Jillian Jiggs to the Rescue

by Phoebe Gilman

read aloud kindergarten, readability grade 2

Jillian Jiggs wakes up one night to find her little sister Rebecca crying. As Rebecca is being comforted she reveals to Jillian that she is afraid of monsters. To help her sister qualm her fears, Jillian and her friends make a monster machine and set off on a monster hunt! This wonderful book can help children deal with their fears as well as promote creative problem solving.

  1. Build a mini monster machine: About a week before doing this, ask kids to bring junk from home (toilet paper rolls, aluminum foil, lids, plastic containers, styrofoam meat trays, sandwich bags, string, little boxes, various paper scraps, etc.) Collect all of this junk in one big pile for the whole class to do. Let the class dig in and pick things that they would like to use and let them go at it. Have paints, markers, and construction paper also available for use also . You’ll probably need a half a day to do this since it generates a lot of excitement and mess to clean up, but it will be well worth it! You’ll be surprised at some of the creations your class comes up with.
  2. Draw a monster machine: If you had to capture a monster what kind of a trap would you build?, how would you attract monsters to your trap?, what kind of monsters would your monster machine catch? Draw a picture of it, keeping all of these questions in mind.