So You Want to Be President?

Title: So You Want to Be President?

Author: Judith St. George

Illustrator: David Small

Publisher: http://us.penguingroup.com/static/pages/publishers/yr/philomel.html

Publication Date: 2000

Genre: History, Picture Book

Audience: Gr. 3-5

Awards: 2001 Caldecott Medal

Overview: This book is a comprehensive guide to the Presidents of the United States, but presented in a fun picture book way. It explains details about the family, education, prior occupations, mannerisms, pets, children, pastimes, and etc about all of the presidents. This book also includes some details about vice-presidents. It allows students to relate to the past Presidents and see what some of them were really like. It is a fun way to present History, and the pictures in the book are amazing and educational.

Activity: One activity you could do with this book is to have each student pick a different president and create a research project on that president. You could also do a class project where you see what president has the same pet, pastime, etc as that student and then have the class play those presidents in a reader’s theatre based on the book.

Reviewer’s Name: Paige Martin