Book Review - Love That Dog by Sharon Creech

Love That Dog is written as the poetry journal of elementary school student Jack.  It takes place over the course of a year as his class learns about poetry.  Every entry is a poem and most are free verse responses to poems or Jack's teacher Miss Strechberry. Other entries are Jack's poems inspired by ones they learned in class. Tying the majority of the entries together are poems about a dog, a blue car, and why Jack doesn't have a pet any more.

This book is a great introduction to poetry.  Some of the poems are short free verse responses, such as "I tried. Can't do it. Brain's empty."  Jack also writes poems in various styles, and excerpts from some of the poems mentioned in his class are included in the back of the book.

The content level of this book is appropriate for anyone in elementary school.  However, it does deal with the loss of a pet and some children might find this very upsetting.  The content also includes feelings of uncertainty and low confidence in regards to school work and deals with over coming these emotions.

 Creech's word choice is very simple, yet she portrays these rich emotions and experiences.  The reading level is about 2nd or 3rd grade. But with all the line breaks children should definitely be Fluent Readers if they're reading this book to themselves.  This book helps to develop the reading skills necessary for poetry.  Also we only read Jack's responses, but he references lessons and conversations with his teacher, and letters he receives from his idol Mr. Walter Dean Myers.  This helps children learn inference, which is the use of deductive reasoning to draw a conclusion.

Love That Dog has won the Christopher Award, the Mitten Award (Michigan), and Claudia Lewis Poetry Award. The story of Jack is continued in Hate That Cat, which I have not yet read. Sharon Creech is also famous for her YA novel Walk Two Moons.