The Gruffalo Book and Film Adaptation: A Review

The Gruffalo - The Book

I believe I've mentioned before that The Gruffalo, by Julia Donaldson is one of our favorite children's books. It is available in both paperback and hardback, but my favorite version is a non-abridged board book. It is durable for multiple readings with small children.

The story is about a mouse taking a walk through the woods who uses his wits to convince three predators (fox, owl, and snake) to let him go or risk the wrath of his friend the "gruffalo". The gruffalo, the mouse believes, is a creature entirely of his own imagination so he is surprised to encounter a real gruffalo later in the book. The gruffalo is also looking to make a snack of the mouse and the mouse uses his wits again to outsmart the gruffalo.

The story is written in rhyme and is a lot of fun to read out loud. The story begins and ends peacefully with a happy mouse walking alone in the woods. It is a great read and I highly recommend it.

The Gruffalo - The Move Adaptation

I seriously cannot think of a better adaptation of children literature. This 30 minute film is extraordinary. The animation is exquisite. The voice actors are perfect. The writers that did the adaptation worked magic. Everything in the original story is there and yet they added so many layers. Through a combination of good writing, animated facial expressions, and outstanding voice acting you can actually see the mouse coming up with his story to the fox including how he comes up with the name "gruffalo" for his imaginary monster. And that is just one tiny example of what this film adaptation does to enrich the book. I put it on for the children and they were entranced for the full show through the end of the credits. My husband wandered in from the kitchen and sat with us through the entire showing because it was just that good.

The only caveat I have is that is might be scary for the youngest or more timid viewers. The predators are a little scary as is the gruffalo. Overall though, the film comes no where close to crossing any lines there, but I felt I should mention it. My kids were scared a little, but in the good way.

Seriously, this was absolutely the best adaptation of a picture book I have ever seen. I honestly think that it might be better than the book and that feels a bit like sacrilege to say out loud. You can pick this short film up for less than $8 on Amazon. It would be a crime to miss out at that price. You can get the board book and the movie for a little less than $15.

The Gruffalo - The Extras

Go to www.gruffalo.com for a nice set of online games. There are also 13 free downloadable printables to go along with the story (mixed in with printables for other stories by the same author). These are great activities to do with a young child at home, as a homeschooling literature activity, as a language activity in a speech room, or with an entire class in a school.

The combination of the book, film adaptation, and free online resources is pretty powerful.

Experimenting on Yourself - Never Recommended

Short Version:
I am going through some serious psychological withdrawal symptoms and some physical ones as well. This has made me uncharacteristically grumpy, rather depressed, and completely unable to focus. This is how you loyal readers have been granted with a whiny post rather than a brilliant and informative one. :-)

Long Version:
As you may know, if you actually make it down to the bottom of my Weekly Review posts, my husband and I have been trying for a healthy lifestyle upgrade in hopes of reversing the steady upward trend in our weights we've experienced since we got married. We've been tracking our activity levels (yea Fitbit - highly recommended) and calories in and we've both lost about 10 pounds in 12 or so weeks.

Then, on the recommendation of a coworker of my husband's, we read the book: Why We Get Fat by Gary Taubes. It is a very interesting read full of history and research summaries. I'm always disproportionately swayed by research. I'll give you a hint. This book essentially explains the science behind why an Atkins style low-carb diet works to help you lose weight, and helps with controlling blood sugar swings. We decided to try it.

Here's the problem. I love carbs. I like the sweet kind and the bread kind. I don't actually much like meat or fats (although I do love cheese). In fact, I would often substitute a small sugary item (hello mini ice cream cones) for a healthy snack during our previous 10 weeks of tracking calories under the assumption that 130 calories is 130 calories no matter what you're getting it from.

Nevertheless, we came up with a week's worth of breakfasts, lunches, dinners, and snacks that we were pretty excited about. After all, after 10 weeks of eating only 1200 calories a day, eating as much as I like of a subset of foods sounded kinda fun. We're all of 36 hours into our first week. Neither of us are happy campers. It is amazing how much I want something sweet even though I'm not actually hungry. It is amazing how little I've been able to focus today. I couldn't concentrate on the speech post I had planned. I didn't get any work on the s-blends resource I'm putting together. I usually enjoy those activities.

Someone tell me that you've tried this low-carb thing and that things get better. While I'm wishing, please tell me they get better sometime in the next 24-48 hours. Please?

Speech Rating Scale - Two Versions

You may or may not remember the Articulation Rating Scale I posted a few months back. I wanted a way to give children feedback on correcting distortions that showed progress even when they weren't getting the sound exactly correct. I came up with this:

Jenn (Crazy Speech World) came across that post and tried the rubric with the students in her school because the entire school was encouraging the use of self-assessment and rubrics with their students. She found the children really enjoyed using the scale, but her youngest students were overstimulated by the 5 point scale. So, she made a great simple version for her youngest kids. You can find the link to download it full-size in her post.

I really like the simple version and will be trying soon. Thanks Jenn!