| I recently read a book called Pickles and the P-Flock Bullies, a story about a young Orca named Pickles and her new friend, Stitches, a harbor seal. The pair meet a group of seagulls who invite Pickles to join their group, but ridicule and push away Stitches. Pickles is left to decide if she should stick up for her friend or join the "cool" P-Flock seagulls. What I found exceptional about this book is the honest conversation about how easily we can be manipulated by negative forces, such as bullies. When a strong personality invites you in, it's hard to refuse and even harder to stand up and call out their bullying behaviors. When in this difficult situation, Pickles finds herself joining in with the crowd, further humiliating her friend. |
Pickles and the P-Flock Bullies is a book written with beautiful detail and imagery that your students will find themselves both relating to and enjoying. I would most likely share this with my 3rd grade classrooms and conduct a follow-up activity with foam fish, similar to this one.
| Students would sit in a circle, if possible, and take turns "fishing" out of the pile of foam sea creatures. There are a few ways that you could structure this activity, but I would probably number the fish so that each one corresponded with a specific type of question. Some of the questions would be about the story (summarizing, details, etc.), while others would be how the story applies to our day-to-day school lives. These could be situation-based questions to see if a student could decide how to respond to bullying or simply discussion starters to open up an honest class conversation about the topic. Overall, I definitely recommend this book! |
Are you an author? Do you have a book that you would like me to review on my blog? If so, contact me at marissa@elementaryschoolcounseling.org. I'd be happy to check out your work and spread the word to my readers.
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