“Baloney (Henry P.)” by Jon Scieszka and Lane Smith
Henry is an alien from another planet who goes to school just like the earthlings on our planet. He also struggles with a similar problem: tardiness. However, he is also blessed with a vivid imagination and this story is one that he creates to tell his teacher why he is late. Sure, it’s a “tall tale”, but it is very entertaining and Henry is in luck because that morning’s assigment just happens to be to compose a tall tale.
Henry is a completely lovable and relatable character in this story and the illustrations are bright and full of texture. Although so many different aspects of this book are fantastic, my favorite is that throughout his story Henry uses words from different languages to tell his story. This gives little readers the perfect opportunity to practice their inferring and decoding skills to understand what is going on. As a teacher, I loved sharing this book with my students!
Click here to purchase “Baloney (Henry P.)” *affiliate link
Free Printable Sheet for Decoding Practice with “Baloney (Henry P.)”
As mentioned above, the use of foreign language in this book makes it perfect to practice decoding skills and it was a favorite book for me to use with my students. When I did this activity in my classroom the first time I read the story I wouldn’t show them the illustrations and I would have them write down their guessed definitions of the foreign words based off of context clues alone.
The second time that I read the book I would show them the pictures and allow them to change their guessed definitions based on this new information. This allowed them to practice the skill of using illustrations to decode. Then, finally, after two readings I would tell them what each word actually meant so that they could see how well they did and what a great role context clues and illustrations play in inferring. A handy thing about this book is at throughout the book each foreign word is in a different color of text so that it is easy to spot and at the very end of the book there is a “decoding” page that will tell you what the actual definition of each word is as well as what language it is. Brilliant right? I hope your children and your students enjoy this activity as much as mine did and I hope that the free printable below is convenient and useful in your experience. Happy decoding!
Click here to print and download the Baloney (Henry P.) Sheet
If you give this Beyond the Book activity a try I’d love to hear how it goes! Share it on Instagram using hashtag #beyondthebook (I’m on Instagram as @book.nerd.mommy) or even just comment here with your thoughts. It would make my day! Or to simply save for later pin the image below.
Also, if you love this activity, you may be interested in my decoding/inferring activity (including a free printable) that I paired with the book “Du Iz Tak?”. Check it out here.
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