A Peacock on the Roof By Paul Adshead Ages 3-10

Children between 2 and 92 will enjoy pouring over Paul Adshead's stunning illustrations of life in and around his beautiful garden, home to countless animals. The author-illustrator himself is "The Man who loves birds" in this true story of a peacock family that lives in his garden. Prince is the peacock of the title. The peahen is Pavlova and their three peachicks are Little Prince, Solomon and Sweet Pea. A strange cat frightens the peachicks but Prince is too busy trying to get attention to help guard his family. When he has to be rescued from the rooftop of a nearby house, he causes quite a stir. Children alone in the house provide a good example for what to do when a stranger comes to the door. Have extra fun exploring the illustrations to find cats and words cleverly hidden in the artwork. Another bonus is in the set-up of the story. It is divided into six chapters with a purpose: each chapter introduces a new character, a great way to introduce children to the use of chapters.

Benefits:

* develops vocabulary as possible new words are introduced (eg. vain, peahen, launched, wellingtons, rumpus etc.)
* introduces child to literature using chapters
* uses colour, double-page spreads, beautiful illustrations
* emphasizes visual images
* illustrations blend with the text to add interest
* projects human traits onto animal characters
* promotes discussion on care of animals and birds
* encourages use of visual motor and observational skills as child and parent try to find hidden storyteller on each page
* engages the child in emergent reading behavior as the child "re-reads" the story alone with the illustrations to re-tell the story in their own language
* utilizes a very attractive format which directly relates to the text

Extended Thinking:

* "if you could be any character in the book, who would you be and why?"
* list the frequency of the little animals - eg. how many times to we see the mouse? the ladybug? the rabbit? the hedgehog? the frog?
* plan a field trip to see a real peacock

*Key Learning Areas:

Literacy - Intermediate Reading
Literacy - Advanced Reading
Observation & Visual Perception
Memory & Concentration
Problem Solving Skills

* Art Work - beautiful illustrations using a combination of media - colours are bright and the illustrations are very realistic
*Dimensions: 32 pages 268 x 245mm