Mem Fox Books Views

General Goods

These websites are about author Mem Fox and her books. Explore the authory’s website to find out more about her background. Read reviews of her books and complete activities. Includes links to eThemes on the book <“Koala Lou,a” the continent Australia, the continent Africa, and African culture and history.

Start by telling the students that the author, Mem Fox, wrote this book in one evening. She was surprised she wrote it so quickly and thought that the two good rhyming lines helped her write it. Ask the students if they remember those two rhyming lines. After writing it the first time, she went back and changed some things. She made the first half of the story have the repeating line time for bed and the second half of the story has the line time for sleep. Re-read Book 1 Time for Bed and ask the students if they enjoyed reading the book. Then, tell the students your reasons for reading and ask them what their reasons are. They should share with a buddy and then come back together to share reasons. Record their reasons on a chart. Introduce the students to their Reader's Notebooks. Have them record their first entry by writing and drawing the reasons they read.

Introduce the idea of an author study to the class. Tell some basic biographical information about Mem Fox. Add the title of the first book to the attribute chart and explain that it will help everyone to remember important things about all of the books they read by Mem Fox. Tell them that she does not illustrate her books. Fill in the rest of the parts of the attribute chart for the first book (except theme). Explain that theme is the most important message in the story. Hold up Mem Fox's books one at a time to show the students. Assign students to groups to explore her books. Ask them to try and look for patterns in the books, but that they don't need to read them.

Today's focus will be comparing a contrasting the books Koala Lou and Possum Magic using Venn diagrams. Tell the students that comparing books helps you to understand them better and point to the Good Reader's Notice chart. It will also help them to understand Mem Fox as a writer. Read aloud Possum Magic to refresh their memories. After reading, ask students for similarities and differences between the two stories and record them on the Venn diagram. Then, ask them if they noticed anything new by comparing the two books. Ask them if they have any questions that they'd like to ask Mem Fox now. You might start with an example. Have students work with a partner to compare two books to fill out a Venn diagram in their notebooks.