The Very Busy Spider
This book is best for:
- copying animal sounds
- sequencing
- simple narrative retell
Review
Early one morning, the very busy spider starts to spin her web on a fence post. One by one, the various farm animals try to distract her, yet the little spider doesn’t answer and keeps working diligently to finish her web. The spider’s web is embossed onto the page so children can follow it with their fingertips.
The Very Busy Spider is an engaging multi-sensory experience for children. The rhythmic and repetitive text make it fantastic for developing children’s language. Young children love copying the animal sounds and learning the names of all the farm animals. The simple narrative structure of this book means that it is a good choice for children who are beginning to learn how to retell stories.
See the list below for further speech and language targets in this book.
Book Details
Narrative Structure: Action Sequence
Story Plot: Repetitive Tale
Themes:
- animals - farm, insects/minibeasts, spiders, birds
- location - farm
- animal sounds
- diligence
Speech and Language Targets
Speech Sounds:
- /b/ - busy, baa-baa, bark, web
- /d/ - duck, cock-a-doodle-doo, didn't, spider
- /g/ - goat, pig, dog
- /h/ - horse, her
- /k/ - quack, cow, cat, duck, oink
- /l/ blends - fly
- /m/ - moo, maa-maa, mud, meaow, farm, swim
- /n/ - neigh, spinning
- /s/ blends - spider, spinning
- /w/ - web
- /z/ - busy
Grammar:
- adjectives (silky, pesty, beautiful)
- copula (was)
- negatives (didn't)
- subjective pronoun (she)
- possessive pronoun (her)
- present progressive tense (spinning)
- regular past tense
- action verbs (ride, chase, swim, eat, roll, jump)
Semantics:
- labelling
Questions:
- who
Concepts:
- temporal (morning)
Social-Emotional:
- initiating conversation
Narrative:
- traditional opening
- character description
- time
- setting
- sequencing
- dialogue
- direct character speech
Rhyme & Sound Awareness:
- copying sounds
Book Info
Published by Puffin Books in 1984 (ISBN: 9780141338323)