Children’s Literature Evaluation Form

Your Name: Samantha Wasylkowski

Book Title: The Pigeon HAS to Go to School

Author: Mo Willems

Genre: Modern Fantasy

Illustrator: Mo Willems

Publisher/Year: Disney Publishing Worldwide, 2003.

Evaluate the Book for the following elements
Style and Language: Using examples for the book, explain the following: Word choices, dialogue,

rhythm, rhyme and sentence length. Share unexpected insights or interesting information the

reader learns from this story. (5 points)

Word Choices are simple words that children can easily understand. Examples: teacher, school,

stuff, scared, dude, practice.

Dialogue is easily read and understood as if the Pigeon is the same age as the children listening to

the story. “Does school start in the morning?” “My head might pop off.” “I’m… Scared…” “Maybe a

playground…”

The story has a great flow of language/words. The sentence length varies. Examples: “Why do I

have to go to school?”, “I’m a fragile bird.”, “I’m scared”.

Character: With examples from the book, provide the following- (5 points)

Who is the main character?

How can the reader relate to the character?

Who are the supporting characters?

The main character of the story is Pigeon. There are no supporting characters. The reader can relate

to the character because children are sometimes scared of change and scared or anxious to go to
school just like the Pigeon but as the story goes, he learns more about what is going to happen at

school and then he is excited about going which is relatable to children going to school for the first

time.
Plot: Summarize the major events of the story (6 points)
The Pigeon learns he has to go to school but he does not want to go to school. The pigeon asks

questions about what happens at school. The pigeon learns that school is there to help him learn

the things he needs to know. Pigeon realizes he gets to ride the bus to school and is excited to go to

school.
Setting: Explain the place and time of this book. (2 points)

Theme: What is the main message of this book? (2 points)

The time and place of the story are a time right before school is starting for pigeon. The main

message of this book is it is okay to be nervous or anxious about starting school, but school is good

for you.
Illustration: Analyze the book you selected with the following categories
Style (realism, surrealism, expressionism, impressionism, naïve, cartoon art)? (2 points)

Cartoon Art
Media Choice (paints, oils watercolors, pencils, pen, charcoal, crayons, acrylic, chalk): (2 points)

Pencils and crayons.

Give examples of describe how the following visual elements are used in the illustrations: (3)

Line: A mix of straight and flowing lines. The flowing lines around the pigeon suggest the movement

of the pigeon.

Shapes: Pigeon is made of curved shapes that suggest he is alive. We see angular shapes in the

school bus to suggest objects built by humans.

Color: We see a lot of cool hues throughout the book, Pigeon is blue, purple, and white. We see

muted but bright colors throughout the book.

Texture: We see the artist using varying thickness of lines to show texture on the pigeon, an
example is when the pigeon is blushing, there are lines on his cheek to show texture.
Page design (placement of the illustrations, use of borders, white and dark space and all pages the

same or different). (3)

The illustrations take up the whole page with color, there is no use of borders or white space. There

are 22 pages of each page having a different illustration. There are 3 pages where the illustration

takes the whole two-page spread. There are 2 pages where there are four separate illustrations on

one page. There is only one page that has two separate illustrations on one page.

Child Development Theory: Choose either Piaget, Erickson or Social Emotional to describe the

connection to the book Chose 1 only (5 points)

Emotional Development: Cognitive strategies help create emotional self-regulation. Increase

language creates more automatic response to empathy.

Identify the age: 3 to 6 years.

Explain the social development for this age and how the book relates to the emotional level you

chose:

Children can identify with the pigeon when he reacts to being nervous and anxious about all the

things that happen at school because children will have to go to school, too. They can empathize

with the pigeon because they have similar feelings about school. “I’m… Scared…” “What will happen

at school?” “There should be a place to practice those things!” “…with experts to help you, and

books, and classrooms, and other birds to work and play with… and maybe a playground.” “OH! That

is school.”

1 would not recommend 2 average 3 highly recommended

 Your rating of the book: 3, highly recommend.

Why? I highly recommend this book because I believe it is relatable to children who are nervous

about going to school. It is also a very easy read, and it is humorous. When reading this book (and all

the Pigeon books) to the children in my prekindergarten class, they always laugh and add into the

story.

Book Extension Activity

Your Name: Samantha Wasylkowski

Book Title: The Pigeon HAS to Go to School

Book Author: Mo Willems

Publisher: Disney Publishing Worldwide.

Date: 2003

1. Pre-K/CCSD K-2nd Grade Core Standard

 3.K.9: with assistance, make connections to self.

 5.K.2: with assistance, draw or communicate ideas in written form

 6.K.1: with assistance, draw or write to communicate

 7.K.5: actively listen to and participate in conversations

 VA.K3.32: create artwork that demonstrates choice of subject matter and symbols to

communicate meaning

2. Objectives (What will children expect to learn?)

 use deliberate letter choices during writing attempts

 draw a picture of a familiar experience

 dictate a related experience

 Participate in conversations with others

 Understand how to express themselves through art

3. Materials and Equipment needed:

 story paper

 drawing materials (colored pencils, markers, crayons)

 book, The Pigeon HAS to Go to School by Mo Willems

4. Teaching (What will you do?)

Before reading the story, The Pigeon HAS to Go to School by Mo Willems, we would

discuss what we do at school and why we come to school every day. I would ask the

children “what is your favorite part of school?” and “what is your least favorite part of

school?” We would then read the book; The Pigeon HAS to Go to School by Mo Willems.

We would discuss how we relate to the book. I would ask the children “if the Pigeon

asked you what happens at school, what would you tell him?” We would then use story

paper and drawing materials to create a picture of what happens at school in their

opinion. We would also attempt to write what we drew a picture of by filling in the

sentence, “What happens at school is ________.”

5. Closure:
 After finishing the activity, we will discuss if we felt similar or different to the pigeon

when starting school for the first time.

6. List 3 additional books in this genre to extend the learning:

 Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus by Mo Willems

 Don’t Let the Pigeon Stay Up Late by Mo Willems

 The Pigeon Needs a Bath by Mo Willems