classroom library because it’s not only a great resource for rainforest characteristics and its living creatures within it but also rich in language. I think this book can be used in a variety of ways for many different lessons such as art lessons to help children visualize and really see what the rainforest looks like with its rich colors and wildlife. I also think this could be used for a writing lesson such as creating a story with different rainforest animals. This can be used in a social studies lesson for example about what’s going on in our world today with extinction and the impact on mankind on nature. This can even be used in a science class for example to learn about the climate and characteristics of the rainforest such as mist and water. Students can even predict or research why he called it the “cloud forest”. I feel that this is a great book to use in the classroom and can be used in a variety of different grades across the curriculum.