Pumpkins!!!

Seed, Sprout, Pumpkin, Pie. Who can resist a book with a pumpkin? Granted it is not the most interesting book I have read, but it explains what pumpkins are and how we use them. The book was produced by National Geographic and shows it by its photographs of the life cycle of a pumpkin. I'm not sure this book would be incredibly interesting to a lot of students, but it might be a good read around Halloween or Thanksgiving when students have pumpkins on their mind. They can see where a pumpkin comes from, and I could use it as a jumping-off point for pumpkin-related activities. The book is very straight forward and tricks the reader in the middle when it says "the end....unless."
Overall, I cannot say that I really liked this book. There are many nonfiction books that are a lot more interesting. Although it isn't the most interesting topic, there were a lot of ways that this could have been heightened up so that students could feel as though they weren't so much learning as experiencing. The book is colorful and would keep a kids attention, but there is no real impact that this book has. Overall, I would not recommend this book very highly if a teacher was looking for a book about pumpkins.

However, here are some sites you can use for planning pumpkin-filled activities!

http://www.easyfunschool.com/ThemeFunPumpkins.html

http://www.educationworld.com/a_lesson/lesson/lesson028.shtml

http://www.sedl.org/scimath/compass/v01n02/pumpkin.html