Picture Book #5 Mr. George Baker

 

Author:Amy Hest

Title: Mr. George Baker

Illustrator:Jon J Muth

Readability: 2.7  Kindergarten

Genre: Picture Book

Subgenre: African American Literature

Theme: Your never too old to go back to school. Role Model. Friendship

Primary and Secondary Characters: Mr. George Baker, Harry, Mrs. Baker
Award(s) and date of publication: 2004

Publishing Company: Candlewick Press

ISBN number: 0-7636-1233-2

Summary and how the book will be used with students:

Mr. George Baker is an African American man who lives next door to a young boy named Harry. Every morning Mr. George yells for Harry to come and sit beside him as they wait for the yellow school bus to come to pick them up for school. Harry says that Mr. George Baker is a hundred years old. He wears baggy pants, a sweater with three buttons down the front, ties knots in shoes that never comes out. Mr. George and Harry even carry red backpacks a like. Mr. George Baker is married to Mrs. Baker and she makes Mr. George a lunch every day. When Mr. George Baker and Harry get on the bus in the morning time everyone wants Mr. George to sit beside them because Mr. George is a famous drummer. Although every morning Mr. George Baker sits next to Harry, Mr. George Baker class is even down the hall from Harry's. They are both learning how to read, Mr. George Baker says with the time and practice it will come easily.


I would use this book in my classroom to show my students that there are even some grown ups that do not know how to read and write. I would allow them to make up their own store about a grown up that have encourage them to do something that may have been hard from them. We could even use this book in math class, allowing the students to tell me how they would teach a lesson to someone who has never learned it.