Teaching Process Skills with Children’s Literature: Graphs

Graphs written by Bonnie Bader and illustrated by Mernie Gallagher Cole is a story about a boy who does not want to go to his family reunion.  Gary, the boy gives many reasons as to why he can’t go to the reunion, including his math homework. His mom tells him to bring his math homework to the party. Gary brings his homework to the party and creates a line, bar and, pie graph of different things at the party. The other children get excited with his work and help Gary complete his graphs.

“I told them about my math homework. I thought they would be bored by it and leave me alone. I was wrong. “We love math!” said Bobby.”

Curriculum Connection

This book is intended to help students learn how to graph different kinds of information. This book can be a good introduction to the different types of graphs. It can also help the students with different things that they can graph. This book can be used for VA SOLs

2.1 f- pictures and bar graphs are constructed using numbered axes

3.1 g- where students will gather, chart, and graph data .

Additional Resources

  • Make A Bar Graph is a great exercise for students to begin learning to make bar graphs themselves. This worksheet has two different sets of information for the students to practice bar graphing.
  • This website gives students more information on the different types of graphs. This website also provides activities for the students to complete their own graphs.
  • This game gives students the opportunity to make their own pie chart. The students can explore and move the different parts of the graph to see how this changes the pie chart. It is very interactive so it helps the students stay engaged.

General Information

Book: Graphs
Author: Bonnie Bader
Illustrator: Mernie Gallagher Cole
Publisher: Grosset & Dunlap
Publication Date: 2003
Pages: 48 pages
Grade Range: 1-3
ISBN: 0-448-42896-2

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