Cindy Hewitt is a retired teacher with a passion for children's literature. Read-aloud stories add quality to a child's life experiences.
Big Words and a Dinosaur Create Interest in Expanding Vocabulary
Grow Your Young Reader's Vocabulary By Learning Big Words With Theo
Shelli R. Johannes' Theo TheSaurus: The Dinosaur Who Loved Big Words is the perfect picture book and story to introduce your young reader to building their vocabulary and learning to use a thesaurus. Theo loves big words and is excited to get back to learning for the new school year. Meeting new friends will be a challenge for Theo because he loves big words and he is afraid that no one will understand him when he talks. Theo is a TheSaurus. His new friends have no idea what a TheSaurus is and they wonder if he is even a real dionsaur. They have a ton of questions. Theo tries to explain his species with a huge word "logomaniacs". These are word lovers. His new friends are still confused and Theo is determined to help them understand him. He begins to share more big words and their meanings and alternatives to the big words. How about going to the "arthenaeum"? Theo explains that big word is another word for "library". Theo is still determined to teach his new friends about using big words for other words. He makes the decision to write a special invitation on the chalkboard for his new friends to read. His new friends did not understand and Theo waited and waited for them to respond to his invitation. His parents helped to solve the problem. The surprise ending will bring Theo's problem to a happy solution with communicating with his new school friends. Theo finally has an opportunity to use his favorite big word.
Mike Moran contributed his talents as an illustrator to Theo TheSaurus: The Dinosaur Who Loved Big Words. Colorful and fun illustrations fill the pages with Theo's friends and learning big words. A glossary of Theo's big words is included.
A notable feature of the story is that new vocabulary is placed in a block with a definition on some of the pages with "Defino-Dino" to introduce the word and definition.
Theo TheSaurus: The Dinosaur Who Loved Big Words was published by Philomel Books, a division of Random House. It is recommended for ages 5-8 and has an ISBN of 978-0-593-20551-8.
Colorful and Fun Illustrations With Theo's Big Words
Bring Theo the TheSaurus Into Your Homeschool Curriculum
Many parents will opt in to homeschooling their young children this year. Building a curriculum for young students can sometimes be challenging. Picture books like Theo TheSaurus: The Dinosaur Who Loved Big Words is a great choice to begin teaching vocabulary to young children. Improving and building a good vocabulary is the key to helping young children with reading. Young children actually like to learn big words. They enjoy language and language activities.
*Read Theo TheSaurus: The Dinosaur Who Loved Big Words in a story time session. Call attention to the big words that are printed in the text with dark black letters. These words are strategically placed in blocks on pages with the definition of these words. These are some of Theo's favorite words.
*Have a thesaurus available for children to learn to use. Find Theo's big words from the story in a real thesaurus.
*Provide drawing paper, crayons, and markers for children to illustrate some of Theo's big words after learning the meanings.
*Use the Glossary at the end of the story to add more big words to your child's vocabulary. Teach the definitions for each word.
*Engage your child in a discussion of favorite big words.
*What is Theo's favorite big word? How many other words can you learn that mean the same as Theo's favorite big word?
*Make a list of some of Theo's big words. Count the letters in each word. Which word has the most letters? This activity can also serve as a math activity. Create a math graph of the longest words from the story.
© 2021 Cindy Hewitt