Teachers that are looking for a book for students during an election or President’s Day will love Doreen Cronin’s book Duck For President. Farmer Brown and friends are back, but this time Duck wants to be in charge. Students will learn about elections and campaigning in this playful and entertaining story. . - Jodi and the Starts With a Story Team
SUMMARY
Duck For President is another book from Doreen Cronin’s series with characters from Farmer Dave’s Farm. In this story, Duck is tired of doing chores all day and getting dirty. He decides to hold an election where he will run against Farmer Dave. The animals on the farm register to vote and Duck wins! However, running the farm is much more work than Duck imagined.
He decides to get his friends together and run for governor. He makes speeches and meets a lot of people. On election day, Duck wins the governor is very upset. Duck soon realizes that being governor is also a lot of work. That night he and his staff start planning his campaign to run for president. Once in office, Duck realizes how hard the job is and sees an help-wanted ad looking for a duck. He takes the position and returns to the farm with his friends and Farmer Dave.
USE THIS BOOK TO TEACH:
While we love that this book is a great read aloud for elections or President’s Day, it can also be used to teach a variety of literacy concepts. Reads alouds are a great way to practice reading comprehension strategies, writing, grammar skills and social emotional learning concepts. Take a look at some ideas for using this book in your classroom.Â
- This book is a perfect mentor text to practice making inferences. Stop throughout the reading and ask students what they can infer based on the character’s actions.
- Another reading comprehension strategy this book lends itself to is compare and contrast. Work with students to compare and contrast the different jobs Duck tried.Â
- Integrate creative writing by asking students to continue the story and write about what would happen.Â
- Engage students in letter writing by asking them to write letters from the characters points of view.Â
- Teach a lesson on plural nouns and irregular verbs using examples from the book.Â
- Introduce students to different homophones.
- Discuss the importance of goal setting.
NO-PREP PRINTABLE ACTIVITIES:
If you are looking for “ready to go” activities for the first day of school, be sure to check out the book companion. With it you’ll receive all of the following resources to align with this specific book:
- comprehension questions
- 30Â writing prompts with themed paper
- vocabulary activities
- word study print & go activities
- ideas for grammar lessons with focus sentence printables
- social emotional learning discussion topics
- graphic organizers to target specific comprehension skills and strategies
This Starts With a Story book companion has over 30 comprehension questions teachers can ask students as they read the book. Each comprehension question have a possible student answer to help teachers with their discussion. We have also included 30 writing prompts, ideas for teaching three grammar skills, and discussion ideas for integrating social emotional learning. The book companion has graphic organizers and worksheets that are a great way for students to practice new skills or demonstrate their learning. We hope this resource makes planning and teaching so much easier!
GET THE PRINTABLE ACTIVITIES
ADDITIONAL BOOK SUGGESTIONS
You and your students will also love these similar books:
- Sofia Valdez, Future Prez by Andrea Beaty
- Grace For President by Kelly DiPucchio
- Click, Clack, Moo by Doreen Cronin
- If I Ran For President by Catherine Stier
TRY OUT A SAMPLE COMPANION
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