Summary: Officer Buckle is passionate about teaching the students at Napville Elementary School about safety and has been giving safety presentations for a long time. Unfortunately, the students are not as passionate about safety. The accidents continue to increase at the school while the students nod off during his presentations. Officer Buckle thinks the students will pay better attention if he has his police dog, Gloria, up on stage with him. Much to his surprise, the students all begin to pay better attention and the accident rates decrease in the school. It isn’t until Officer Buckle watches news footage of his presentation that he realizes that Gloria is standing behind him acting out the safety tips. He becomes disheartened and thinks it would be best if Gloria takes over giving the presentations. Gloria’s presentation is disastrous and the worst accident ever takes place at the school. This 1996 Caldecott Medal winning book by Peggy Rathmann is a great lesson in teamwork that includes a great mixture of humor.
Qualitative Reading Analysis: According to the Qualitative Measures of Text Complexity Rubric, overall, this book can be categorized as a text that is comfortable or builds background, fluency, and skill. Density and complexity is the first area of evaluation in the levels of meaning and purpose. The meaning is explicitly stated and there is a limited use of figurative language. The purpose of the text is easily identified based on the context of the book.
The structure is comfortable for the reader. The text is consistent with the rules of the genre, humorous picture book. It is well organized and is told in a chronological order to the story. The narration is told in the third-person and little is hidden from the reader. The text features a black font on a white background that is large and easy to read. Italicized and words that are all capitalized are used to show emphasis, such as the safety rules. When the biggest accident occurs, word with different size fonts in all caps are used as well as sentences that are arched. Thank you notes from the students to Officer Buckle and Gloria are in a font that looks like handwriting. The illustrations are collorful, whimsical drawings.
When looking at the language conventionality and clarity of the text, there were no variations in the standard English and would closely adhere to the reader’s linguistic base. The register was casual and familiar.
The knowledge demands are comfortable and needs no background knowledge or prior knowledge. Most readers will be familiar with school assemblies and special guest speakers. The vocabulary knowledge would be common to the reader.
Genre and/or Subject Area: Humor, Reading
Reading Level/Interest Level: Lexile RL: 510L , Accelerated Reader RL: 3.4 , Reading Counts RL: 2.5 /Grades K-3
CCSS Reading Standards for Literature K-5:
1. Read closely to determine what the text says explicitly and to make logical inferences from it; cite specific textual evidence when writing or speaking to support conclusions drawn from the text.
2. Determine central ideas or themes of a text and analyze their development; summarize the key supporting details and ideas.
3. Analyze how and why individuals, events, and ideas develop and interact over the course of a text.
4. Interpret words and phrases as they are used in a text, including determining technical, connotative, and figurative meanings, and analyze how specific word choices shape meaning or tone.
5. Analyze the structure of texts, including how specific sentences, paragraphs, and larger portions of the text (e.g., a section, chapter, scene, or stanza) relate to each other and the whole.
6. Assess how point of view or purpose shapes the content and style of a text.
Recommendations/Curriculum Suggestions: When discussing safety, this would be a wonderful and humorous resource.
Links Supporting Digital Content: Peggy Rathman http://www.peggyrathmann.com, Peggy Rathman http://kids.librarypoint.org, Meet The Author/Illustrator: Peggy Rathman http://www.eduplace.com
Awards: Caldecott Medal Winner
Bibliographic Information: Rathman, P. (1995), Officer Buckle And Gloria, New York: Putnam’s
mkennedyreads 