Children’s Literature Evaluation Form

Your Name: Samantha Wasylkowski

Book Title: Bark in the Park! Poems for Dog Lovers

Author: Avery Corman

Genre: Poetry

Illustrator: Hyewom Yum

Publisher/Year: Orchard Books, 2019

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)

Interesting information the reader learns from this book is information about all different types of

dogs. Examples: “The Beagle is bent, on tracking a scent” Beagles are known for being able to track

scents. “German Shepard, He’s a police dog for some, Because he’s so clever.” German Shepard’s

are known for being intelligent police dogs.

The word choices throughout the book are mostly simple that children would be able to understand

and words that are already in their vocabulary like “grumpy”, “sweet”, “polite”, “tiny”, “tall”, “like

she’s a hot dog”, “looks like a sheep”, “he’s friendly and he’s lovable”.

There is no dialogue in the book. The sentence length is mostly short but does vary slightly. “Why,

she’s so tall, you can almost ride her.” He follows his nose, wherever it goes.” “She thinks she’s

bigger than she is.” “So, here’s to dogs both big and little, and the others in the middle.”

There is rhyme throughout the book, “The Bulldog is lumpy and always looks grumpy.” “Mostly,

people love, the little Pug’s mug.” “As foxy as the fox is foxy, it takes a dog with lots of moxie.”
“Whatever you lose, you’d better believe it, the Labrador Retriever is sure to retrieve it.”
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 characters throughout the book change. On each page, there is a different dog poem, and

the specific dog is the main character.

There are 38 different breeds of dogs that each have their own individual poem.
Plot: Summarize the major events of the story (6 points)
The story begins with a woman and her child walking an Afghan Hound and, in the background, you

see row houses with various dogs in the windows. Throughout the story you see different parts of

the city like coffee shops, markets, a gym, the park and a dog park, a playground, a bus stop, a

theater, etc. When the book finishes, it brings you back to a row house with a man and his child and

a bunch of dogs.
Setting: Explain the place and time of this book. (2 points)

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

The setting of this book is a day through a city where people are walking their dogs through the

park where there are many different types of dogs interacting and then back through the city where

you see people with their dogs.

The main message of this book is informative, the book is just telling you about different types of

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

The illustrations in the book are naïve, they are child-like.

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

Painterly Media
Give examples of describe how the following visual elements are used in the illustrations: (3)
Line: We see a lot of diagonal lines which suggest movement because the illustrations are made as

if the people and dogs are moving throughout the city. An example: On the sixth page, there are

diagonal lines on the sidewalk and the deli building. A man and child are walking up to the deli

building and a bloodhound is nose to the ground following the diagonal line on the sidewalk

following a scent.

Shapes: Most of the shapes throughout this book are easily identifiable and curved which shows

things that are alive and organic like the humans and the dogs. You do also see angular shapes in

the buildings, fences, playground equipment, that show inorganic objects built by humans.

Color: The book is full of color, all different colors in varying shades and hues. There are cool colors

and warm colors.

Texture: We do see texture throughout the book where the illustrator uses varying lines in different

lengths and widths to express the texture of the dog’s fur/hair as well as the human’s hair.
Page design (placement of the illustrations, use of borders, white and dark space, and all pages the

same or different). (3)

Throughout the book, the illustrations cover both pages. The pages are all different in the sense

that you are seeing different backgrounds (parts of the city) and a different dog in focus. Four times

there is only one dog in the scene (with one poem about that dog) across the two-page spread. On

19 pages, the background scene is the same, but each page focuses on one dog. On 6 pages, the

background scene is the same but there is a focus on more than one dog.

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

connection to the book Chose 1 only (5 points)

Piaget:
 Name the stage: Preoperational Stage and the age: 2 to 7 years.

Explain the cognitive development from this stage and provide an example from the book to support

your choice:

The cognitive development from this stage is that children understand the world through language

and mental images. I think this book supports this theory because it gives you an illustration of the

dog and it gives you information about the dog. An example would be on the page where you can

find the Dalmatian, most associate Dalmatian’s with fire stations, the page with the Dalmatian has a

firetruck and firefighters. Dalmatians are also white with black spots and the poem of the Dalmatian

reads “You’ve got an easy way to spot him. He has spots on his top and spots on his bottom.”

1 would not recommend 2 average 3 highly recommended.

Your rating of the book: 2, average.

I would rate this book a two because I think it is informative on dogs, the poems are short which is

good for younger ages, the illustrations are colorful and vibrant which I think would catch the

children’s attention. I think the book is longer and there are so many different dogs that it might be

hard to keep a younger child’s interest for the time it takes to read through all the poems.

Book Extension Activity (25 points)

Your Name: Samantha Wasylkowski

Book Title: Bark in the Park! Poems for Dog Lovers

Book Author: Avery Corman

Publisher: Orchard Books

Date: April 2019

1. Pre-K/CCSD K-2nd Grade Core Standard (5 points)

 2.PK.3: Identify pictures to aid in comprehension.

 L.PK.7: Identify and sort animals by observable characteristics.

 L.PK.1: Investigate animals.

 P.PK.1: Sort objects according to observable properties

 3.PK.1: Compare objects by size to determine smaller and larger.

 2.PK.1: Sort objects by similar attributes

2. Objectives (What will children expect to learn?) (5 points)

 Remember events and characters from a story.

 Identify animals based on characteristics.

 Sort animals based on characteristics.

 Begin to become interested in animals and identify a variety of animals.

 Sort objects by shape, color, size.

 Sort items from smallest to largest.

 Match items that are similar in size.

 Give reasons for placement of objects in groups.

3. Materials and Equipment needed: (5 points)

 Book, Bark in the Park! Poems for Dog Lovers by Avery Corman
  Cardboard

 Pictures of common dogs from the book attached to cardboard, I chose Chihuahua,

Dachshund, Yorkshire Terrier, Shih Tzu, Beagle, Bulldog, Pug, Jack Russell Terrier,

German Shepard, Labrador, Dalmatian, and Siberian Husky.

 Printed Labels: Small Dogs, Medium Dogs, Large Dogs.

 Poster Board

4. Teaching (What will you do?) (5 points)

First, we will read the book Bark in the Park! Poems for Dog Lovers by Avery Corman. After

reading the book, the children will volunteer to share if they have a dog and what kind of dog

they have. We will take a picture walk back through the book and I will ask “Do you see any

small dogs?” and the children will point out which dogs are small, and we will review the name

of the small dog(s). We will repeat the picture walk through the book for medium and large

dogs, each time identifying the name of the dog breed.

I will show the children an example of the posterboard labeled Small Dogs, Medium Dogs and

Large Dogs. I will show the children an example of the dogs I placed in each of the columns, an

example for the small dog would be the Yorkshire Terrier, a medium dog would be the Jack

Russell Terrier, and a large dog would be the Siberian Husky. The children will work in groups of

two to place the cardboard picture dogs in each column of the posterboard for the dogs that

are small breed dogs, medium breed dogs, and large breed dogs.

5. Closure: (2 points)
After we finish the activity, we will discuss why we placed the dogs into each category. We will

discuss what category our own dog (if we have any) would go into. We will discuss if we like

small, medium, or big dogs.

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

 National Geographic Book of Animal Poetry by Patrick J. Lewis

 Snow Still by Holly Surplice

 A Hatful of Dragons by Vikram Madan