Hopkins Award Poetry: BEHOLD THE BOLD UMBRELLAPHANT AND OTHER POEMS

BIBLIOGRAPHY: 

Prelutsky, Jack. 2006. BEHOLD THE BOLD UMBRELLAPHANT AND OTHER POEMS. New York, NY: Greenwillow Books. ISBN: 978-0-06-054317-4.

REVIEW AND CRITICAL ANALYSIS:  

Behold the Umbrellaphant is a collection of 17 poems written by Jack Prelutsky.  Each poem is about a creature that is part animal and part inanimate object.  For example, the Alarmadillos have alarm clocks for bodies, and the Ballpoint Penguins can write with their beaks.  The poems are fun and extremely witty.  Prelutzky has included clever wordplay with rhyme and meter that make them a great choice for read alouds.

A table of contents is included at the beginning of the book to help readers find their favorite poems quickly and easily.  Carin Berger has used unique collage illustrations to perfectly complement Prelutsky’s unconventional creatures he has created in his poems.  She has included many details and layers in her collages that make the creatures in the illustrations really come to life.  

THE CLOCKTOPUS

Emerging from the salty sea,

A wondrous beast appears.

It clearly is a CLOCKTOPUS,

We marvel as it nears.

It moves with slow precision

At a never-changing pace,

Its tentacles in tempo

With the clock upon its face.

While undulating east to west

Across the swirling sand,

It ticks away the minutes,

And it has a second hand.

We watch it for an hour

And it never goes astray-

There's nothing like a CLOCKTOPUS 

To tell the time of day. 

Berger's illustration is of an octopus with a clock for a face and a clock of some kind on each of his eight arms.  She has cleverly made parts of the clock that is the octopus face appear to look like eyes.  

Kids would have a great time creating their own illustrations for these poems.  The teacher or librarian could read the poems out loud without showing the illustrations.  To make sure they understand the animal and the object that are combined, the teacher/librarian could lead a class discussion.  The kids could then illustrate their mental images and compare illustrations with other students in the class to see each other's mental images.  

After studying animal adaptations, kids could create their own animal/object combinations and create a poem about it.  The object could serve as an adaptation for the animal that gives it an advantage in some way.  After they write their poem, they could illustrate their new creature they have created.